Happy New Year from Sadie Speaks!
I can get easily distracted. My inbox fills more and more often with funny memes about adult-onset ADHD. These reels hail from two of my daughters (as if they should talk) who, rather convincingly, want to give me a provable reason for my distractibility. Though humored, I think my scattered brain has more to do with self-sabotage than anything else. "Your focus needs more focus" as Mr. Han from the 2010 Karate Kid remake would say.
I can get easily overwhelmed by regrets. This feels less funny when I rehearse my past failures and sit in a sort of entitled place of depression about the what ifs, if onlys and truly regrettable decisions of my former self. This has been my way of bringing in the new year for quite some time now. Ruminating over regrets and sitting in a stagnant paralysis, I think my self-pity has more to do with perfectionism than anything else.
"Your sadnesses, sorrows and imperfections are forgiven" as the Scriptures would say.
I can get easily disconnected from the people and the values I cherish the most. Call it by anything you want to call it, but 'life' has a way of being busy, loud and demanding. All the while, 'it' lulls us and tempts us into offering the best of ourselves to tiny screens and influencing strangers instead of the family and friends among us. We have touch screens and the people we love go untouched. Culture and its wars don't just want some of our attention, they want all of our being. I think that my disconnectedness has more to do with lazy neglect than anything else. "This one thing I do..." as the Apostle Paul would say with resounding clarity.
But this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. Philippians 3:13-14 (N)KJV
It is with these thoughts that I brought in the new year of 2024.
I wanted an anthem. I wanted this year to move with purpose. I wanted a good and important calling deeper and higher than how many times I got a good score on Wordle or how many touchdown passes Jordan Love threw. Besides having an anthem, a word--more goals and resolutions, I wanted action verbs to characterize this turnover of season. I wanted to plant in the cold winter of the New Year bulbs that will bloom and bear fruit every year.
And so, this poem was born. Maybe it will give voice to the cry of your heart, too. Maybe it will remind you that God is the God of new years, new lives, new wine and always, new mercies.
Let's do important things, together.
This Year,
Let me do important things
Single-mindedly,
But not singlehandedly
Focused,
But not with blinders on
Connected,
But not hooked at the hip
Worthy of glory,
But not taking it for myself
Instead,
Let me do the Lord’s good work
Prepared in advance for me to do
With verbs of perseverance,
Diligence,
Faithful patience,
And loving kindness
Moving with His Spirit
For where He leads
There, I’ll follow
Each movement of my life
Given back to Him.
The dark and dissonant tones
that cry and hum sad lyrics;
The bright and vibrant chords
that sing harmony and resonance;
The long legato of waiting...
The short staccato of a hundred prayers per minute
The metronome, God
Pulsing out His orchestral score
The songs of praise,
The anthems of healing,
Singing, until the masterpiece is rendered;
The poem, finis
The resolutions, resolved
A leg in the journey of faith, completed
Moving forward day by day
Forgetting what’s behind
and pressing on toward the prize,
The Savior’s calling.
A living sacrifice, a holy temple,
A renewed mind.
For in Him
We live
We move
We have our being.
Welcome, new year.
God of every new year,
New mercies, new lives, new wine-
Let me do important things.
CJZ
4Sadie
1.19.24
4pm
Inspiration:
Ephesians 2:10
For we are His workmanship (masterpiece; poeme)
created in Christ Jesus for good works,
which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.
1 Corinthians 13
Love is patient; love is kind.
2 Peter 1:5-8
But also for this very reason, giving all diligence,
add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control,
to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness,
to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love.
For if these things are yours and abound,
you will be neither barren nor unfruitful
in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Romans 12:1-2
Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God,
to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God,
which is your spiritual service of worship.
And do not be conformed to this world,
but be transformed by the renewing of your mind,
so that you may prove what the will of God is,
that which is good and acceptable and perfect.