2024 - Twenty Twenty Four - MMXXIV

We turned a calendar page and ushered in a new year. Are you looking forward to this new year? What are your plans? What are you looking forward to? Are you excited?

This time of year - the last month of the old year and the first month of the new year - it is exciting to listen to the predictions being floated out.  Some are political predictions especially since we have a Presidential election coming up.  Some are financial predictions.  What will the markets do this year?  Some predictions are based on planets and stars and the like.  One thing all these predictions have in common is that know one knows what is going to happen.  No human that is.

My grandparents introduced me to the Old Farmer’s Almanac when I was a kid.  They raised cattle.  We would sit around the breakfast table and read the forecast for the weather in the newspaper.  Then we would consult the Almanac for the bigger picture.  However, my grandparents had been on the planet long enough to know cycles and trends instinctively.  They had been cattle-people for generations.  The cattle business has a natural cycle.  It is predictable.  However, what I learned from them is that even though there is a cycle to life, we still had to get up every morning and “work” the cattle. No matter what the forecast or prediction, the cattle had to be fed, watered, doctored and cared for. Every day.

I don’t remember ever sensing fear in my grandparents. No matter what the paper or the Almanac predicted, I never picked up on any dread or panic in them. There was never a morning when they said, “Well, the paper said the world is going to end because of (fill in the blank).  Might as well stay home and do nothing.”  No, we ate our breakfast and got to work.

Fear is a reaction. Courage is a decision. I’m sure my grandparents experienced fear. Maybe I was too young to know.  Now that I look back on that period of time I realize they were courageous.  Now that I know what I know about what was going on in the world back then I realize the news then was just as bad or scary as it is now. But we ate our breakfast and got to work.

As I write this it is 2 degrees in Kansas. COLD!  I remember getting up at 4am to go break ice in the water tanks so the cattle could drink.  I was frozen by the time I got to school.  But that’s another story.

No person can predict the future with absolute certainty.  Why we still listen to people that try is a mystery.  Most of us know that the people who throw out predictions, especially predictions concocted to scare, are trying to sell something. Fear I suppose. Fear freezes some people into inaction.

However, as followers of Jesus we know what he told us in Matthew 6:34, “Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself.  Each day has enough trouble of its own?

Do not worry about tomorrow.

As I reflect on the work Frontier Partners International has done over the last year I am inspired by the workers on the field that are working TODAY to feed the hungry, provide clothing and shelter, and build relationships and community to help those in crisis.  FPI and our partners are serving today and tomorrow no matter what the forecast or predictions.  We are not worrying about tomorrow because we know who owns the cattle on a thousand hills. 

Please consider helping in these efforts by praying, giving and supporting.