Notes from my Knapsack 1-3-19

Notes from my Knapsack 1-3-19

Jeff Gill

 

That was the year that

___

 

We were talking in Bible study recently about the past year.

 

These are church people, and we're used to taking the long view, and seeking the bright side. But there was a general consensus that 2018 is a year we're all ready to see move on. Let's give 2019 a chance.

 

What I'd like to say, though, is that we really should avoid writing off years. As we all know, you never want to say "well, it couldn't get any worse." I'm not even superstitious, but that's a bad, bad, bad thing to say.

 

And every year has its challenges, just as there isn't a set of four seasons go by without at least something to be thankful for.

 

A couple of decades back, Queen Elizabeth II in her annual Christmas Message talked about an "annus horribilis" which is Latin for "it was a really bad one." This year, the 92 year old monarch struck some lovely notes (it's worth looking up online, just five minutes) showing that you can always come back from an "annus horribilis."

 

In earlier ages of humankind, when calendars and almanacs were the preserve of the priests and kings and queens, the average bloke talked about a year being "the sixty-sixth year of the reign of the queen" or "the year when King Uzziah died." The year 1816 became known generally as "the year without a summer" thanks to the eruption of Mount Tambora in Indonesia and resulting global cooling; 1833 was "the year the stars fell" thanks to a memorable Leonid meteor shower in November that marked for decades how that year was remembered.

 

When tragedy strikes, it marks more than a day or month. When someone important to us dies, that loss colors a long stretch of our lives just as a volcanic plume can tint sunsets and skies for months on end. So that death becomes a landmark in our mental map.

 

It's also just as possible for a good day to become the measurement for a whole year, a turning point in one's life: the year you got married, the year your first child was born. Graduating from school or returning home from overseas service, those are year markers that stick up above the stubble of day to day events.

 

What was 2018 for you? Not so much a bad year or a good, but what made this last 12 month stretch particular to you? In twenty years, if God grants them, how will you look back on it? Would it help your attitude and intentions if you intentionally think about how this year is going to become memorialized in your mental map?

 

Because one way or another, 2018 will be something to you, in general. Maybe the year you missed the fireworks at Wildwood Park; it could just be the year you started going to the Farmers' Market on Saturdays. Perhaps you had a great event stand out from the passing days and leave you a guidepost for future comparison; bless you if this last year brought a harder change in your life that will cast a long shadow.

 

This was the year that . . . that something. What that was for you will probably set the table for the year ahead, but it's almost certainly going to be memorable for its own reasons, which we'll all discover together.

 

Happy New Year!

 

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and pastor in Licking County; he's glad for some of the harder lessons of 2018, but . . . anyhow, tell him about your year at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.