On Sunday, I read John O’Donohue’s poem “At the End of the Year” as the benediction. If you missed it, you can read the full poem HERE. The whole thing is good, but several lines caught my attention as another year of pandemic precautions and uncertainty draws to a close.
When I first read these lines, I wondered what it means to “give thanks for the gifts” this year brought when so much of the year felt so heavy—when there were so many darkened days that stopped / The confidence of the dawn? In a year that began with an armed attack on the Capitol, curtailed voting rights, and launched an assault on women’s health, what gifts do we have to give thanks for? And those are just the “gifts” we received on a national level.
There were so many other big and small losses we each experienced on a personal level in The slow, brooding times / When all was awkward.
And yet, in the end, it’s good for us to give thanks even for the hard things. Because the hard things help us realize what’s most important. We give thanks for the not-so-good things because they empower us to make changes in our lives and world. In the end We bless this year for all we learned, / For all we loved and lost / And for the quiet way it brought us / Nearer to our invisible destination.
We give thanks that, while all things are not always good, “all things work together for good” (Rom. 8:28). All things work to bring us closer to our “invisible destination.” As this year draws to a close, I pray you recall moments of joy and remember times of peace as you reflect on the gifts of this past year. May we move into this new year with the hope, faith, and resolve to bend the arc of history just a little closer to that invisible destination of a more just and loving world.
In Love,
Pastor Annette