Happy New Year, friends! Here we are at the close of yet another year…365 days have passed since we last said those words to each other. What has happened in that amount of time? All kinds of things, probably. We set goals and met them. Some we missed. Some changed when we realized they weren't worth pursuing anyway. We may have made new friends and said goodbye to old ones. Gladness and grief. We might have moved from one chapter of life to another, faced down a scary diagnosis, or found a new sense of sustaining peace. Certainly we all weathered the never-ending changes of mood that move through our days like clouds crossing the sky.
There are so many experiences in a year's time that we truly can't remember them all—the smile of each barista, the waves of the mail workers, the little things that add kindness and joy to our days. We may struggle to recall now even the big problems that seemed so insurmountable this time last year: Can we even remember what they were? It all seemed so important in the moment, but as time and experience flow on, even the things we worried most over now cause barely more than a ripple in our memories.
But remembering to some degree is important, and what we remember even more so, because what we tell ourselves about what we've lived has something to do with how hopeful or discouraged we feel as we look toward the future. If we look back and see a year of disappointment and struggle and things that went wrong, we may find it hard to believe that something wildly better can happen in the new year. If we picture the high moments of 2023 and feel like it was a pretty good year, we're likely to feel more encouraged about what's coming. That's why hope is sometimes no more difficult than remembering that things can change. Because they have, and they do, and they will.
In his New York Times bestselling book, Thinking Fast and Slow, psychologist and economist Daniel Kahneman presented ideas based on research he and fellow scientists had done over more than 40 years on the way people think. His book suggests that we have two different thought systems going on in our minds—one fast and one slow—and we use both to make decisions and to understand our world. He also offers that based on these thinking systems we actually are a combination of two different selves—a remembering self and an experiencing self. The remembering self is the one that looks back over 2023 and tells the story of whether it was a good or bad year. The experiencing self is the one sitting here just now, breathing in and out, feeling the chair against our backs, reading these words on a screen. What we remember is mostly the work of the remembering self, Kahneman says, because the experiencing self doesn't create a story to remember.
Kahneman did a fascinating experiment to demonstrate the influence of the remembering self. The people who agreed to be part of the study were about to go through a routine but fairly uncomfortable medical procedure. In one group, the procedure was performed as it was normally; in the second group, the same process was followed, but the patient was allowed to rest for a few minutes at the end of the process. The staff took care to make sure the patient was comfortable. In the interviews that followed, the people who had been allowed to rest made comments like, "It wasn't that bad," and "I'm not sure why people complain so much about that." People in the first group did all the usual complaining. The research showed that those in the second group remembered things more favorably because of the rest period at the end, which colored their perception of the whole experience. The remembering self sums everything up based on a few select—and maybe not entirely correct—memories and then presents us with a story we rarely question. One thing is certain: Our experiencing self did a whole lot more living in 2023 than our remembering self recalls. The story we think we know, isn't all there is.
So with that in mind, what kind of a 2023 did you have? Was it a year of rest, a rollercoaster of challenges, a time of discomfort and loss, a period of opportunity? Did it end well, with a good time with family and a sense of peace and rest? And when you figure out the answer to that question, here's an even more important one: Have you remembered to say thank you for it all?
Because ultimately no matter what we remember when we think back over the year—the good moments and the hard moments—in every moment, God's loving presence was with us, helping to arrange our circumstances, calming our hearts, inspiring us to pray. We may or may not have been aware of all the help given us. But the goodness of God was ever at work, drawing people and ideas and opportunities around us, guiding us toward kindness, honesty, and care.
In our Old Testament reading today we hear God's intention for each of us, as told through the prophet Jeremiah:
"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future."
It's a promise that knows nothing of problems and challenges, difficulties and hurt feelings. God's plan for each of us is all good, all hope, all love. The ideas and beliefs that held us back in 2023—whatever they were--can't hinder us in 2024 if we don't let them. Here at the gate of the new year we have an opportunity to pause for a moment and reflect on what we've experienced, how we've grown and changed in the past year. We can let go of things we no longer need and prepare our minds and hearts for a year in which God's promise and intention is a reality for us. We can invite God's light to show us what gets in our way, we can leave behind in 2023—let's not take our past mistakes through the gate—and where we can begin again in 2024. These questions might help get us started:
- Is there anyone I need to forgive in my life?
- Am I using my gifts to the fullest?
- Where in my life is God teaching me to be more loving?
- Am I willing to let God heal my past mistakes and hurts?
