Pathway 2024

In December 2023, I was overwhelmed with anxiety and depression. I was desperate.  In my heartache, I determined to spend time in God's Word and journaling to Him every day in 2024.

                                                                 

On NYE 2023, at the front of my new journal, I wrote a letter to myself, an honest evaluation of my struggles, problems, circumstances, relationships, health... like a confrontational state of the union.  The end of my letter to myself said:  

"You need change in 2024-- if not in your circumstances at least in yourself. I hope it happens for you. ❤️ Me"

                                                 

Every day in 2024 I opened God's Word, and I wrote my prayers to Him in my journal. My word that God had given me for 2024 was "pathway."  At the time, I assumed it meant I would reach a destination of some sort by 2024's end, but as the year went along, I realized this "pathway" wasn't about a destination, it was about the journey. All through the year, God kept taking me back to that word. I found myself looking for more from Him.

On December 4, 2024, I finally found the pathway in the Yorba Linda Redwoods that I'd tried to find many times before to no avail.  I had to struggle to get down to the pathway on the knee I injured in October, but once I got down to it, for a bit of time, it was a peaceful, quiet, beautiful stroll. I could sense God's presence.  I sat down on a bench to soak it in.  As I sat there, I looked to the left and noticed this dry ugly field with this wide path busy just outside the grove, so I turned my head. Then a park ranger came along with a loud saw and started cutting weeds at the perimeter to my right, my peace was disturbed. I kept trying to ignore it when this big group of moms and kids came barreling down the pathway completely trampling through and destroying the quiet-- shouting, climbing places they weren't supposed to, moms letting them run amok. And suddenly the word picture was overwhelming.

That narrow, little, beautiful pathway where peace and God are found is surrounded by ugliness and chaos and people who will come and disrupt and trample on your peace, but it's worth seeking out that "pathway" anyway because God will meet you there to refresh and restore.  This is the walk of faith.  This is My Walk of Faith. 

As I opened my old journal to read the letter I had written a year before, I anticipated seeing how much my life had changed.  What I realized was that actually very little about my struggles, circumstances and problems had changed at all, but I had changed tremendously.  And perhaps those changes might not even be seen by others, but I see them, and I know God sees them.

God met the hope I stated in my letter to myself on 12/31/23. Sitting daily in his presence in 2024 HE changed ME.

God has spoken and revealed many things to me through 2024 as I have taken the time to sit with Him. He had been waiting all along for me to come to Him. Patiently and faithfully He waited. Let me encourage you, if you need change in 2025, He is waiting for you to come to Him too.