Year of Tears

Wednesday, December 31, 2008

I've officially decided. 2009 is going to be my Year of Tears.
Does that sound pessimistic of me? I don't mean it to, and I actually feel rather positive and hopeful about it at the moment. For one thing, I know I can succeed at crying alot this year...(chuckling now).
You see, I've spent this morning, this last day of 2008 trying to decide how best to face 2009. I somehow can't bring myself to do the whole, "it's a grand new beginning" thing. Not again. I don't have the heart to make hopeful goals about a year that is shrouded in more darkness and unknowns than I can ever remember facing before. I'd like to say it's going to be the Year of Hope, but i said that in 2007. I did learn to hope that year...still hoping...in the same unfulfilled promises. In 2008 I believed God was going to teach me about Joy. The Year of Joy. Still hoping for that too :-) I'm beginning to learn, but Joy still eludes me all too often. So as I look ahead to 2009, I don't have any grand expectations about God's work in my life...except for this.

I cried again today at the feelings of hopelessness and joylessness and aloneness that I have to fight off everyday still. I get so frustrated that I have to fight so hard and the tears just come unbidden. But as I sat with my head in my hands, drops tumbling off the tip of my nose, a thought popped in my head. A verse actually. Psalm 126:6 "He who goes out weeping, carrying seed to sow, will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with him." I've gotten good at weeping and it has occurred to me at other times that perhaps my tears are watering seed, somehow, somewhere. I remember that there is something in scripture about God storing up our tears...and I can't find it right this second so help me out if you know where it is, but it gives you the feeling that he values our tears somehow, saves them up. I must have an ocean somewhere. Maybe it's useful. Maybe.

So I realize that I do have plenty of sowing to do in the year to come. That's part of what I feel so discouraged about today. We'll be helping to start a new church plant in the weeks to come, having seen the final deeply painful demise of the beautiful work we put our hands, shoulders, hearts into a mere 5 years ago. It's hard today to feel energetic about doing it all over again from scratch...less than scratch, in many ways. But we do both believe this is where our dear Lord wants us, for better or worse and so...we have work to do. Sowing work. Hard work. I feel overwhelmed, and then I think, "but I am going out with seeds to sow, and golly...I am so good at crying!!!" And so I've decided. 2009 is going to be my Year of Tears. I will cry gladly, because I go out carrying seeds to sow and the promise says that if I sow them in tears, I reap them in joy. Everytime it gets hard and frustrating enough to turn the tears on, I'll remember the seeds that I'm sowing. Everytime I feel that rejection and loss so sharply that I weep all over again, I'll remember the seeds that I'm sowing and be glad for the tears.

That's how I'll spend my 2009. It feels nice to know I'll be good at it.
I'll be investing in some waterproof mascara. Anyone know of a good one?