I get very pensive every January. I have trained my spirit to fast and pray at the beginning of every new year. The church that groomed me for ministry always provided women's retreats the first week of the new year. I miss those days. I found it easy to hear God speak to me when I was sequestered away like that. While I don't always get a yearly retreat, I still petition the Almighty for fresh wisdom and direction for me and my family as we begin another year.
I don't know if you do this too, but if you don't, let me make a suggestion. Take a good hard look at your life. Take inventory. Perform an evaluation. Is there anything from 2010 that you don't want to carry into 2011? It could be anything, spiritual or natural. Is something nagging at you, disturbing your peace, weighing you down? Then maybe you need to subtract some stuff. Lay something down. Let something go. Leave something behind.
Or, is there something new that you feel like God is calling you toward? Maybe you need to add something to your life this year. If it's something that you feel completely unfamiliar with, I assure you, I can relate. When I was sixteen years old, I knew God was calling me to worship dance ministry. This was back in the 1980s, when dance in the church was not a common form of worship. In fact, I had never heard of it before. Since I'd never seen it before, with my eyes, I could not figure out how in the world this was going to happen. I felt like Noah, building an ark because God said to, but having never seen rain. However, my spirit could see it happening and I trusted God to do His thing. I took the first step (pun intended). I signed up for dance classes. That was all it took. God took over from there. Within four months, I had mastered the basics of ballet. Within six months, I was dancing in pointe shoes. Within nine months, I was a student in a bible college that welcomed me into their dance ministry (oh, they do exist!). Within one year, I was dancing on a team. After fifteen months of that original calling, I was ministering worship dances and introducing a new form of worship to churches in Georgia, Alabama, and Florida. After an eight-year hiatus to get married and birth children, I was directing my own dance teams. Two years after that I was teaching dance conferences. Another year later, I was teaching Christ-centered ballet classes in the community and holding recitals where people got saved. All it took was me being willing to say "yes" and let God add something beautiful and powerful to my life.
I hope that encourages somebody. As you have been reading, has something popped into your mind? Talk to God about it. Take the steps to make it happen. Whether it's overcoming an addiction, mending a relationship, or serving God in a new, unfamiliar way, let me encourage you to go for it! Do the math. Finish the equations that God is writing on your heart. Add or subtract as needed.
And may the end of your 2011 feel amazing.
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