Lessons Learned This Past Year

It’s time to grab yourself a brew and buckle up because this one’s a long one!!!

For the past two years, the word trust has been coming up for me in various guises namely through the Bible.  In the last few months of 2021, it was the word hope.

It started with a journaling session that we did at work at Church on Romans 15:13.

 “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.”

We had to write a word or a phrase that spoke to us. I got hope, overflow with hope, God of hope. Then we asked why this word or phrase was speaking to me.

I wrote; It’s been a time of lack or drought for me but my time is coming he is always working for me and in me

Then we asked what he wanted to say to me about this word or phrase and I got ‘you’ve never had hope you’ve always felt a lack.

But I am here to tell you you are the world's hope.

People look to you and see it can get better and that they will be okay.

You are my hope.’

Then a couple of times in my morning devotion while listening to The Messy Masterpiece (now renamed Mornings With The Masters) with Tori & Chad hope came up again a couple of times.

On Tuesday, November 30 the devotion that they were doing this from Psalm 39:7 “and, so Lord, where do I put my hope?

My only hope is in you.”

Then in my quiet journalling time after listening to the devotion I wrote ‘hope when it seems scary’.

On that Tuesday there had been 40 new variant Covid cases announced in the UK and it would be a few weeks until the scientists and specialists knew how the new variant impacts the effectiveness of the current vaccine and how serious the new variant may be.

So hope when it seems scary at that point is a very poignant thing to have written. My family and I, like many others, had planned to be able to spend Christmas together in 2021 for the first time since 2019. But with my mum being classed as vulnerable, the plans changed last minute to do our best to keep her safe.

On Thursday, December 2 The Messy Masterpiece Podcast devotion was on Lamentations 3:6 ‘so it is good to wait quietly for salvation from the Lord.’

Even though it’s difficult to see if God works in the waiting. The waiting isn’t wasted even though it feels like it is being wasted. He is working for us in us and through us. We have to trust in him in those moments of apparent abandonment from him. So again hope in the waiting.

It feels like he’s preparing me for something although obviously, I’ve no idea what.  Trust used to be the word that would come up for me so many times I feel I’ve conquered that a lot more this past year and past few months. I put in my trust in him daily and made a concerted effort to put my trust in him to switch my mindset to trust him to know that he has my best interests at heart.

2019 was the start of putting scaffolding up and to bring me back to him while 2020 was deconstructing all the old beliefs to the foundations and then strengthening those foundations and starting to rebuild the first layer of the new beliefs in the blocks starting from the corners like when a house is built of bricks, the builders start with the corners, let those cure and then they build the wall up in between those corners.

On Thursday, December 2 I was doing a journaling session with the church and the following came up as we were reviewing the past year. 

‘The past year or two has been rebuilding new beliefs about my truth of who he says I am. I’m his beloved daughter who he chose, he picked me specifically, he created me specifically.  He is leading me and guiding me towards the purpose that He has designed for me.’

Then I got Jeremiah 29:1; “For I know the plans I have for you. “Declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”

Again that word ‘hope’.

On Friday, December 3 listening again to the messy masterpiece podcast devotion that they’ve been doing, again the word hope came up for me. “Though accusations fly and the enemy assaults your thoughts, though people try to cut you down and drag your name through the mud – your hope is in the one who fights for you.”

For clarification, I googled what hope means. It means to cherish a desire with anticipation, do you want something to happen? It's a feeling of optimism or a desire that something will happen. I have no idea what hope is about in my life at the moment, but I’m excited to see what He has for me.

In my journal time that morning, I wrote from the devotion about “your hope is in the one who fights for you. I wrote; ‘maybe God is changing tactics because maybe I’m struggling with trust still he’s switching it up on me. Am I still struggling to trust in him? I don’t think I am. I think my trust in him has gotten much better the last few months. Playing worship songs that pop in my head in the morning as I get ready for work.

‘Put my workday in his hands.

‘Even a week ago I had very little sales. By Saturday I barely made a dent in my target for the week, I had a comeback on Thursday and that was all my sales that week, till Saturday. There may have been some on Friday but I can’t remember. But then Saturday was my last sales day of the week. I did some really good sales and was very close to my target for the week.

‘So by trusting in the Lord even on those days where there weren’t any sales when no one was close to buying, he comforted me in the knowledge by my trust in him that things will be okay that he has me that he is working in front of me to clear a path for me.’

Sunday, December 4 The Messy Masterpiece podcast is based on Psalm 46:10-11;

And the devotion said as part of it; be still.

A time of stillness as we wait in hope for the Lord.

Hope again. That word is coming up for me repeatedly daily, every other day, and I have no idea what it means at this point.

But I am trusting in Him that He knows because He does know what it means.

While I was journaling that morning I think that he is now teaching me hope because I don’t think I’ve had it for many many years. I can’t remember the last time I felt hope. I’m used to hoping for a better year after a low or bad year but often it never felt like that following year was any better.

But after being pursued by God in 2019 each year the past few years have gotten better for me. I know it sounds strange to say it but it’s true.

2020 was the year that never was for the world, but it was also the year where I had 11 weeks alone to focus solely on my trauma and therapy. For 24/7 I could focus on myself without needing to consider having to go to work or worrying I’d bother my housemate because he was away at his girlfriend’s. I’ve never had that luxury before.

That, along with my church community and their prayers along with mine for myself, 2020 was one of my best years yet, or for a long while at least!

Then in 2021 beginning it in a four-month lockdown and during that time losing a job that I thought I would be forever tethered to. But that’s where I really started to trust God, I had to because I had no idea what was going to happen.

I had no idea what to do where to go anything. So daily I put my trust in the Lord that he has my back that he is working for me ahead of me to prepare the way to have amazing blessings.

He kept reassuring me that things would be okay and to trust him whenever I faulted from my moments of trusting in him. Whenever I started to feel scared or worried he reassured me that he was there with me so that’s where I began to fully trust in him in the early months of that year during the job uncertainty. There was also a few weeks after I graduated from my training from my new job where I wasn’t hitting my targets I was worried about my job again thinking that I would be let go that I would get into trouble, which just caused my anxiety to skyrocket. But He reminded me again to trust in Him because I’d forgotten about doing that daily. I had been trying to control things on my own again that weren't mine to control.

Now in the morning, I make more of an effort of a daily practise or habit to put my trust in him, especially on a workday.  Whenever wake up singing a workshop song in my head, I then play that song as I’m getting ready for my day.  I then let the playlist pick which songs I need to hear that day.  It’s a new part of my morning routine that I am loving!!!

I feel that I have so much more to say about what He is teaching me but this post is already the longest one I have ever written, and I am also still downloading what He wants me to know.  

There’s patience and empathy alongside the trust and hope that He is currently teaching me.  

I’d love to chat with you about what He is currently teaching you, comment down below so we can start a conversation around it.