How Surprise Showed Up & what 2014 holds (OneWord365)

For the past few years, I have been picking one little word... allowing one word to come and find me! It's a break away from Resolutions and a new way of inviting a Word into your life... I am all for Goal Setting and dreaming big, but I love how when we focus in on one thing... one word - God brings it to us all year long in ways we couldn't have imagined!  As the OneWord365 website says, "Forget New Year's Resolutions.  Scrap that long list of goals you won't remember three weeks from now anyway.  Choose just one word.  One word that sums up who you want to be or how you want to live.  One word that you can focus on every day, all year long."

My OneWord365 for 2013 was "Surprise" and you may remember how I tried to fight against it!  I wrote about my struggle and how Surprise showed up here, and here, I Guest Posted here, and I wrote once again about how we are the only ones who categorize Surprises 'good' and 'bad' here.  Basically - as was expected, it showed up in good and hard ways! I found myself "Surprised" way more often than in the past.  It took a few months, and a lot of preaching to myself - but I learned to lean in to change, and the unexpected, and the spontaneous, and to kick fear to the sidewalk... once you do that, it's nearly impossible not to welcome Surprise right on in!  

As I mentioned earlier this week, my One Word showed up bringing with it some serious swag! I won all sorts of books, and jewelry, and music, and scarves... it showed up with a ticket to #Allume, with extra days added on to vacations, with faith and strength and calm that I didn't know I had.  It also showed up with Emergency Rooms, with Strained Friendships, and Sudden ends... with Cancer and tests and a lot of unknowns.  No - "Surprise" wasn't always welcomed... but I clung fast to the lesson He taught me early on:  HE is NEVER Surprised!  I could trust Him, no matter what, because even if I was blindsided and lost my footing - He was right beside me and would steady my steps and hold me close and He always, always knows just what is needed!

My OneWord for 2014:  "Vision!"

Again... I made this Word fight hard for my attention!  After Surprise, I must admit - I wanted a warm and fuzzy, sort of predictable, self-explanatory Word... something concrete that I could KNOW what to expect! (Ha - so much for the work of Surprise, right? )

But "Vision" is good... it is necessary and it is wide open enough that it can mean a lot of things. 

The Scripture He gave me is a familiar verse... one that has been spoken over me by friends and strangers alike... it is found in Habakkuk:

"Then the Lord answered me and said, “Record the vision And inscribe it on tablets, That the one who reads it may run. For the vision is yet for the appointed time; It hastens toward the goal and it will not fail.  Though it tarries, wait for it; For it will certainly come, it will not delay."                                       Hab 2:2-3 NASB

I love to look up the Definitions of my OneWord, just to be sure I am looking for the right things as the year unfolds! I have to say, after spending some time with my dictionary, I am falling more and more in love with my Word!

Webster's defines VISION like this:

"The faculty of sight; something that is or has been seen; unusual capability in discernment or perception: intellegent foresight; the way in which one sees or conceives of something; a mental image created by the imagination; the mystical experience of seeing as if with the eyes of the supernatural or a supernatural being; one of extraordinary beauty."

The definition of ENVISION is:

"To picture in the mind."

Lastly, the definition of a VISIONARY:

"Marked by foresight; having the nature of fantasies or dreams; marked by or tending to apparitions, prophecies, or revelations; not practicable, one who has visions: Seer; one given to speculative or impractical ideas: Dreamer."

Um... yes, please!  I want ALL of that!

I pray 2014 is full of clarity and hope and "Vision"
- and *"The Maternal Heart of God" for you and yours!

Happy New Year!

(To read about the *prophetic phrase & the book in the Bible that the Lord gave me this morning, click HERE.)

Do you have OneWord this year?  If so, I'd love to know what it is! Share in the Comments below!