Twenty twenty-four

December 31, 2024

This was a very challenging year. Looking for a new opportunity dominated the year after my last job ended. I experienced a lot of the normal ups and downs that unemployment entails and struggled at times to live with the uncertainty. It took me a while to hit my stride and learn how to play the job search game.

But with the challenges of the job search have also come a lot of unexpected blessings. I stand here today with a much stronger faith than I had nine months ago. That faith has been forged by the waiting process. And been forged by the many prayer conversations with God as I walked around my neighborhood. Not only were the walks good for my physical health but also for my spiritual and emotional health as I processed the many hard emotions that come with the situation.

Another blessing was the opportunity to travel back to Hungary this year. I enjoyed seeing familiar sites, tasting foods that I have missed, and recounting past experiences with my son as walked the streets of Budapest. I savored the time reconnecting with old friends–remembering our times together in the past as well as catching up with where they are now. I visited Barcelona for the first time and got to experience the city that my son called home for a semester. I relished my time at the Sagrada Família and Casa Batlló. It was such a blessing to make new memories and bond with my son over the course of ten days in two different countries.

Other friendships were renewed this year as several men from different chapters of my life prayed for me and walked through this journey at my side. Their emails encouraged me and helped me to remember that I was not alone. I also saw newer friendships grow as those men prayed with me, for me, and did their best to care for and encourage me.

It was a year of necessary endings. And a year of new beginnings. My oldest daughter started a new job that she loves. It is a job that has given her an opportunity to shine through her unique skills and talents. My youngest daughter started college in the fall and has thrived in new friendships and experiences. I enjoyed getting to see her act in her first college production in October.

This is not the year that I would have chose. It has been painful at times. There were some very dark days where I struggled to not get buried in discouragement and fear and to not lose hope. It has been disorienting. It has been frustrating. But it has also been filled with a lot of rich experiences–made all the richer because of the hardship I have been called to endure.

It is not the year that I would have chosen. But I am incredibly grateful for it and wouldn’t trade it. God has shown up for me in ways that leave me speechless. He constantly met me through many desparate prayers and gave me the strength to hold onto faith, to tie my shoe, and to press on. The blessings outweigh the negative. And I am a stronger person in so many ways than I was when the year started.

I have not yet reached the destination. I continue to move forward believing that the right opportunity is out there. I hope to find it soon.

There are two songs that have been very meaningful. Their words encourage me, challenge me, and have helped me to keep a right perspective as I have walked through these challenging days.

His Glory and My Good (CityAlight)

Verse 1
I have seen my Father’s glory
Revealed in Jesus Christ
And the more that I behold Him
The more He satisfies

When I gaze upon His beauty
When I see Him as I should
Then my eyes are lifted upward
For His glory and my good

Verse 2
There is hope in every trial
For I can trust the Lord
He will turn my heart towards Him
And help me bear the thorn

So in faith I follow Jesus
On the road not understood
For I know that He is working
For His glory and my good

Chorus
To our God be the glory
To our God be praise
He alone, the name above all names

I will boast ever only in the Lord my God
For I know
His glory is my good

Verse 3
See the open arms of Jesus
Upon the cross that day
What they understood as weakness
Deserves my every praise

For the charge that was against me
It was nailed into the wood
Yes I know that He has saved me
For His glory and my good

Verse 4
Would I gladly be made nothing
That Christ would be made more
Would I seek the only kingdom
That far outweighs them all

I will stand before my Father
Where the faithful saints have stood
And with joy my heart shall praise Him
For His glory and my good

Whate’er My God Ordains is Right – Hymn from 17th Century

Whate’er my God ordains is right:
his holy will abideth;
I will be still, whate’er he doth,
and follow where he guideth.
He is my God; though dark my road,
he holds me that I shall not fall:
wherefore to him I leave it all.

Whate’er my God ordains is right:
he never will deceive me;
he leads me by the proper path;
I know he will not leave me.
I take, content, what he hath sent;
his hand can turn my griefs away,
and patiently I wait his day.

Whate’er my God ordains is right:
though now this cup, in drinking,
may bitter seem to my faint heart,
I take it, all unshrinking.
My God is true; each morn anew
sweet comfort yet shall fill my heart,
and pain and sorrow shall depart.

Whate’er my God ordains is right:
here shall my stand be taken;
though sorrow, need, or death be mine,
yet am I not forsaken.
My Father’s care is round me there;
he holds me that I shall not fall:
and so to him I leave it all.

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