Reflections on 2020: A Year to Behold

 

We kicked off 2020 with a word for the year, and I had some aspirations and goals. I am not even sure WHERE those journal pages are, but I do remember that I wrote with so much intention. Our word for 2020 however, was nearly prophetic, and there were many days I sat with it at the front of my mind.  Our word was Behold.  And man, did we ever.  This year we beheld many things, some of them precious, some painful. 

In February, we started to hear about the pandemic as it began its slow and menacing spread into our country.  At the beginning of March, Jay’s grandmother died. We found ourselves driving up to Rhode Island as the pandemic ramped up. We drove 16 hours. We visited and laughed and cried. We celebrated a life while mourning a death and we worried about the packed house full of friends and family.  We looked through a lifetime’s worth of photos and belongings.  Sacred objects found new homes.  We took a drive out to Newport and wandered around.  We drove by the mansions.  Ate at a pizza shop. 

We returned home and then lockdown came.  Eden celebrated her 11th birthday with just immediate family.  She smiled like it was the best day ever.  Isaac matched and then outgrew his Dad. Black Lives Mattered.  We found a baby snapping turtle. I began a weight loss journey in the middle of a pandemic.  The COVID numbers soared, summer came.  We played games. People protested.  An election year ramped up.  In July, Jason was cutting grass out back and had a freak accident.  A metal rod shot into the side of his ankle, inches deep.  We went to the ER.  I had to wait in the car at 1 a.m. because of Covid precautions. Jay couldn’t walk.  My incredibly active, UPS driver husband was couch-bound and out of work for weeks.  We beheld all these things.  His healing was slow, he went from crutches to limping.  We were so thankful nothing was broken, but ligaments were torn and healing was painful. We spent time together. We lamented the brokenness of the world around us.  We budgeted. We crossed our fingers. Jay went back to work.  We began a new school year.  We beheld all these things. 

 

I listened to a story that I didn’t want to and changed my entire mind, just snap like that.  It felt divine; like God took my thinking and turned it, “Nope, this way now, this is the way of love; you go this way”.  We watched dear friends and others become unraveled over politics.  We became unraveled in a different way.  We questioned church leadership.  We spoke up.  We questioned our own beliefs.  We wrestled and we became tired of swallowing down practices that felt like lumps in our throats.  We peacefully stepped away from our church home of 10 years.  We hoped dear friendships would not be lost. We grieved.  We sat in the space of uncertainty and we BEHELD the God of the Wilderness.  The God that sets a table wide for ALL.  We read and studied the book of John with friends.  We got a beautiful new dining table from my in-laws after Jay’s grandmother’s estate settled.  

I emailed an old friend who was an Episcopal Priest. We visited an Episcopal Church.  We worshiped wearing masks in a new space that was so different,  but full of the same Holy Presence. We read school books. We picked apples and pumpkins.  We listened to Isaac play guitar.  I watched Eden draw and paint.  I read the Daily Office and prayed. Sometimes I cried and I didn’t quite know why.  Sometimes I doom-scrolled the news.  We decorated for Christmas. Advent began: a new season of waiting following a year of waiting. But with Advent, we wait with confidence of what is coming and this gives me so much hope.  

     This year seemed to unfold in ways that I had never imagined and I can’t recall a year where I have felt so strongly that we were pulled along as passengers.  And yet it was a beautiful year. There was coffee and coziness and laughter.  There was GROWTH and the shedding of dead things.  There was the sacred and the monotonous and pain and joy. Confrontation, unraveling, courage. Dread and fear. Hope and new beginnings.  Scarcity and abundance.

We encountered the God of the wilderness.  The God also, of the Promised Land.  This Jesus who when reviled, blessed; when persecuted, endured; when slandered; spoke kindly.  I hope that this is what I will remember most about this year:  what I learned about my God when I set out to behold Him.