Happy New Year!

There's a special tradition that started for me New Year's Eve of 2006.  At the time I was really struggling with letting the past go, really to the point of paralyzing me from moving forward with my life.  It reminds me of one of my favorite quotes in the movie Ratatouille; Chef Gusteau tells Remy the rat, "If you focus on what you have left behind, you will never be able to see what lies ahead!"  Yeah, profound.  I'm sure that New Year's Eve of 2006 I was pouring out my heart to God in prayer.  I don't know how it came to me, but I felt that God used Philippians 3:13-14 to comfort me: "... one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus."  It was the verse I went back to throughout the year to encourage myself not to be emotionally chained to the things of the past and to keep pressing forward.  It was such a sweet memory that I've carried on the tradition every New Year's Eve since then.  I figure since God knows the future, He knows what I'll need to help get myself through the year.  So as the New Year approaches, I start praying that God will give me that prophetic verse that will aid in keeping me sure-footed through the different seasons the upcoming days, weeks, and months will bring.  This year, through my regular reading through the Psalms, this one stood out to me as my New Year's verse for 2012:

"You crown the year with Your goodness, and Your paths drip with abundance" (Psalm 65:11).

It's such a special reminder, as I flip through my Bible, to see the New Year's verses that have been marked in past years.  And as I read recently, "O God, You have taught me from my youth, and to this day I declare Your wondrous works" (Psalm 71:17).

I truly do wish you all well in 2012!  Here's to hope for a new start and grace to get you through to the end!