Happy New Years 2025! Before we get too far into the New Year I wanted to take time to share a testimony about Christmas and express my gratitude for other peoples generosity. 2024 had some really hard challenges for our family, and to be honest it's been some hard years. It's been difficult to find our way off the hard road and onto a more hopeful road. Yet the solid truth along the way is that alongside the hard there has always been good, actually really good things happening. When your heart falls into despair, good can happen all around you yet it hardly touches your soul. When you can return to the path of joy, the smallest gesture or laugh brings so much delight and awe in an awesome Creator. We all may experience seasons of both. Grief and loss is not a sign that you don't trust God, it is a sign that you have experienced hardship and were deeply impacted by it. The journey out of grief sometimes takes longer than it should. I have known this all too well, though I wish the last few years were different, I can not rewrite them now, but I can chose gratitude and joy for what is today and tomorrow as much as possible.
God has been very present in our difficult seasons, and He always sends believers across our path to lift our spirits and support us physically and emotionally. To the people that have shown up in our difficult times, thank you. To every practitioner and doctor that has tried their hardest along the way to make me feel better, thank you. To every person that has prayed for me and my family when we had no idea, thank you. To every well meaning soul that has crossed our path with encouragement, friendship and hope, thank you. Every prayer and every physical need met has ministered the love of God to our hearts, and is a constant reminder that God is tangible, present, answers prayers and never leaves us without love and support. In fact there is a scripture I read recently in the amplified from Hebrews 13:5 that says, "I will not in anyway fail you, nor give you up, nor leave you without support. I will not to any degree leave you helpless, nor forsake, nor let you down or relax my hold on you." I can admit that I definitely lost my firm trust in God, I began to feel the shaking of poor health and financial stress and children and so much disappointment just washed over my soul until I was not just shaken, I was shaky. I didn't remember scriptures like that that said I will never leave you without support. The amount of mental stress and energy expelled by me spinning my wheels could have been silenced by that one truth...had I believed it, let alone remembered it in my times of need.
Now back to this Christmas testimony. After some hard months, my capacity for anything other than basic survival was too much for this mama. The thought of Christmas barely even sounded fun or hopeful. Financially we weren't in a great place, and I had decided early on that I didn't want to expend any energy buying gifts with money I didn't have, or trying to sign my kids up for charity like I did last year. I quickly pushed it out of my mind, and just said maybe we will go volunteer somewhere on Christmas and teach the kids about those that have less than us. But my heart wasn't even in that idea, it was just a bandaid for my souls deep disappointment in myself, my year and my own abilities. Deep down I felt like a failure, a failure at life and especially a failure at motherhood. How did I let these lies paint my soul? Over a long period of time, thinking it over and over and feeling less than adequate while facing physical and mental illness. I could do way less than I was used to, and overtime this translated as I am less than. There are many scriptures to combat that lie, that translate as you are enough. The one that comes to mind is the infamous Psalm 139, "I am fearfully and wonderfully made." I see that as I am writing, I am actively trying to correct the lies I have believed at one time due to my circumstances. The truth is circumstances can't change the truth. So if you are in the hardest of hard seasons don't let your circumstances speak louder than the truth. Pick yourself back up and let the truth of the Word wash over you today.
So back to my story, early in December I got a call from my daughter's school and they simply said you can pick up your Christmas gifts on Saturday. Caught off guard, I said umm okay sounds good. They had sent a paper home a few weeks back inquiring about our families sizes and gift ideas. I didn't think much of it, and didn't ask or inquire further. I just filled the paper out and returned it to the school. They called me back a few minutes later and asked does your family need a tree? I said well yes, we weren't planning on getting one so I guess so. She said, okay great you can pick that up on Saturday as well. She then called a third time and asked if we wanted the tree pre-decorated or not? Wow, I was filled with a sense of joy and wonder. A whole Christmas supplied without any effort of my own. Saturday came around and I walked into the school. They asked who is your child and I told them Zara, they responded by saying Oh you're Zara's mom we have a lot for her. They proceeded to wheel out a double cart that was stacked with gifts and had a pre-lit beautifully decorated 7 and half foot tree waiting for us with an industrial tree storage bag. And two boxes of food with grocery store gift cards! Somehow they managed to fit everything in my CRV. It looked like Santas sleigh driving home. When we unpacked all the pre-wrapped gifts they had something for every family member. It was beautiful, it put joy and beauty and a hopeful expectation into our little apartment. We spent many nights just admiring the glow of the Christmas lights and wondering what were all these gifts. I just want to say thank you to Lockheed Elementary and for any organization and individual that contributed to making this Christmas special for us. It really was a labor of love and generosity and it meant a lot to our family. Also thank you for getting me noise-canceling headphones so I can get the occasional peace and quiet.
Just as a reminder of Gods abundance, when He shows up He always shows up with more than enough. He is not stingy, nor does He ever hold out on us even though we often hold out on Him. We hold out on praising Him, or thanking Him or even just recognizing that the reason we are breathing is because of Him. Our actions don't always determine His, thank God, no pun intended. He is much more loving than the best earthly father you could ever experience. I was in awe that I didn't even ask God to show up in our Christmas, I may have haphazardly said God take care of our Christmas with little to no heart behind it. And in His love and kindness He showed up not just for me, but for the little hearts that it truly mattered to, my children.
One night a friend of ours knocked on the door and said we have some gifts for your family and proceed to carry up multiple gifts for each family member causing the presents to spill out everywhere into the living room and onto the adjacent bench. As if that wasn't enough, yet another friend sent us home with more gifts just a few days before Christmas. The only thing left empty was our stockings and lo' and behold on Christmas Eve the kids papaw stayed the night and brought an abundance of stocking stuffers and yet more gifts for the kids to unwrap. We were ambushed by the God of more than enough. The God who wanted to clearly communicate through tangible means, I am the God of more than enough and my message over you is abundance.
I pretty much always want to be the one that supplied the stuff, figured out the plan, planned far enough ahead that everything came together, but that has not been my reality nor my ability for many years and it has left me feeling less than, but I know God is saying it's not on your shoulders. I didn't even design you to be your own provider. We were all designed with a need to rely on God. When you can't, He always can, and He is always willing. Don't lose hope whatever you have need of... and in the case of Christmas that was all above and beyond what we needed. God is more than willing to supply both needs and wants, not always when or how were want, but He always comes through. This Christmas was an invitation to 1 Peter 5:9, for us to cast all our anxiety on Him because He showed us that He truly cared for us.
I don't want to lose that remembrance in the seasons of silence or waiting or even loss or hardship. As I go into 2025 I want to carry with me two things, one, that God is always looking for ways to love me through other people if I'll let Him, and two that one of Gods names is Jehovah Jireh, the Lord will provide. Interestingly enough the word will is used in the meaning of Jireh. Will denotes future tense, this gives us the promise that whatever we fear or are worrying about God has already determined that He will provide. So you may look at your circumstance and say He hasn't provided yet, but His promise is stronger than the present, it is the assurance that when you get to where you need something, He will meet you there and provide. Do not fret be grateful when you cannot see and remember His goodness in the waiting. He is the God that always comes through.
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