Celebrate in the Hallway Before the Door Opens!
If many of us reflect on 2024, it was a whopper of a year! Transitional periods are often a myriad of ebbs and flows. They test our ability to be able to reset and recalibrate. In the midst of a challenging year, what did we learn? What can never be taken from you? What are lessons that are helping to shape you for what is to come?
There are times that we want to get out of something so badly, that we do not focus on what it is building in us. Just as one embarking on a fitness journey. The pain and sacrifice in the beginning can blind us from focusing in on the progression. Transition can bring about a greater appreciation or deeper resentment for what is not accomplished.
This year was very sobering in so many ways. It was the realization of some of my new normals, from losing my grandmother; to pivots in my business; to dying more to self! I had very earnest moments of saying how I was choosing to come out of my challenges! I made a concerted effort to not allow life’s circumstances to force my hands down. There was a Vow I made to God and I intended to keep it! My hands would remain lifted! God never failed me, because there is no failure in Him. I vowed to give Him what is due to Him!
You see, God is not just good on the mountain, His goodness deeply expressed in our values! There are moments that He lovingly speaks to us through His Word. There are other times when His presence is so intense, that there are no words spoken, just His beauty and care on display.
Give yourself permission to not always have to get through the Open Door to Celebrate. The Hallway can be a great dress rehearsal! It is the place where we wait in anticipation. It is the location where the Love of God is embraced as you ponder on how faithful He remains.
He is not only through the Open Door. He promised to never leave us; nor forsake us. Therefore, as we wait in the Hallway of 2024 ready to go into the Door of 2025, pull out the Sparkling Cider & Party Favors!
2024 was certainly full of challenges:
Yes, you were broken in 2024!
Yes, tears flooded your pillowcase!
Yes, it was beyond what you could handle!
Yes, friendships ended!
Yes, the relationship did not withstand!
Oh, but what 2024 also did…
It strengthened your trust in God!
It caused you to put your whole weight on God and experience Him in a way that had never been imagined.
It left you with your hands raised in praise!
Transitions are one of the Most Maturing Agents and it will cause one to truly evaluate not only our decisions, but how we treat God in the midst. Every Hallway Occurrence also has Witnesses. No Hater Talk here.
There are people in that hallway with you that have seen your life up close and personal and the way that you have navigated and triumphed has not only encouraged them, but caused them to lean in all the more to God! This is a part of why the Hallway should also be a Praise Fest! There is nothing like being hit with trials and tribulations and your whole squad have their hands lifted in praise because at the end of the day- God has done it again!!! Kept you; Protected you; and Implanted His Love so deeply in you that it has changed your Spiritual DNA!
Divine Work & Pray:
Work:
Jot down in your journal what you are grateful your trials and tribulations produced in you in 2024 that you get the privilege to take into 2025!
Pray:
Oh God, how excellent is your Name in all the earth. When I think about how you have kept me and matured me, my heart cries out…gratefulness! Grateful for how you have allowed life to not triumph over me, but through you- produce a resiliency that brags on you. You have allowed me to come out better and not bitter. You have turned my mourning into dancing. You deserve the glory and honor. Life is worth living because of You. Thank you for the ability to praise you at all times! May 2025 find me crucifying my flesh more for the Hallway Witnesses to see You and glorify You! In Jesus’ Name. Amen.
