Here we go with Kayla’s Word of the Year recap for 2018. I know that my faithful 11 followers (appreciate y’all) have been anticipating this blog drop. Which is quite fitting since it’s about my year of waiting. I’ve just been making you suckers wait, joining in the sometimes agonizing in-between of one thing and another.
That sentence made no sense, but that’s how I live my life.
I’ve never really been one for resolutions. I can remember as a 3rd grader being asked what our New Year’s resolutions were in class and I just shrugged my shoulders when the question got around to me. There’s probably something in that about my inability to be decisive…
But, for the past…well…I don’t know exactly how long, but a while…I have prayed about and landed upon a word of the year.
2018’s word: Wait.
When asked about my word, I found myself hesitating to reveal it, and very quick to defend it once I told.
I feared that people would think I chose wait as my word because I’m the single girl and that’s what single girls do. We wait. For a husband.
But that wasn’t it at all. If anything, I desired the year of waiting to be about everything BUT that. I felt like God was laying it upon my heart to learn what it means to actively wait for Him.
The image above was the lock screen on my phone for the entire year. For 365.25 days, I would raise my phone to see that word and that verse. I was constantly reminded that the Lord is good to those that wait for Him. And (this is of particular importance, I believe), the soul that seeks Him.
I felt an urge from Holy Spirit to sit in anticipation of waiting for God to move. To truly seek Him with my whole soul – my entire self. To wait for His revelation in my life. And ultimately, to wait with expectant hope for Him to return and set all things right.
One thing I think I’m pretty good at is surrounding myself with wise, loving friends. Over a year ago – before the year of wait began – I was sitting with one of those friends, talking about this very idea. About the uncomfortability that exists in the waiting.
“But here’s the thing,” she says as the wisdom starts to seep out, “there are consequences to not waiting. Can you imagine what would’ve happened had the disciples not waited like Jesus told them to? They would’ve missed the Holy Spirit. There are consequences!”
And that sealed it for me. I had to learn how to wait because there would be consequences if I didn’t.
2018 was a weird & difficult one. I was asked to wait in a lot of different areas of life. For reconciliation. For healing. For new life – physically and spiritually. For revelation. For next steps to take. Clarity was given in some areas, and more questions were given in others. But in all, God remained who He always has been: loving and faithful to His people.
Just because the year is over and I’m on to a new word doesn’t mean I’ve gotten this active waiting down. In fact, I’ve seen a pattern over the last few years of my words building off of one another. I believe that in His great mercy, God has simply laid the groundwork for what He’s going to teach me this year.
And truly, I can’t wait.
Kayla Smith 