New Year/new mercies (we hope)

We have reached the end of 2016. It seems like many found this past twelve month period unusually difficult. Think of Syrian refugees, beloved celebrity deaths,  world-shocking political upheavals. I personally have friends suffering from soul-shattering health crises and even more in spiritual crisis, wondering where God is in the midst of this.

As do many, I both look back and look forward at the calendar change. It is time to clean out files, drawers, and closets in preparation for the new year. I look for ways to catch up with people I’ve neglected.

On my computer, I start a new file folder labeled with the year number. So folder “2017 files” has been created. It will soon fill with my writings, messages, articles I particularly like, spreadsheets, bank statements, family notes, photos, correspondence, and other life markings.

That folder marks a fresh start with work. But there is a far greater fresh start before me. The turning of the calendar reminds me of one of my favorite scriptures, Lamentations 3:22-23. Here I read that God’s mercies “are new every morning.”

For me, the changing of the calendar says, “acknowledge those daily new mercies.” Learning to do that seems far more important than some “make myself better than ever” type resolutions, especially the “exercise more and lose weight” ones.

Six practices that block new mercies

Over the years, I have identified six practices that block my awareness of God’s mercies. When I pay attention to these things, I am far more able to see God’s daily given mercies. Seeing and experiencing them permits me to enjoy a free and light soul.

Even more importantly, I am free to pass them on to others. I offer these to you at this year end:

Number one: Lay down the idea that gifts always come with strings or unwanted expectations. Learn to receive the gifts given by God and others with thankfulness and without suspicion. Should there be a string attached, that is the giver’s problem, not yours, not mine.

Receive simply. Give simply.

Number two: Refuse to permit other people to make important choices for me. Let us live with courage, integrity and out of well-formed character despite the actions, words and responses of others.

Too often I hear phrases that sound something like, “I can’t do that [be obedient to God, be truthful, live generously, say a strong “no” to injustice, etc.] because someone else will [not like it, get mad at me, not respond the way I want them to, etc.].”  Those words indicate that others make vital choices for us.

Those are death decisions. Choose life. Own your soul and your actions. Blame no one.

Number three: Relinquish forever any idea that we may find security in any human institution including church, family, economics and politics. It won’t happen. When the primary driver of life is to be secure, we immediately move to the worship of money and things. We also become resistant to God, to change and the needs of others. Fear shuts us down.

Number four: Quit insisting that you or I occupy the center of the universe and that God stands ready to do our bidding. I am not the center. You are not the center.  God is not our celestial vending machine. Those attitudes are appropriate only for the tiniest of babies, not for mature adults.

Number five: Leave behind the fallacy that if we understand enough about why something happens, we can find meaning in random events. Do not give up intellectual curiosity or scientific endeavor. But recognize that there will always be a mystery beyond our collective ability to comprehend. That mystery will also always be much bigger than our ability to grasp it or make complete sense of it. Learn to appreciate the wildness of mystery rather insist on domesticating or taming it.

Number six: Acknowledge our fear of innocence and our truly human vulnerability to being hurt by others. Leave behind cynicism. Look at our fears face to face and seek to love those fears and change them into trust. Practice believing that that goodness does permeate a cosmos held together by a good God. While we have to stop insisting that we are the center of the universe, we still do well by finding again the child within that enjoys intrinsic trust in an ever-present God who does very much love us.

Thank you!

Thanks for reading what I write. Please send me more fascinating and complicated questions for “Ask the Thoughtful Pastor.” May 2017 be full of new mercies for you and all those around you.

[Note: a version of this column is scheduled to run in the Dec 29, 2016, edition of the Denton Record-Chronicle. The Thoughtful Pastor, AKA Christy Thomas, welcomes all questions for the column. Although the questioner will not be identified, I do need a name and verifiable contact information in case the newspaper editor has need of it. You may use this link to email questions.]