As each year begins, I start asking God for a word for the year, and sometimes because I’ve forgotten mid-year, I’ve taken to start writing it down in the front of my journal when I know my word.
The word for this year is ‘Abundance’.
Oftentimes, as I have the word, I have no idea what it means or what it will mean.
To be honest, even mid-year I’m sometimes wondering how this word will come into play.
Growing up in Jamaica, our high school motto was ‘Life more abundant’. It was recited. It was on the pins we wore to represent our school. It was an integral part of the messaging of our school.
As a teenager, I don’t know if I thought about our motto much ‘life more abundant’, but as I’m walking through this year, now and again I have to pause and wonder, what does this even mean? What is abundance? An abundance of what?
Of course, I decided to go to Google: Abundance means having a large quantity of something.
As I’m pondering, I realize I have a choice to make in this matter. Will I have an abundance of joy and happiness or will I have an abundance of stress and worry? The word abundance by itself doesn’t say much, except that whatever I have is plentiful.
I recently decided that I had to let go of my abundance of stress and worries. I am intentionally choosing what is within my control and letting go of what I cannot control. In its place, I’m choosing to replace stress and worry with joy and peace. With doing little things that bring me joy and happiness. They don’t need to cost much, I simply have to choose which lens I will use to look at my life.
Can I tell you that it’s making a world of a difference?
How will you choose to approach the word abundance? What do you want to have an abundance of, that is already within your control? What thing do you have an abundance of that you’re being led that it’s time to let go? Let go and let God do His work in you.
Dear Heavenly Father, thank you that you have called us to live a life of abundance. And while the abundant life may look differently to each of us, I pray we seek your guidance and wisdom on what we should hold on to, and what we need to let go of.