A Word for the Year

     For me, a new year  usually begins with fresh resolutions. I love  the blank page and the newness that suggests a better year.  More organization, discipline in exercise, healthy eating, reading good books:  these are common themes that I can energetically rally around in January of each year.

     But this year a dear friend suggested to me choosing a word for the year, instead of composing a list of resolutions.  This word would incorporate a character quality that I would try to practice throughout the year.  Mmmmm. . . . this intrigued me and I was immediately besieged with a list of characters qualities I would like to have more of:  patience, gratitude, humility, etc. . . !!  How to choose?!

     God scooped out a space in my heart.  I wanted a word that I could plant and nurture and grow.  Five days later as I sat in church, God dropped the word like a seed into the soil of my heart:  YIELDEDNESS.  I didn't hear the word in a song or the sermon.  It's not a word I use.  And my spell check does note even  recognize it!  But in the stillness of a worship service, God pressed this word into my heart.  

     As God is so capable of doing, He had already been doing groundwork to prepare me.  The day before was one of the last days of Christmas vacation and I had designated it to be my "workday".  Mark agreed to take the kids and I planned to work on lesson plans.  I was staring down a demanding January and February and desperately needed to get some advance planning accomplished.  I had two places I needed to go and the rest of the day at my disposal.  But these were not simply places to go; they were people to visit.  Five minutes at my parents became an hour of conversation.  Ten minutes with a friend became a lengthy intervention about her health challenges.  No doubt, I was meant to linger at each place.  But my "work time" was largely sacrificed.  As I drove home, I could feel anxiety rising and God speaking, "You can trust me with this.  This was my plan for you today.  Trust me." 

      I didn't get my work done that night and the next day God spoke the word "yieldedness" to me.  Immediately, I knew that this was a variation on an emerging theme in my life:  radical dependency.  A few years ago I finally figured out that life really was too big for me.  I didn't have enough organization, enough energy or enough wisdom to "make life work".  Every day was big and unpredictable and I pictured myself as a toddler holding both of her daddy's hands just to walk across the room.  Life was big and I needed God to be bigger in my life. 

       Yieldedness means laying down my desires every day.  It means offering up my "to do" list and submitting my agenda, however good, for God's agenda.  Yieldedness is laying down my tendency to control people and circumstances in an attempt to keep my life manageable.  Yieldedness may look impractical and inefficient and even foolish.  It is not a formula, but more of a posture.  Yieldedness is rooted in the belief that God's ways are better than my ways.  It comes from a heart that doubts my own wisdom, but trusts God's.

     Yieldedness is a tall order for this girl who loves control and competency.  It's like falling out a plane day after day.  But what I'm really doing is falling on my Father day after day.  The fall is scary, but the landing is sure.  His arms are safe, His ways are trustworthy. 

     The day after "the word,"  I opened my Bible to begin reading through Psalms.  I read these words in the first Psalm:  "Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of wicked, or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of mockers.  But, his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night.  He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season. . . " (v. 1-3)  This was God's sweet confirmation of "the word for the year" and His encouragement that "yieldedness" is not only hard work, but a brings sweet fruit.