How many titles like “2020 Vision” are out there?

I’m thinking it’s going to be the catch phrase of the year!

#2020vision means to see clearly… most of the time we use it in the context of an eye exam or when we are looking back in hindsight.

Isaiah 43:18-19

Do not remember the former things or ponder the things of the past. Listen carefully, I AM ABOUT TO DO A NEW THING. Now it will spring forth; will you see it? I will put a road in the wilderness and a river in the desert.

We are instructed to NOT look back because that focus could keep us from seeing what is coming.

And yet, hindsight is so clear….how tempting it is to linger and ponder back there.

Ten years ago, as the ball was dropping onto 2010, I looked over at my husband who was actively weeping.

My man does not cry often.

My man especially does not cry when we are at a friend’s house celebrating New Year’s while tossing back a few beers and playing Rock Band on the Xbox…

This was ten years ago, after all …the winds of change were beginning to blow painfully upon us.

I held my sobbing husband while our friends looked on in disbelief of his abnormal display of visible vulnerability.

2009 would forever be remembered as the year his beautiful, strong, smart, funny oldest sister died of alcoholism.

Nothing else reverberated in us except for that.

I asked him why he was crying …wondering if he was remembering her, grieving for her: his response was that he “didn’t know”…but the tears would not cease.

As we entered 2020, when the ball dropped, we were surrounded by our two sons (who are now taller than me) and our dearest friends that God brought into our lives to become our family.

The wounds of the last decade are healing with many scars remaining and palpable …My husband’s tears were valid that day~ even if he had no idea of what was to come.

I am reminded of the Scripture passage in Psalm 56:8 that our tears are not forgotten but instead stored and recorded by the Lord.

He remembers them.

I believe that means it is so He can use them for His good and glory.

In this last decade we have experienced so much pain and we have lost much as well.

BUT

through the pain and loss, we have grown…we have changed…we have learned ….we have taught.

Without the wounds, we would have not become the people we are today.

Without the scars, we cannot become the people we need to be in tomorrow.

Our story may have truly begun its change in 2010 but it is not over in 2020.

The Lord has promised us a road in the wilderness- a path where one has not been before…a new journey/path/plan perhaps.

We have been promised a river in the desert- life where there hasn’t been before…Something in us or around us being made new…

Hindsight has made our future so much clearer…We can see that there has not been one step where the Lord has not been with us- guiding us, leading us, directing us, loving us in these ten years…and the evidence of that has become all the clearer the more we trust in Him.

Our story and tears are to be remembered- to be shared- but, more importantly, to be used for Christ’s Kingdom and glory.

We have learned this:

We are to seek and deeply long for the Lord and His strength. We are to seek and deeply long for His face and His presence. We are to remember with awe and gratitude the wonderful things of which He has done (Psalm 105:4-5).

THAT is 2020 Vision.