Was 2020 A Blessing in Disguise? Yay or Nay?

Dear 2020, Whoa girl! Who pissed you off?! Do you not know how we waited for you with bated breath? We made plans with you in mind; selected you as the person who would usher in our completed goals. Countless organizations had you pasted all over their strategic documents – talking about “By 2020, we will have achieved xyz goals.” We were so looking forward to bragging and celebrating with you the fact that your impending birth gave us the motivation we needed to accomplish said goals.

And so there we were. December 31^st. 2019. Bright eyed and bushy tailed. Some of us were at home, some in the clubs, and others in churches. Regardless of our locations, the collective energy of the world was pregnant with anticipation. You were about to be born to us. At the stroke of midnight, we heard your first cry – but only for a second – because we drowned out your newborn’s cry with our own shouts of jubilation. You were going to be our fresh start, our turnaround year, our platform to showcase the completion of goals we had been working on over the last decade or so. But while we welcomed you with hugs and kisses, you “embraced” us back with kicks to the teeth and punches to the gut. Little did we know that while we were busy planning for your arrival, you also, were making plans for us…and as we would soon find out, your plans for us were a lot more sinister than any of us would have ever imagined.

And so you rolled out a runway – like that of a prestigious fashion show. You demanded that we sit down while showcased the collection you designed specifically for us. You called all world media to cover your grandiose display. You dimmed the lights, turned on some ominous music, and cued your first model. She catwalked her way down the runway dressed in a sweeping fiery red gown – her name was ”Australian Wildfires’. Your second model wore a bikini with feathered wings jutting from her shoulders – her name was ‘East African Locust Swarms’. Your third model wore a metallic gown with a black and grey cape – her name was ‘Downed Ukrainian Plane’. Your fourth was adorned in a circular skirt made of brown leather, and a purple and yellow blouse – her name was ‘Kobe Bryant Chopper Crash’. Your fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth models were clad in aqua blue, nude, yellow and camouflage gowns. Their names were ‘Flooding’, ‘Tornadoes’, ‘Murder Hornets’ and ‘Political Unrest’. Your ninth model was clad in all black. He was male. He took three steps down the runway and was shoved back; he took two more and was tackled to the ground. He tried to rise and run but again and again, he was tackled and pinned down until he lay motionless. Silent. Breathless. Gone. His name was ‘Racial Injustice and Violence’. The mood grew increasingly somber as you paraded more and more models before us. You worked hard to dampen our spirits, and sadly, you succeeded, wildly!

Like any designer who is worth their weight in salt, you saved your best model for last. She was your swan song, your crème de la crème, your pièce de résistance. We saw her silhouette before we laid eyes on her. She wore a simple crimson gown with small spikes. We all looked at each other unenthused! “2020 saved this as her last showcase?? There is nothing spectacular about this!” But ooh did you ever shut us up! The model took center stage. The seemingly simple gown started off hugging her curves, but with each step she took in her 6-inch stilettos, the model pulled on a cord by her waistline, causing her gown to balloon ever so slightly. At first we were impressed. We broke out in cheers at the ingenuity of your design and handiwork – but our cheers slowly turned to frowns, then to concern, then to sheer panic and crippling terror as her gown kept ballooning to the point of enveloping the entire audience – suffocating us under its weight, piercing us with its now gigantic iron spikes! The model’s name? COVID-19 Coronavirus! (You, young lady, deserve your own personal address. So here goes…)

