When Your OneWord365 Refuses to Let You Ignore It! 2020

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It's a little late to be posting about my OneWord365 maybe... I mean --I know normally I would have written this out in December along with other end-of-the-year posts! Well - 2019 was far from 'normal' and many of those posts didn't get written at all! I did write about all the books I managed to read. You can find that post HERE... and I did write the Annual Prophetic Post for the New Year! You can find that one HERE!

I have been doing this OneWord365 project for many years now and --again-- 'normally' I know my word by the beginning of December. Not this year... He snuck it in the last minute, probably hoping I wouldn't fight Him on it. (But, come on... Y'all know me better than that, right?) 

Listen,  here's the deal:
This is how I opened LAST YEARS' OneWord post:
"2018 has been so full of Heavy and Hard (even more so than 2017... which was pretty terrible, if you recall!) and somehow I completely forgot about my OneWord... 

Well, it seems it forgot about me, too! Or at least that is how I felt when I went back to look it up!"

It just--
Whatever, man! 
2019, 2018, 2017: All wretched.

BUT GOD... 
Seriously --even in the midst of all of these Heavy and Hard, Sad and Terrible-No-Good years...

--God was near... we were Held... and my OneWord kept sneaking up around the corners of our lives.

Joy...

My OneWord for 2018 & 2019 was Joy. I felt like God told me I could have a Do-Over (or Do-Better!) year and so I gladly kept JOY around!

I wrote this at the beginning of 2019, regarding my OneWord:

"I'll look for it in the obvious, easy, light and breezy places (like our Lil' Miss and her sweetness and laughter, or a perfect cup of coffee and catching up face to face with a friend...) but I will also look for it in the deep, beneath the surface, amongst the unearthing and re-seeding... amongst the watering and the weeding! 

I'll be intentional in finding it, in relishing in it --when I feel it or not-- and in giving it away with reckless abandon!"

I was intentional in looking for it and finding it... in really be in the moment and present whenever Joy showed up! I really was!  And I think I did a pretty good job of that up until April.  

April is when things took a hard turn, once again. 
April is when we found out the cancer was back.  
April is when more of our dreams and hopes fell to the ground!
April sucked, guys.  

But Joy was in April, even though... 
In small group gatherings, and walks with friends,
and trips to see family and a sunrise service
in our backyard on Easter Sunday... 

Joy intermingled with our tears
and helped push back our fears
and Oh My... Joy comes in the morning! 
He is persistent and He just keeps showing up!

The rest of the year held more challenges,
more sadness, more loss... 
it held less of me intentionally looking for,
finding, and sharing Joy, to be honest. 

But there were still moments... 
Storytime at the library with Evy... 
Playing at a playground and new job offers
and a beach trip with my little family... 
a music festival with friends, 
dinner invites to our girlies' new home, 
podcast shenanigans, and lavender farms,
pool fun and book club,
summer nights with My Honey, 
The list goes on... 

I wrote down thoughts on Joy at the end of each month (except for a few!) in my Day Planner. 

This was one such entry:

"Laughter is such a gift --and it's one I unwrap on purpose, every day! Joy showed up big in August through family gatherings, fun on the patio and in the tiny kiddie 'pool', on walks and during dance parties and in circles on the beach, over a table, and at the park! August held Hard and Heavy, too... but Joy stayed right there in the midst of it!"

So --as much as I was ready for a new Word... 
  I wasn't quite ready for the new Word He gave me!

I tried to fight it --but you know how that goes!
It started to literally show up EVERYWHERE...
He's so relentless sometimes!
(and --you know, eventually, I am oh so glad about that!)

So... my OneWord365 for 2020 is:

~Gather~

It both excites and scares me... 
A lot.

Listen --when My Honey turned 50,
he decided we were going to be more spontaneous
and just start saying Yes to more things
...and we started a church.
A church, you guys!!?

The running joke was when I turned 50
--we would NOT be doing that again! 
LOL! Well --guess who turns 50 this year? 
Yep... me.

And God gives me, "Gather"... 
Oh boy.

While we have no intention of starting a church again,
it's not totally off base or completely out of the blue.  

I mean, it's sort of what we love to do
and it's who we are!
Gatherings are pretty much our Jam! 
--Even my Introverted-self loves to Gather!

So maybe it's not THAT scary after all!?

Gather: gath·er
/ˈɡaT͟Hər/

1. come together; assemble or accumulate."a crowd gathered in the square"Similar: congregate, convene, assemble, meet, collect.

2. bring together and take in from scattered places or sources."we have gathered the information"

3. develop a higher degree of."the green movement is gathering pace"

4. infer; understand."her clients were, I gathered, a prosperous group"Similar: understand, be given to understand, believe, be led to believe, think, conclude, come to the conclusion, deduceinfer, surmise, hear, be informed, notice, see, learn, discover.

5. summon up (a mental or physical attribute such as one's thoughts or strength) for a purpose."he lay gathering his thoughts together"Similar: summon, summon up, call together, bring together, assemble.

So... 

We are awake to possibilities... 
and we are opening our hearts and our hands
(and our home, because --obviously!)
and we're, once again, desiring to be
intentional in how this OneWord
shows up and shows off!

May 'Gather' happen in us
and through us, and
all around us in 2020... 
--a year with greater Clarity and
Hope and Understanding... 
with greater capacity 
to Love and to Laugh and to Linger... 
(After all --those are the BEST kind of Gatherings, right? 
When those three are invited, too!?)

What comes to your mind when you hear the word, Gather?

What about you, my friend? Do you participate in finding One Word (or letting One Word find you?)  If so... what's your Word? I'd love to hear!