2012...farewell...

   
Today we say goodbye to 2012. When I look back over the past few years, sometimes I shudder. Father mentioned in his sermon yesterday that it's a good thing God doesn't sit down with us ahead of time and give us the whole plan with all the little details. I for one know that I would bail out. If I were to have seen that "annual plan" of 2011, all the blessings would have faded as I saw "bury two babies" in big black type. How could we survive knowing what is to befall any of us? We couldn't. That's why only the very few, very holy are given the gift of foresight. The rest of us take it as it comes, bit by bit. We can't handle any more than that.

   Up until 2011, while bad things had happened (and they've happened to everyone), none of them came close to losing Innocent and Andrew. I had previously been able to turn my back on the bad and look to the future with some hope, knowing "things will get better". Last year, every time I looked to the future it was with sheer terror. Knowing some of the worst that can happen to you, I was terrified that there was more to come, right around the corner. I had to fight irrational fears that one of my children or my husband would be dead in the next 24 hours. I found myself mentally planning funerals. This sounds awful, but after two funerals in 8 months, anything seemed possible. Where were Father's good white vestments (to be buried in)? Who would take all the children if we both went? How do you keep breathing? Well, no one died in 2012. I didn't lose parents, siblings, nieces or nephews, husband or children. It just went to show me that things do not always continue to get worse.

   Now, looking ahead to 2013, I have to fight down fear again. And I really do mean have to. Fear must be fought. The evil one deals in fear. I will not put down all of my fears here in print. The evil one cannot read our minds [this was a surprise to me when I found out] but he can read over our shoulders and listen in on our conversations. The only place we are safe from that is in confession.

   I used to look at a new year and think of the "resolutions" everyone is trying to commit to. I used to make those too. "Lose weight", "read the Bible more", etc. I have very little confidence in my ability to on my own make plans like that and stick to them. Plus, I have bigger fish to fry.

   I am not looking ahead at the whole year. I'm not looking at half a year, or a month, or even a week. All I can work on is today. I have no assurance that I will be still in this life tomorrow. Why waste time fretting and frightening myself with morbid fantasies [my spiritual father said most people fantasize about good things...I do the opposite, lol] when I might not even be alive to see them happen or not? I'm not saying that I'm about to pop off. The odds that I'll still be around to write a post for the beginning of 2014 are pretty good. But something I've learned about in the last 2 years is how meaningless odds are. I've been on the "wrong side" of the odds too many times to count. I can't see into the future and things like odds are only useful (if they're useful at all) in retrospect.

   Something my spiritual father has told me is that the evil one wants us to live in either the past or the future, but not today. We can't go back and change the past and we can't go back to live there. We can't see into the future and worrying about it distracts us from today. We are saved today, not yesterday or tomorrow.

   So, I guess if I had to make a resolution, it would be to live today. But I only make that resolution for today, not tomorrow.

   Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble. [Matt 6:25-34]