2020 is not a wasted year. The season you are in is not a wasted season. The circumstances you are walking through are not part of a wasted journey. They all serve a purpose in our story to ultimately give God glory. The righteousness of our lives is often brought about through trials, tests, and journeys through the fiery wilderness. I’d say that’s what 2020 has been. A wilderness year where we have had to be brutally honest with ourselves and before God about our true condition.

“If you only look at us, you might well miss the brightness. We carry this precious Message around in the unadorned clay pots of our ordinary lives. That’s to prevent anyone from confusing God’s incomparable power with us.” 

2 Corinthians 4:7-8

Focusing Well enables us to release what is good to partner with what is BEST. God’s transformative power is then at work in our lives as He changes us in a gentle and kind way. We can be transformed through one idea, one word, one thought at a time and become more of who He has called us to be because we are more intentionally focusing on Him.

John 10:27 “My sheep listen to my voice; I know then, and they follow me."

Focusing Well allows us to cut through the distractions of life in order to look for God and find Him in new ways. It is then that we realize that God is using the places and positions we are in now to prepare us for what He has prepared for us.

Isaiah 26:3 “You will keep in perfect peace those whose minds are steadfast, because they trust in you."

Obeying God may often lead us towards actions and service that looks counter cultural to the “norm” of the world. So, we must remember whom we serve and do all that we set our hearts and hands to in honor of our singular audience, Jesus.

Colossians 3:23-24 "Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ."

To heal well, we have to set ourselves about the everyday action of fixing “our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.” (2 Corinthians 4:17-18)

We have to daily surrender our agenda, our will, our plan, our dreams, our hopes, and our future before Him and trust that He is good and that He is for us.

We must choose every day to surrender ourselves to the truth that His will is perfect, which far outweighs anything we could plan on our own. We must choose to surrender the dreams and desires that we have for our own lives and instead open up our hands to hold only what He places in them.

I finally realized after walking with Jesus for over 30 years that He didn’t owe me anything and what He had already given me was really the only thing I ever needed. I realized that He didn’t owe me a baby or a sibling for my daughter or a wonderful husband or an eternity with Him. He didn’t owe me anything but He had already given me everything in Jesus.

God is faithful and He is true. He is constant and steadfast and mighty to save. He is good beyond our imagination. But His goodness does not mean that He is obligated to give you everything that you decide is good. He is the author of good and every perfect gift comes from Him. So there is a point where I believe we have to trust that if the thing we deem as good isn’t coming from Him then maybe it isn’t the good He has planned for our lives.

We have to realize that in the face of great trials and pain, we must have the courage and determination to press on, to keep straining forward, because we know and understand that Christ alone is our reward; and He has called us to persevere. By straining well we can uncover the will to say “it is well.”

Philippians 3:12-14 “Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.”

God has something within each of us to reveal as treasure, but we must first confront our past, our present, our pretenses, our processes, and our prejudices in order to pinpoint our potential. We must confront the battle in order to be transformed by the renewing of our minds. 

Romans 12:2 “Do not conform to the pattern of this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is- his good, pleasing, and perfect will.”

Anything can be an act of worship when it postures our heart to give love, affection, adoration, accolade, and attention to Jesus. When it positions us to listen to God, hear from God, and be transformed by God…it’s worship.

“I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.” John 15:5

A mission mentality is founded as we allow the love of the Lord to flow into and out of our lives like the smooth cadence of an easy rolling river. We must allow ourselves to be filled by The Well in order to live out wellness in our everyday lives.

"Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.” Deuteronomy 6:5

The distractions and interruptions of life might just be an invitation to dance with God right in the middle of the mess and simply ABIDE right where we are with the very lover of our souls.

“I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.” John 15:5