Hindsight is 2020

As most typically do at the end of the year, I have been reflecting on 2020 with mixed emotions depending on which memory I choose to focus on. In the latter part of yesterday morning, I was in a cleaning mood and started looking around my room to see what I could toss out. Peering at my bookshelf, my eyes landed on a folder that has a collection on childhood treasures, random pieces of paper which most individuals would consider to be trash. I thought to myself, “Surely, there is something in there that I can throw away.”

Opening the overflowing folder of memories, I started to dig through to see what was not worth keeping anymore. Almost as soon as I began my quest though, I came across a copy of a letter that I wrote to my best friend during my senior year in high school. Knowing vaguely what the letter was about, I decided to read it.

On September 17, 2014, I wrote to my friend about a bizarre event that had recently occurred. I had just finished a workout with my teammates in Rhodes Park when a stranger was introduced to me. Her name was Angela, and this is what I wrote about my meeting with her:

This woman told me that she was a praying woman of God and felt led to pray for me. She grabbed my left hand with her right hand and held it for a bit. She then asked me if I did crafts or drew stuff. I said no with a bit of a chuckle because I did nothing in art. But then she said, “Well, I think God is telling me that you have the power to touch people and heal them. You’ll be able to pray and touch people, and God will work through you.” She said this, and every part of me knew that she was speaking truth!

After that, she started to pray for me. Of all the prayers I’ve heard in my life, I’ve never heard of one spoken with such power, truth, compassion, and love! She prayed for my running that I would lose my fear and run with boldness (how did she know that I often run in fear??) She prayed for my life and that I’d be blessed when going to other countries sharing Christ to people. She prayed that God would anoint me from head to toe with His healing power. It seemed like she prayed about everything I’d been asking God questions about and more!

After she prayed, she continued to tell me that I had a love for kids and would be doing something in mission work with children. All of this she was telling me I KNEW was from God. And then, she said something that answered my biggest question I had. College! The question of where God wants me to go for college. She said that I will find the right college and will know it’s right because God will give me a peace about it when I choose. This statement alone gave me peace that I haven’t felt in what seems like forever….

There’s other stuff I could mention… The one thing I’ll conclude with is that it is amazing how God can use someone you’ve never meet before to change that way you think about your life! It is truly baffling. But in all, God is good all the time, and all the time God is good! Hope you are having a blessed day!

After reading the letter, I heard God whisper in my heart, “Every word Angela spoke over you back then has been fulfilled. In fact, some of her words have been fulfilled this year, and you did not even realize it.” The more I recalled key moments in my life, the more I had to agree with Him.

A month or so after Angela prayed over me, God did tell me where to go to college, and I did experience His peace. Now that I have been a graduate from the University of Florida for over a year, I look back on my college years and can see the Hand of God and His purpose in sending me there.

While at college, God gave me the freedom to quit running as a competitive sport. A month later though, He led me to run a marathon competition where I finally learned how to run with no more fear but rather with joy instead.

Since graduating high school, I have had opportunities to go to northwestern Europe, Haiti, and Thailand. I have been able to share my testimony abroad, and I have been so blessed by all the internationals that I have had the honor to meet and now call friends and family.

God has done all of that and more within the last few years. However, there were three things Angela spoke over me that were not true prior to 2020. I did not view myself as artistic, I had never prayed for healing in someone’s life, and I did not have a love for children nor a desire to minister to them. Those three words of encouragement were fulfilled this year in ways I never would have imagined.

This year, due to the surplus amount of time I had, I started to dabble a bit more in various arts. My love for music grew when playing the guitar or the piano, and journaling became even more of a key element in my walk with the Lord. At random points, I would find myself doing something artsy in my own style like writing poetry, scrapbooking, flower pressing, learning film and photography, and whatnot. The more I experimented, the more creative I became.

October was the turning point though. My church needed a Mandalorian costume for a children’s ministry video, and (long story short) I ended up volunteering to make one out of cardboard. Why did I think I could make one with zero experience crafting with cardboard?? I honestly have no clue, lol. Yet, to my astonishment, I successfully created the full body armor and helmet, and it ended up working perfectly for the video!

After that project, I acknowledged my gift and let myself freely create anything including a musical instrument called a Pogo Cello and a model of a Japanese Katana. In all of my artistic impulses, I have noticed one key factor. Every project I crafted, God used it to bring glory to Himself and/or to bless someone else with His Love.

During the summer of 2017, God used me to share the gospel with a young woman during my study abroad trip. The following day, He prompted me to lay my hands on her and to pray for healing in her knee, which was injured earlier that week and caused her to limp when she walked. I still remember my heart beating faster and His beckoning in my soul to obey Him, but that memory ends with me not moving in obedience due to fear of man and lack of faith in God. The following day, my heart felt God’s conviction of my mistake, and I apologized to Him asking for another chance. I never got another chance with her. As the rap god Eminem said, “You only get one shot. Do not miss your chance to blow. This opportunity comes once in a lifetime, yo. You better…”

During the summer of 2020, I was at church with a few other believer, and we all gathered around one brother to lay our hands on him and to pray for physical healing in his body. While others were praying, I began to tremble because I felt the Holy Spirit’s powerful presence and heard Him say, “Tell him to do this, and then command him to believe and be healed in My Name.” I still remember my heart beating faster and His beckoning in my soul to obey Him. This time, I did not dare disobey Him. I looked at my brother in Christ, and I commanded him to do what God asked and said, “In Jesus’ Name, believe and be healed.” My brother did exactly what I asked of him. At first, I saw nothing chance. His physical ailment was not healed. Yet something did change. He changed. His face shifted into a smile of gratitude as he whispered to me, “Wow, thank you! Praise the Lord!” And then he worshipped God. Because I obeyed God, I witnessed the Hand of Jesus touch that brother’s heart and fill his soul with healing joy and praise.

