Doing a 2020 Recap
This past weekend our church did a service revolving around a 2020 recap. There were a few testimonials of people discussing what they’ve learned from 2020, how the year has been impactful for them, or what God had done for them over the past year. It got me to thinking… “How WOULD I recap this past year?”
One of our yearly Christmas traditions came to mind as I was thinking about this. Each year at Christmas we get each of our kids a Christmas ornament for that year. These ornaments usually reflect an event or milestone or memory from the year. This year as I was shopping for their ornament, I knew I wanted it to be 2020 related but not just referring to all of the COVID-19 stuff as so many of them were. I wanted it to reflect the many, many crazy events that took place during 2020—a kind of a 2020 recap on the ornament.
I ended up settling on a type of word cloud ornament. As I was reading through all of the items listed on the ornament, I found myself saying, “Oh yeah, I forgot about that.” It had things like Kobe Bryant’s death, the Australian fires, travel bans, birthday parades, virtual graduations, virtual meetings, distance learning, of course the whole Coronavirus pandemic themed things (quarantine, panic buying, toilet paper shortage, social distancing, face masks, front line heroes and essential workers, etc.), murder hornets, the Beirut explosion, and BLM protests. (It was missing the whole presidential election fiasco which was odd.) It did seem to sum up events of the year pretty well.
On a personal level
While this was a great 2020 recap of the year’s events, it still wasn’t a very personal reflection of the year. I thought about how my mom often does this in her Christmas or end-of-year letters where she summarizes the whole family’s yearly goings-on. So, I started to make a list (although not completely comprehensive)…
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- Learned that I don’t like snow-skiing
- Learned that I might be allergic to wasp stings. Ouch.
- Transitioned my entire course curriculum to online format and quickly mastered Zoom
- Dealt with the nightmare of having to eventually adapt to teaching in non-classroom locations (oh, the stories here…insert eye roll)
- The kids experienced distance learning
- Juggled expectations galore
- Experienced bartering ground beef for toilet paper…no joke
- Both of my kids “celebrated” milestone birthdays while in lockdown
- Attended virtual church for 10 months straight (including Easter and Christmas services)
- Led virtual youth group
- Taught Glory House class via Zoom
- Watched niece’s virtual graduation and attended her graduation parade
- Participated in Moms in Prayer Zoom meetings
- Attended a Zoom bridal shower
- Had some interesting… let’s call them “supernatural interactions” (more about these later)
- Interacted more with neighbors we didn’t know as people walked and did some fun activities (rock painting and leaving them out for the neighbor kids)
- Met some not-so-pleasant new neighbors who fit in well with 2020 as a whole
- Daughter got a new bunny
- I got a new car
- Welcomed a new niece
- Nearly our entire family, immediate and extended, got COVID (all recovered, Praise the Lord!)
- Rejoined my original women’s small group, MUCH needed this year
- Participated in Hanukkah celebrations for the first time
- Learned many new and humbling lessons from God about things like spiritual authority, discontentment, racial justice, gratitude, humility, faithfulness, handling stress, letting some things go, and much more.
A 2020 recap of my “one word” for the year
I also revisited my “one word” for the year which was “Way”. Wow, was that word relevant in so many ways! See what I did there!? 😉 I had written in my journal that I felt going into the year and in the first few months of 2020 (BEFORE everything exploded) that…
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- God had been preparing me for a new way
- He is going to make a way, where there seems to be no way (Isaiah 43:18-19)
- God is the Way Maker
- There would be a new way of doing things—we won’t do things the way we’ve always done them, it will look different, I would have to step out into something new
- Jesus is the Way (John 14:6)
- His ways are higher than my ways (Isaiah 55:8-9)
- The Lord is going ahead of me to prepare the way (Deuteronomy 31:6)
- In temptations and trials there is always a way of escape (1 Corinthians 10:13)
- Provision will come from unexpected places in unexpected ways (Philippians 4:19)
All of these things rang true. Doing things a new “way” this year is definitely an extreme understatement! We were ALL forced to find new ways to manage our families, homes, careers, and schools. We had to do church in a new way. Connecting with others took new and creative ways and methods.
Foreshadowing?
One journal entry that I found slightly humorous in hindsight was something I wrote prior to the pandemic about doing things a new and different way. I had been reading Luke 5:1-11 where some of the disciples had been fishing all night, doing everything they knew to do…probably tired, frustrated, irritated, and spent. However, Jesus told them to go back out and cast their nets a different way. I had written down as a takeaway that Jesus might be saying, “You’re going to have to ‘cast your net’ a different way. The things that always worked before aren’t going to work now. You’ll have to do things a different way.”
It would only take a couple of months for me to experience some of these same emotions. In many of my roles (parenting, teaching, volunteering, leading youth, etc.) I grew very tired, frustrated, irritated, and felt spent doing everything that I knew to do. The things that I had always done no longer worked or couldn’t be done the same. I had to learn to do things in a different way. However, Jesus really was the Way through it all, and he guided the way as I navigated through uncharted waters. He also offered provision in many forms to meet my various needs along the way.
So how would YOU describe your 2020 recap?
Take Some Practical Steps to do a 2020 Recap, a Year-in-Review:
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First take an assessment of your year. Some ways you can do that can be:
-Look back over your photo streams from this past year
-Go back through your journal entries
-Browse through your church or sermon notes
-Skim through what reading plans and/or books you read this past year
-Look back through your social media posts
– Revisit your “one word” for the year if you had one
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Then, as you think back over the year, consider the following questions:
-What have you learned?
-How have you grown, both personally and spiritually?
-How did your “one word” play out, if you had one?
-What have you gained?
-Is there anything you lost?
-What memories did you make?
-What would you change?
-Is there anything you wouldn’t change?
-If you could name it, what is your biggest takeaway from your 2020 recap?
“Always remember what you have been taught, and don’t let go of it. Keep all that you have learned; it is the most important thing in life.” Proverbs 4:13 (NCV)
“I will give thanks to the LORD with my whole heart; I will recount all of your wonderful deeds.” Psalm 9:1 (ESV)
“Remember the wonders he has performed, his miracles, and the rulings he has given” Psalm 105:5 (NLT)
“Remember the wonders he has done, his miracles, and the judgments he pronounced” 1 Chronicles 16:12 (NIV)
How would you describe your 2020 recap? Tell us about it by leaving a comment below.
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