Happy New Year!

I love celebrating! For the past 14 years in Flagstaff, our city leaders have created a tradition of dropping a pine cone from one of the old hotel balconies in the center of town. This event has grown from a real, large-sized pine cone found in the forest to a giant metal pine cone with blinking lights. The Pine Cone Drop has become known around the country and the world. For the last few years, the streets have been closed to handle the thousands of people who gather at 10pm (coinciding with the New York City Ball Drop) and then again at 12am to cheer and sing and dance in celebration of the new year. Somehow the dropping of a pine cone has inspired people to come and celebrate together.

In the last few years, I have devised a plan to be able to see both the 10pm and 12am Pine Cone Drop without freezing to death! We have collected some friends to join us at a local restaurant for dinner at 9:30pm. At 9:50pm we step out the door of this restaurant and we are looking right down the street at the pine cone. And then we turn around to see fireworks soaring off the roof of another local hotel. When our dinner is over, we step outside again at 11:50pm and do it all over again. It has been suggested to me that we could eat a bit earlier and head home after the 10pm drop, but I can't imagine sitting on my couch when I could be cheering with my neighbors in downtown Flagstaff. It is so much fun to feel the excitement and energy of the New Year's Eve cheer!

As I reflected on this celebration and my exuberance in the anticipation, I ran across a scripture in my Bible that spoke to me. I was reading in 1 Chronicles 15 about the time King David brought the ark of the Lord back into Jerusalem. The ark of the Lord was the place the people associated with God's presence in the Old Testament. So the ark represented bringing God's presence back to Jerusalem. As you can imagine, quite a celebration broke out in the city as the ark came in.

It says in 1 Chronicles 15:28 "...with shouts of joy, the blowing of rams’ horns and trumpets, the crashing of cymbals, and loud playing on harps and lyres." In verse 29, it says in the Amplified Bible that King David was "...leaping as in sport..." I especially love this visual because often time the joy of life and the Lord causes me to jump in the air and click my heals together! We are created to celebrate! Yes, bad things happen, but in the mix are many reasons for joyous celebration!

In this New Year, I am going to take the opportunity to demonstrate the joy in my heart! There are so many moments worthy of shouting, singing, and jumping for joy! God has filled our lives with reasons to celebrate! And the greatest reason to celebrate is His presence in our lives! And maybe in the exuberant celebration, someone will learn all the Lord has done for me! So join me this year in the celebration!

1 Chronicles 16:8-13. "Give thanks to the Lord, call on his name; make known among the nations what he has done. Sing to him, sing praise to him; tell of all his wonderful acts. Glory in his holy name; let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice. Look to the Lord and his strength; seek his face always. Remember the wonders he has done, his miracles, and the judgments he pronounced, O descendants of Israel his servant, O sons of Jacob, his chosen ones."