- Do I listen and care for my heart?
- Do I take time to spend with God each day?
The idea is that here the threshold of the new year is a great place to leave our limitations behind once and for all. We can take the rocks of resentment out of our pockets and leave them beside the road before we walk into the new year. Untie the knots of self-doubt that kept us from feeling confident and using the gifts God has given us. Shrug off the heavy burdens of self-blame and let God teach us—this experiencing self, right here, right now—what God sees in us, and hopes for us, and wants so much for us all.
As we open our minds and hearts to something new from God in 2024, we'll begin to see and learn and know that the hope and future God holds out for us is real. And possible. And very close, if we have the minds and hearts to see it.
In our New Testament reading, we heard the story of the three magi—or astrologers, as some theologians and astronomers believe. These are educated, learned men skilled at reading and understanding the positions of the stars and planets in the night sky. They'd likely been watching the heavens for years, aware of the prophecy of the birth of the Messiah, waiting for an indication that the time is right. Finally they get the confirmation they've been watching for, and they set out to find the child.
In our story today, Herod called the magi to meet with him secretly, wanting to know what they know. He has ulterior motives, of course. They share their story and Herod tells them to go to Bethlehem to find the child. As soon as the baby is found, Herod says wants to know. "Report back," he tells them, because he claims he wants to go worship the baby too. We know that's not really his intent.
So the magi set out, once again following the star, and they were overjoyed when it stopped over the place where the child was. They went to the house and found him with his mother Mary and they bowed down and worshipped and gave the gifts they had brought: Gold, which was a gift for a king; frankincense, perfume for a god; and myrrh, an anointing oil. And then, the story says, "having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route."
The considerable education and experience of the magi would have prepared them to recognize when extraordinary events were being foretold in the night sky. But little would have prepared them for the moment of pure grace, pure innocence, pure love they encountered when they found themselves face-to-face with the Christ child. Their hearts must have been touched, and stirred, and changed. A new life began for them in that moment. And divine intervention helped them understand their part in the story—protecting this pure goodness newly born into the world—and, having seen and worshipped and given their gifts, the magi went home by another road, to keep the light of love beyond the reach of those who sought to harm it.
As we prepare our hearts and minds for the new year, we, too, are educated and experienced in the matters of our own lives. We know how things go. We are well-versed in learning and growing; we've been doing it all along. In fact, we are starting 2024 more equipped to handle whatever life brings because our experiences in 2023 taught us important things: we know better how to care for our emotional lives; we can love more truly; we got some practice in forgiving; our faith that things work out has been strengthened. Today we are stronger, more resilient, more aware and in possession of more knowledge—maybe even wisdom—than we had at the beginning of 2023.
Each year brings new gifts, new challenges, new possibilities—with God right at the center, as lover, companion, and guide. In every situation, there is truth to guide us, comfort to warm us, hope to life our hearts, and peace to calm our minds. No matter what comes, God—whose purpose is to give us a hope and a future—provides all we need. Our experiencing self recognizes that when we turn down the volume on the story the remembering self tells.
In closing, I'd like to share with you the poem, "The Gate of the Year," written by Minnie Louise Haskins. It was read by King George in his 1939 Christmas broadcast in the early part of World War II. The royal family liked the poem so much it is engraved on the gates of the Memorial Chapel at Windsor Castle:
The Gate of the Year
And I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year:
"Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown".
And he replied:
"Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the Hand of God.
That shall be to you better than light and safer than a known way".
So I went forth, and finding the Hand of God, trod gladly into the night.
And He led me towards the hills and the breaking of day in the lone East.
So heart be still:
What need our little life
Our human life to know,
If God hath comprehension?
In all the dizzy strife
Of things both high and low,
God hideth His intention.
God knows. His will
Is best. The stretch of years
Which wind ahead, so dim
To our imperfect vision,
Are clear to God. Our fears
Are premature; In Him,
All time hath full provision.
Then rest: until
God moves to lift the veil
From our impatient eyes,
When, as the sweeter features
Of Life's stern face we hail,
Fair beyond all surmise
God's thought around His creatures
Our mind shall fill.
Happy New Year, Friends! Let's walk confidently into 2024 with our hand safely, surely, securely in the Hand of God. We have more help than we know. This year let's open our hearts and minds to all the love around us and make it our task to claim God's promise—a hope and a future—not just for ourselves, but for all the world.
RESOURCES
No comments:
Post a Comment