As we draw near the end of 2020, we should take a few moments to look back on the year.

It's been an eventful one for sure.

It's been heartbreaking.

It's been sorrowful and yet it's also been full of joy as well.

Pastor John, as you look back on 2020, I know a lot has happened in your world as you

look back on this year.

What has God been been showing you?

As I look back over 2020, the most fundamental experience for me that colors everything

else and has shaped everything else is the experience of sweeter fellowship with God

and with Jesus through His Word and through the mercies of the Holy Spirit.

As I have tried to figure out why this is, I think the most persistent reason that I

come up with is that I have lived this year as though walking along the precipice of

eternity.

COVID-19 means that floating around me in the air are invisible viruses that specialize

in killing 74-year-olds.

And then add to that, my city blew up last summer, and 1500 businesses near my home were

burned.

And even through the election, buildings just blocks from my house were boarded up out

of fear at what might happen with the election results, and as Noel and I have sat together

in the evening, night after night, month after month, she would read to me the statistics

of the thousands in Minnesota who are infected anew with the virus and the numbers of how

many had died and what their ages were.

...