Dear COVID-19, Whoa girl! Look at you! I have heard of overnight fame – but the fast rate at which you gained your celebrity status is mind boggling. Queen Cee, right? I suppose we are to bow down to you, right? You cough and we all stand at attention. You clear your throat and we all run to do your bidding. Your name is on everybody’s lips. You have a seat, the head seat at every table. You have bulldozed your way and demanded to have a voice and a say in every life, every home, organization, institution, economy, government, nation, and media outlet. You are shroud in mystery – no one can agree whether you are bat-made, lab-made, man-made or simply made up! At the height of your power, the churning wheels of commerce all but came to a screeching halt. The whirling engines of planes and trains all but grew silent. The sensibility of humanity all but departed from us – you reduced us to primal levels of fighting to the death in the supermarket aisles for toilet paper (of all things)! You had us traversing unchartered waters. You delighted in canceling our plans, our trips of a lifetime, our proms, graduations, weddings… each cancellation announcement was preceded by the words “because of COVID-19 …” and I bet you loved that – it made you even more drunk with power! You shut down our world, kept us under lock and key, held us hostage, made us skeptical and fearful of the embrace of our loved ones! We couldn’t even be at the bedside of our dying loved ones; they departed this earth all alone. In some instances, we couldn’t even bury them ourselves! You had us scampering and cowering under our beds. No one was immune to your cruel touch – pauper, tycoon, servant, king – you did not discriminate. You touched the untouchables. You felled the ‘unfellable’. You slayed giants and brought mighty men to their knees. You sunk your talons into 83 million lives, permanently silencing 1.8 million of them. You proudly padlocked thousands of businesses and threw away the key, robbing people of their livelihood – yet up to now you are not satiated! You greedy girl! You still thirst for more! Yes you have roared, yes you have mauled us, and you have terrorized us. But here is the bad news for you, this too shall pass. We shall overcome. You shall be eradicated! He who conquered death, hell and the grave will do away with you too!

I don’t think there’s a day that had been more anticipated in recent history than December 31, 2020. Almost all of us were eager to see 2020 come to an end. In fact a friend of mine (Andrea, who also blogs) said this to me: “What a year 2020 has been! And to think it should have been ‘Perfect Vision’!” But that’s just it! It was!! It lived up to its name and provided us with “the perfect vision”.

Yes 2020 has been the hardest year in recent history. Yes, it has amassed more casualties, deaths, disease, heartbreak and economic turmoil than any year I know of. Yes, we have all felt the negative, sometimes crippling, effects of all the tragedies it brought to our doorstep. Yes, we were all caught by surprise and had the rug pulled from under our feet. We can agree that 2020 has suffered a bad reputation. It was regarded as a villain. It was loathed. It was feared. It was unwanted. But was it all bad news?

Although 2020 left us battered, bruised, grieving and limping, it also presented us with a gift of a lifetime. It pried our eyes open and gave us perfect vision. In the past we seemed to have trouble prioritizing our lives – and so it prioritized life for us. Every single one of us was wiser on December 31^st than we were on January 1^st.  We may have been naïve but no longer. We may have been jaded, but no longer. We may have been misguided, but no longer. We have learned that life is important; that health is one of life’s greatest blessings. We have learned to value people over things. We have learned to relearn and to change the way we do things. We have learned new skills, we have innovated, we have thought outside the box. We’ve learned that the control we thought we had on life and on our world was merely a fickle illusion – but alas! we learned that we can definitely control how we respond to adversity – we can choose to have trials strengthen us, as oppose to weaken us. We learned the difference between needs and wants; and between necessities and luxuries.

We learned to be defiantly victorious against all odds! We learned that we all belong to one race – the human race – and for the first time we saw a global movement to end racial injustices. We re-adopted the long forgotten practice of togetherness and focused on village and community, rather than self. We put aside petty differences because we recognized what was important, and realized just how fleeting life is. We learned that none of us are invincible and we were forced to think about our own mortality…and perhaps this is why we saw many turn to faith in God for hope and comfort. We learned that church is not a building – but that we as people are and always have been the church. We learned that despite it all, Jesus is still on the throne and He has not lost control over our world. Despite the darkness that was 2020, His light shone and still shines through – and if we seek Him and look through the eyes of faith, we will in fact see and identify the promise of Romans 8:28 in our individual and collective lives: “And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to His purpose for them.”

So 2020, we thank you. Because of you, this is how we will conduct ourselves in 2021: We will not sweat the small stuff. We will stand up to evil. We will fight for those considered “less than”. We will value relationships… especially with our family members. We will forgive others easily. We will prioritize our lives better and keep first things first. We will cherish every moment we are alive, and every moment spent with loved ones. We will live every day with eternity in mind, ensuring that we take the necessary steps to be found ready when the curtain closes in on our life’s chapter. We will learn to count our blessings. We will celebrate small wins. We will never take anything for granted ever again. 2020, thank you for prying our eyes wide open and giving us 20/20 vision.

So fam, I wish you a purposeful, healthy, blessed and successful 2021. I pray this prayer of blessing from Numbers 6 over you: The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make His face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn His face toward you and give you peace. Happy New Year!

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