new

I am not much of a contemplative person. I don't often take time away, alone, to think. As the new year starts tomorrow I find myself resisting the thoughts that "should" accompany a new year. Resolutions, hope for change, fresh starts. It's not that I don't want these things... Maybe I'm worried that if I reflect on the past year and write down hopes for the new one that I will be let down.

Maybe underneath it all I am afraid that I won't grow and change, that longtime ruts are too deep to get out of... So I buck the trend of new beginnings with a new year. Because I doubt. But even as I write there is a twinge of hope in me.

And someone reminds me of some words

No eye has seen, no ear has heard,
and no mind has imagined
what God has prepared
for those who love him.

1 Corinthians 2:9

and

I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen. Ephesian 3:16-21

and

This resurrection life you received from God is not a timid, grave-tending life. It's adventurously expectant, greeting God with a childlike "What's next, Papa?" God's Spirit touches our spirits and confirms who we really are. We know who he is, and we know who we are: Father and children. And we know we are going to get what's coming to us—an unbelievable inheritance! We go through exactly what Christ goes through. If we go through the hard times with him, then we're certainly going to go through the good times with him! Romans 8:15-17 (the message)

I took these photos today, in Alberta, where it is -18.

An unlikely place and time for new life. I like that.