Abundant: A New Year’s Word
Y’all aren’t surprised when I say that I adore the Word of the Year. I am a word gal, after all.
I’m not sure how everyone else practices Word of the Year, but for me, it is a posture of paying attention. I pray about what I need to pay attention to in the upcoming year, and that becomes my Word of the Year. It becomes my anthem, my prayer, my habit, and my summary. I pair the Word of the Year with a passage of Scripture, and I turn to that passage regularly. When I don’t know where to turn, my Verse of the Year is my refuge. When I’m making decisions, it is right there. When I’m rejoicing, it comes with me.
I’m not talking about “manifesting” things into the year. I’m not even talking about making goals or ambitions. For me, Word of the Year is far more about listening than speaking. It is far more about waiting that doing. It is far more about receiving than creating. I often enter the year with a question tied up in my Word of the Year. I’m not sure what the Word will bring. So I wait. I pay attention. I pray. And throughout the year, that Word pops up a lot. Throughout the year, the Lord speaks. Slowly, softly, these Words become part of the narrative of my life, and they shape my thoughts, language, and actions.
In 2021, my word was “delight,” and I haven’t been the same since. The Lord taught me to dwell in delight. I still light up whenever I see that word. In 2022, my word was “glory,” and in many ways that year built on “delight.” For you see, I got a little twisted at the end of 2021 and I began to think that maybe delighting in the Lord prepared my heart to receive blessings. What 2022 taught me is that delighting in the Lord is the blessing. His glory is magnificent and my place in that is to behold it and be transformed.
That leads to 2023. (How is it already 2023?)
In the She Reads Truth Advent Study (100/10 recommend), I kept noticing words in Scripture that spilled forth in abundance. Words like “how much more,” “overflow,” “even more,” and ““surpasses” all received a squiggly underline in my book. That’s how I knew my Word of the Year.
You see, last year the Lord taught my soul to hold my plans in open hands. He taught me to trust Him even if He took my plans out of my hands. He taught me to cling to Him with both hands, not waving my fists in the air. That process, though, was painful. He had to till the ground of my heart to make room for that garden. Still He bent my soul to trust Him. In my determination to see the glory of God and be transformed, I perhaps forgot of His tender care. I forgot how He longs to be gracious to us. I forgot that His mercy is unrestrained.
Yes, the glory of the Lord is the point. My life is firmly oriented around His sovereign and good plan, and I know that He has the victory, even if my life isn’t how I planned. However, I don’t want to view God as sovereign to the point that I start to see Him as pulling the strings in my life to make a puppet show. He isn’t pulling strings but pulling my heart into His care. He isn’t playing a game of chess with my life but bringing me into the victory. He isn’t calculated with His grace or discounted with mercy. It is abundant.
This year, when I say that I trust the Lord, I’m not expecting worst case scenarios. I’m expecting grace. This year, when I hold my plans in open hands, I’m not expecting Him to take and take but to give and give. I won’t be able to hold it all in.
I don’t know what 2023 holds, but I have this Word, and it is Abundant.
Do you practice the posture of Word and Verse of the Year? What was/is yours? Maybe this is the year to start? It doesn’t have to be this big moment to chose a Word, it’s closer than you think.
Hannah