That January my little sister was getting married.  I had never met her fiance, but I was traveling to Northern Michigan from Central New York to be part of the wedding.  I hadn't really seen my sister in a year, and, for many reasons, I was very nervous.  My sister and I were very close, but had fallen out of touch over that year.  The whole story is for another blog post entirely, but, all that to say, I had been afraid that our relationship was never going to be what it was.  Some arguments between family members never recover.  Thankfully ours did, and we are just as close as we were, if not closer.  But I had been dealing with so much on my own that I was very nervous about how I would handle the whole wedding week.

During the month of December of 2012, I spent a lot of time alone with my thoughts.  I could pinpoint certain emotions I was feeling, but I was so quick to try and dismiss them without really thinking through why I felt the way I felt.  I decided to do some journal-writing that month.  First I wrote down the individual emotions that I was feeling, then I took some time to expand on each emotion separately.  It has always been helpful to me to write down my feelings.  I am not very good at verbal emotional expression, so the best way for me to really process my feelings, is to write.  Over the next few posts, I'm going to be sharing some segments of my journal entries from that time, because it does the best job at explaining how I actually felt then, and not just my memory of how I felt.

I was listening to a sermon this week on the Sermon Audio app I have on my phone.  The pastor was teaching his congregation 5 interesting facts about the Holy Spirit.  The message was based on John 14:16-18:

He talked about the word "Helper" in verse 16.  The Greek word used here is "parakletos."  In some Biblical translations, this word appears as "helper."  It also appears as "comforter," or "counselor."  He talked about all the implications that the word parakletos has and what Jesus meant when he used the word to describe a distinct role of the Holy Spirit.  I found it very interesting when he described how the Holy Spirit is our counselor​.

We had been living in New York for just four months when my parents came for their first visit. Well, it wasn't an ordinary visit, I suppose. There was a women's event that our church was hosting and my mom traveled here to speak. My mom is very active in speaking out on behalf of the voiceless in the stand against abortion. In fact, here's a little free advertising, mom!... Check out her website here! 10% of all her proceeds as an artist go to support her local Right to Life organization.

Anyway... to continue on with my original story....

So, I know a lot of people who have entered the New Year with the goal of reading their Bible cover-to-cover throughout the course of the year. It's a great thing to do every year, and an awesome goal to set. Some people go with the One Year Bible plan with each date laid out with scheduled reading (usually a combination of Old Testament, New Testament, Psalm and/or Proverb each day). I have gone through the One Year Bible many years, and it is a good way organize your daily reading. I have also read from Genesis to Revelation, each day divided into equal segments of reading. This is a great plan if you set to do it every year because you begin to associate certain times of the year with certain passages of Scripture. For instance, every summer you are working through the wisdom books and the prophets, every spring you are in the Historical books, and every year around the beginning of October, you enter the New Testament for the remainder of the year. There is also the plan to read the Bible in chronological order. I have not done this yet, but I am thinking I might be interested in it for my 2018 reading plan.

With the start of a new year, everyone is setting goals. I feel like the expression "New Year's Resolution" carries negative connotations, and it really shouldn't. I make plans and set goals all year round. And I often do resolve to do new things as a new year begins. I set financial goals, spiritual goals, physical goals, domestic goals, relational goals, etc. Sometimes my plans are small: Being more hospitable and inviting more people over this year. And sometimes they are big: pay off $20,000 worth of student debt. Either way, I am always planning and setting goals. I like seeing the goal-line get closer as the months pass.

Well, we did it!!! Finally, every paper is signed and every document filed away. Our adoption of Emmanuel is finally complete! Its crazy to think that this last year with our Manny, we were still in the waiting phase. Now he is 100% ours on paper! He has been ours since day 1, but now the state recognizes us as his parents. His new birth certificate will say that Mitch and I are his mom and dad.