Looking forward

Every New Years I come up with a theme or a motto for the upcoming 365 days...and then I try to live by it. Previous themes have included:

• Shut up and pray (in response to talking about prayer more than actually praying)
• Simplify
• Go through the door (2004--a year when I took many leaps of faith)

I've been doing it for about 10 years now, and some have stuck and have become life themes while others have quickly fallen by the wayside. Like this year for example. I think it rhymed with eleven...was it about heaven? Or priorities? I have no idea.

I was just looking through some recent tweets and I saw the one I posted on January 1 of this year. "And if our God is for us..." I had copied it off someone's FB status. Since I've already forgotten my 2011 theme, I think I will change it to this.

2010 was a roller coaster year with many challenges. It was awesome to get married to my bestest and start a new life with him. It was thrilling to get pregnant after I had all but given up hope of ever having a family of my own. But we faced many tough times together...the suffering of my mom from cancer and strokes and her passing in June, several months of morning sickness, thousands of dollars of vet bills for our sweet little dog, a car accident, insurance squabbles, job changes, a tick-infested home(!), and many financial difficulties.

I'm not expecting 2011 to be any less roller-coaster-ish; after all, we are having a baby in 33 or so days! But I am confident of this: Our God is for us, so who can stand against us? We have personally witnessed God's faithfulness in the past year. He has been by our side every step of the way. He has blessed us with a love beyond limits. He has taught us new things about love--real love--not the kind that feels warm and fuzzy but the kind that sticks with a person no matter what. He has restored health to our pup and positive integers to our bank account. He has blessed us with family that has supported us financially and emotionally. He has given us countless friends who have cried both tears of joy and sorrow with us.

And most of all, He has given us hope for a life yet to come. A life where there will be no more tears (of sadness), no more death, no more breast cancer, no more strokes, no more long days and nights in hospital rooms, no more feelings of helplessness, no more wondering how we will pay the mortgage.

Instead we will enjoy endless delight. Reunion with loved ones. Joy. Mansions with no mortgage. Abundant health. New bodies. Unlimited hope. Seeing our Savior face to face.

All because of the Great Exchange...I was accepted because He was condemned. I am loved because He was rejected. I am alive because He died and rose again.

So we face 2011 with much anticipation. A new baby is on the way. We both have jobs. We are in love and happy. We are healthy.

But even if we lose all that... and our house is infested with nasty ticks and the dog is vomiting blood and the bill collector won't stop calling...our God is for us. Who can stand against us?