From January to July, I was looking for the next step in my life with no success. Whether it was a job, education, ministry – literally anything – I kept getting ghosted, forgotten, and rejected. At the end of June, after going through the interview process for an opportunity that I seemed overqualified for as well as one that appeared to be 100% orchestrated by God, I received another rejection by email with this phrase written, “Our concern is that, whatever God calls you to, you need to be free to follow that call at this point in your life. Wherever He takes you, you need to be free to go. He is using you already, and I know He is going to use you in a mighty way.” I had never received a better rejection letter than that one, yet this one hurt the most because I knew God was the only reason why I did not get the opportunity.

In my hurt and anger, I went to Wickham Park alone to “wrestle with God” (Genesis 32:24-30). I told Him I was angry and tired. I ranted about this year of disappointments. I reminded Him of all the times I tried to follow His calling yet was met with more sorrow and defeats. I asked Him all my why’s, but He never replied. He did not need to. Instead, after I had thrown my tempter tantrum, I finally surrendered to Him, as I had learned to do over and over again this year. I told Him that He was still Lord, and that I was not. I reminded myself that He knows everything and that His plans for me are better than anything I could imagine. I entered the park with rage and bitterness towards Him, but I exited with gratitude and thanksgiving. As I drove my car out of the park, I heard Him speak, “I have something better for you.” Though I had no clue what the better could be, I returned home with Hope in my passenger seat.

At the end of July, I saw a Facebook ad for a teacher assistant position at No Limits Academy, a private Christian school for students with disabilities. Though I was only mildly interested, I thought, “Well, what’s the harm in just applying?” A few days later, I had a phone interview and was informed that many other candidates were also being interviewed. I told myself that, of all the applicants, I was probably not going to be selected. Less than a week from my phone interview (when I was told I would not hear back for at least two weeks), I had an appointment for an in-person interview. After that interview, they told me I would hear back in a few days. Later that afternoon, I received a call from the director of education. She wanted to propose a different TA opportunity for me to work with and oversee the high school students. I was very interested and excited about this opportunity, and we ended the call with her saying she would call me at the beginning of the next week. One hour later, she called back stating, “Long time no hear”, and we both had a good laugh. She told me that she could not wait until the following week because God was telling her to hire me and wanted to offer the job to me ASAP. I was so shocked and in awe of God. Of all the past opportunities, none of them were so smooth nor had one door flown open after another. I asked her for a day or two to pray about it, which she gave me until the following week. After 24 hours though, I knew God was calling me to accept the job and happily called back the director of education.

Since the first day I started that job, it has been a joy! I have seen God’s Hand throughout my time there in little, tender mercies while serving His precious children. All of my students have become so dear to me, and I cannot imagine that classroom without one of them. The way they think outside of the world’s box and love one another is inspiring to me. Though many would just ignore these kids, God is using them to open my eyes to see how deeply He loves His children and how He has designed them uniquely for His glory to show the world that, through Christ, there are no limits.

I am sure all of us have mixed thoughts and emotions about the year of 2020 due to many events that have occurred around the globe. In my own personal life, there were incidents that happened which I would not have volunteered to go through. However, as I try to find closure to this chapter in life, I hear God speaking to my soul, “2020 needed to happen, Em. I used it to change you.” Jesus has used this year to craft a desire within my heart to create art for Him and others, to touch others in faith believing He would bring healing into their lives, and to learn to love children like He does. The last adjective I thought I would describe 2020 by is the word necessary, but now I cannot think of anything better.

Coming to the end of the journey of 2020, I feel like a sojourner who is looking back at the long, narrow trail that took me over the high mountain peaks and into the deep, dark valleys that I had to travel. Though I had thought there were secondary trails I could switch onto that later resulted into dead ends, I now see them more clearly as the switchbacks I hiked to reach a divine destination. There was one predestined path, and, if I had known where it ultimately would lead me, I would never have doubted the wisdom and knowledge of the Map Maker.

The sojourner that I was at the beginning of January is a different person from the one I am now at the end of December. I think that is mostly for the better. For the areas of my soul that are still for the worse, I have faith that my God will use 2021 to transform those for the better too.

So, I will pick up my walking stick and venture on toward the trailhead named 2021 remembering the milestones I passed in 2020 with wisdom, sorrow, and gratitude as my companions. And I will go onward beckoning to all I meet with joyful songs and peaceful words. Because my Lord has never and will never leave me on this life journey, I know and believe that the best is still yet to come.

P.S. If you are looking for a song to close this year out with praise to Jesus, this would be my suggestion: