A New Year

What did your New Year's Eve look like? I'm curious.

My last night of 2009 was spent watching Beverly Hills Ninja and Terminator 3 with James, his roommate Jake and a bunch of guys. Around 11 pm James and I ventured up to the hill in Northwest Reno that overlooks downtown (aka the property off Leadership Parkway) and watched the fireworks with hot cocoa in hand, glow in the dark necklaces, hats and blow horns that didn't really blow.

The full moon glistened off the snow in the dark night air and James and I enjoyed some good conversations with the lights of downtown Reno in the distance. He's a good man for wearing his glow necklace and celebrating full flare, wearing hat and all! It was a fabulous New Year's Eve.

Today my mom and I are going to Dillards to meet my sister and find some really good bargains. Apparently there is a half off the half off sales from Christmas, which translates into $5 shirts. We'll see. The rumor was that lucky jeans were purchased there last year for as little as $15. Sounds too good to be true!

After my mom and I run a few errands, most likely I'll come back to unwind and unpack from Sacramento. Most of my new years day will be spent reading, praying, organizing, and cleaning.

I always love the beginning of a new year. It's like getting a fresh test in high school with no erase marks, and no answers filled in. OK maybe that's not the most exciting example. But you get the picture, a clean slate. Nothings been written, nothings been done. Maybe that's why so many people make resolutions because they want to redirect and rewrite parts of their life that need adjustment. I don't know but for me I process a new year through by looking to my maker in the midst of it and extending my heart to him, asking and desiring his thoughts, his desires and his dreams as I step into a new year.

This morning I read a devotional by Charles Spurgeon in the Morning and Evening Devotional. Here's what it said. What is sackbut? camphire? spikenard? - Old English of which I have no idea!!! Sounds mysteriously peculiar to me. And yet my heart resonates with the rest of this devo. Basically, rejoice in Him. Open up this new year with songs and sounds of praise and thanksgiving! Even if things have been bitter in 2009, there's a sweet treasure in our relationship with the living God!


"Evening...

Song of Solomon 1:4
We will be glad and rejoice in Thee.

We will be glad and rejoice in Thee. We will not open the gates of the year to the dolorous notes of the sackbut, but to the sweet strains of the harp of joy, and the high sounding cymbals of gladness. "O come, let us sing unto the Lord: let us make a joyful noise unto the rock of our salvation." We, the called and faithful and chosen, we will drive away our griefs, and set up our banners of confidence in the name of God. Let others lament over their troubles, we who have the sweetening tree to cast into Marah's bitter pool, with joy will magnify the Lord. Eternal Spirit, our effectual Comforter, we who are the temples in which Thou dwellest, will never cease from adoring and blessing the name of Jesus. We WILL, we are resolved about it, Jesus must have the crown of our heart's delight; we will not dishonour our Bridegroom by mourning in His presence. We are ordained to be the minstrels of the skies, let us rehearse our everlasting anthem before we sing it in the halls of the New Jerusalem. We will BE GLAD AND REJOICE: two words with one sense, double joy, blessedness upon blessedness. Need there be any limit to our rejoicing in the Lord even now? Do not men of grace find their Lord to be camphire and spikenard, calamus and cinnamon even now, and what better fragrance have they in heaven itself? We will be glad and rejoice IN THEE. That last word is the meat in the dish, the kernel of the nut, the soul of the text. What heavens are laid up in Jesus! What rivers of infinite bliss have their source, ay, and every drop of their fulness in Him! Since, O sweet Lord Jesus, Thou art the present portion of Thy people, favour us this year with such a sense of Thy preciousness, that from its first to its last day we may be glad and rejoice in Thee. Let January open with joy in the Lord, and December close with gladness in Jesus."

I'm excited to see what this year has in store and I will rejoice in knowing one thing that is forever unchanging. He is Immanuel, God with us!!

Happy New Year To All!! =))