I’m writing this on January 2nd of this very new year and am aware that by the time you read this we will be into our 2nd month of this new year.  However I am not there yet so my words will at least reflect this contradiction of time….

On New Year’s Eve a friend sent me the following words from T. S. Eliot’s “Little Gidding”. They are:

“For last year’s words belong to last year’s language
And next year’s words await another voice.
And to make an end is to make a beginning.”

I have read through “Little Gidding” several times over the years and on occasions re-read meaningful sections but have to admit that I have no memory of the above.  So I am grateful that my friend sent it to me.

Now in saying all that I find myself thinking about the quote almost continuously because it reminds me that God’s mercies are new every morning; that when I go to bed every night I am making an end and that when I wake up the next morning I am claiming a new beginning.  So each day is a small new year for each of us.

I remember as a child when we laid our heads in our Mother’s lap as we said our prayers (and she searched thought our hair for whatever foreign objects which had accumulated from a day of outside play) that part of our ritual was to make amends for our daily ‘misdoings’ and then to go to bed knowing that when we woke up the next morning a clean slate lay ahead.  It was a gift of grace for one such as I who inadvertently always needed a clean slate.
 
As we move into the Epiphany season I find that all of this relates as one way to look at Epiphany is through the lens of restoration. Through this season we are called to begin again. It is a time to sort and sift what is past and to give thanks for what we have been given as Christians.

So I wish each of you a daily clean slate, knowing that God’s mercies are new every day.