๐๐๐๐๐, ๐๐๐๐๐๐, ๐๐ง๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐:
A few years ago, during what I assumed would be an ordinary phone call, a friend asked me whether I had chosen a word for the year, as so many do when welcoming a new one.
What began as a light, almost playful conversation quickly shifted into something weightier.
At the time, I couldnโt have named its significance, only that something had settled in my spirit in a way that would not easily fade.
I have carried that lesson with me ever since, testing it against time, loss, prayer, and lived experience. Years later, I can say this: the word that surfaced that day has proven far more enduring than I ever could have imagined at the time.
This is where it began:
At first, my mind could not settle on just one word. There was no eureka moment, no lightbulb realization, no sudden jolt of awareness, โThis is the word!โ
There was none of that.
There ๐ค๐๐ a word that kept intruding, though.
It wasnโt inspirational, or motivational, or even confrontational. It awakened no desire, revealed no purpose, and prompted no strategy for self-improvement.
Is that not what those words are ๐๐๐, by the way?
To characterize, or declare, all that a new year can be, in light of what has already been?
If so, my word really made no sense at all.
Neither, though, could I get away from it. It was insistent and unmistakable.
It was the word please.
๐๐๐๐๐ ๐.
Justโฆplease.
This wide-ranging conversation, begun on a whim, had quickly become momentous and significant. The seemingly random nature of that phone call morphed into a complete, unwavering awareness that class was in session.
I realized, as I often do, that there were discoveries to be made under Godโs tutelage. There was something He meant to teach me that morning.
He used one word to do it.
It was a word I neither wanted, nor understood. It was my word, though. I knew it instinctively. Every other one had melted away. There was no longer any doubt.
Please would be my word.
If frequency and usage alone make a particular word the word, then please, in my life, was already the unrivaled, obvious selection, ready to take its place among all the other newly adopted, carefully chosen โnew year, new meโ words.
Its meaning at the time, however, was still lost on me. Its significance still nebulous and unclear.
So I pondered it.
Please.
๐๐๐๐๐ ๐.
Then it dawned on me: how many times have I uttered that word since Jimmyโs loss? The number is simply incalculable. In my desperation, it became my mantra, my default, my go-to.
I breathe in please.
I breathe out please.
I go to sleep with please.
I awake to please.
Please became my scaffolding for precarious, uncertain days. When all around me quaked, my steady, firm foundation was just a please away.
Always spoken in prayer.
Always uttered in different ways:
from plaintive wail to quiet whisper,
from urgent call to weary petition.
When I am lonely, afraid, shattered, or unsureโฆ
Please, Lord.
When I have no hope, answers, assurance, or directionโฆ
Please, Lord.
When I need peace, healing, provision, or victoryโฆ
Please, Lord.
Pleas wrapped in please.
Beautifully cyclical encounters.
I cry out. He listens. My life becomes an offering.
Pleas. Please. Please.
I see it now.
One word. Countless meanings.
Class dismissed.
โPrayer breaks all bars, dissolves all chains, opens all prisons, and widens all straits by which Godโs saints have been held.โ
~ ๐. ๐. ๐๐จ๐ฎ๐ง๐๐ฌ
๐ฟYears later, I am still choosing that word, and still finding the One to whom it is lifted faithful beyond measure.