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How to have a truly happy new year.

For the first time in years, I don’t remember my New Year’s resolution from January. Usually, I write it down in my journal or on a note I stick to my mirror. There’s been many of those dog-eared sticky notes from years past. The year of contentment. Speaking life. We passed pancakes across the breakfast table on January 1st this year. “What do you want from 2018?” I can’t remember my answer. I know what I didn’t want though. I didn’t want to walk into her office and share the parts of my life I’m inclined to hide. I didn’t want to Facetime her the day after she delivered her baby that never breathed. I didn’t want to spend four months wondering how I’d walk into her house on Christmas day and see her empty chair. I didn’t want to go on another first date that led nowhere. We sit across from each other in a little coffee shop in Colorado, picking at a charcuterie board. “When I think about all of the things I have left to go through,” her voice cracks....
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Permission to Forgive

I remember the first time I was stung by a nest of mud wasps on a creek bank somewhere near the west coast of Canada. Like being pricked with countless sharp needles on my face, neck, arms. Then, throbbing, burning underneath my skin. 

And that’s how his words felt.

Later, we talk in the car and she mentions his name, a subtle comment about his faults. I want her approval, a closer connection. So, I monologue his faults and we laugh together in agreement.

I get her on my side.

Isn’t that the instinct of war? And human hearts.

But I toss a lure to someone else, something about his hurtful words. But it’s someone who’s wiser than both of us and he doesn’t bite the line.

And it’s then I realize that he is giving me permission. Permission to forgive. Permission to leave resentment in the grave.

I start to notice it with others, how some people give you space to love. To forgive. How there’s no pressure to bond over someone else’s mistakes.

It’s a taste of the presence of Christ.

Because no one in their right mind would sit down to coffee with Jesus and whisper to him all the things they hate about their parents—as if the scars in His hands didn’t exist.

I remember how she was a sweet taste for her daughter when she never spoke one unkind word against her abusive husband. A chance for her daughter to move forward.

Because bitterness can sting more than offense. And its taste is never sweet.

Oh, to have a presence like Christ. A presence that gives others the permission to forgive. To love.

To loosen the burden of bitterness.






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