The weight of the world felt heavy in 2016. Wars expanded. Terrorist attacks made the news almost every day. Drug epidemics surged in many parts of our country. The election churned vitriol around our dinner tables, in our Facebook newsfeeds, and on our TVs. All around, I witnessed a mix of disdain, confusion, and anxiety.
The weight of the world felt heavy personally. I slept poorly, argued regularly, and felt uniquely high levels of frustration more routinely than I wish.
And yet, on December 28, Alli and I welcomed a healthy baby girl—June Kaarina—into the world. And for a few days, the expansiveness of the world shrunk to the walls of our hospital room, where we held and cooed and awed at the grandeur of this precious new life. For a few hours, the world’s biggest challenges faded, as baby June apprehended our imaginations.
It made me start to wonder how my 2016 might have been different.
The challenges of last year were not insignificant. It is good and right for us to mourn and respond to the challenges around us. But the challenges awaiting us in the decades to come will be no less significant. 98% of the world’s adults now own a cell phone. Atrocities and protests and exposés from everywhere in the world will continue to populate our screens in real-time. 2016 wasn’t an anomaly. It was just the start of our new normal.
I don’t want to be as grumpy in 2017 as I was in 2016. I want to be informed, of course. I want to be critical, when needed. And I want to be engaged deeply in a few issues and causes where I’m uniquely able to do so. But I don’t want to repeat last year. And based on what I’m seeing and hearing from my friends, I don’t think I’m alone. The idolization of national politics, specifically, has reached unhealthy levels for me and for many of my peers.
Though there was reason to lament in 2016, there were perhaps even more reasons to celebrate.
Globally, as Bill Gates wrote in his annual letter, by almost every measure, the state of the world’s most vulnerable people is better now than it was twelve months ago, and perhaps better than it has ever been. Across the globe, literacy and child survival rates are way up. Conversely, rates of disease and violence are way, way down. All told, average life expectancies have nearly doubled worldwide over the past two hundred years.
I have much to be grateful for personally as well. In 2016, I traveled to Rwanda and met amazing people who are writing a new chapter in Rwanda’s story. These stories will likely never make headlines. 2016 was also a year when HOPE took over management of large faith-based microfinance institutions in both Burundi and Rwanda. By God’s grace and through the sacrificial generosity of our supporters, we raised sufficient funds to accomplish this and to meet the needs of our budget.
This year, I also undertook some exciting projects with some remarkable friends. I published the story of a pallet company entrepreneur employing dozens of refugees in his company for The Denver Post. I shared the stories of an inspiring notebook designer and a formerly homeless housekeeper. We welcomed five beautiful foster children into our home. And, with a few family members, I launched dadcraft, a fathering web site. We hosted friends for conversations around our firepit, traveled to new places, and enjoyed the luxury of a warm home, full pantry, and good health.
Despite all this, there’s a lot I lament about 2016. So as we enter this new year, I’m committed to a better 2017.
I’m committed to spending more time praying more for my friends and family than I spend rolling my eyes at things they post online.
I’m committed to spending more time roughhousing with my kids than I spend bickering with my friends.
I’m committed to spending more time caring for my actual neighbors than I spend ruminating about national politics.
I’m committed to reading more words in books than I read in status updates.
I’m committed to savoring beautiful moments more fully, rather than thinking about how to best snap pictures of them.
I’m committed to more unpractical decision-making—to family bike rides in rainstorms, to gardening for the sake of gardening, and to walking more places.
These commitments won’t change our world. But they’ll help me live slower. A year from now, I pray my soul is more hopeful and less fickle, more sorrowful and less snippy, more rested and less harried.
