Well, it’s that time of the year again… the end. 2018 has come and gone and 2019 is just a few hours away, and let me just say, it’s been a banner year (insert adequate amount of sarcasm). Justin Timberlake released an album that no one listened to, a British prince married the girl from “Suits”, and Saudi Arabia gave women the right to drive, which they continue to refer to as “progress”. However, even after all of that, some people had a pretty rough year.
 
It's kind of become common place on social media to declare that the coming year will be better than the previous. I first remember seeing this trend as we approached the end of 2015. But when the much anticipated “Batman vs. Superman” film was less than stellar, topped with the deaths of David Bowie, Carrie Fischer and a number of other beloved celebrities, people looked to 2017. Then when 2017 didn’t fare much better, it was all about 2018, and now, not so surprisingly, people are all too ready to welcome 2019.
 
Maybe you’re one of the people who are looking to rip off your 2018 rearview mirror and drive on into 2019 with some hope of self-improvement. If that’s you, then keep reading, and if that’s not you, then keep reading.

History is full of great quotes, with even greater stories to go along with them. One such quote I ran across this week was the story of Union General John Sedgwick. During the Battle of Spotsylvania (I know, that sounds made up, but it is a very real place). General Sedgwick was quoted as saying, “They couldn’t hit an elephant at this distance” in reference to confederate soldiers that were roughly 800 yards away.
 
This quote by itself is fairly lackluster, I understand that. However, what makes this noteworthy is the fact that it was almost immediately followed by General Sedgwick getting shot in the face by the aforementioned confederate soldiers.

In January of 1997 a fire broke out in our home.  Burned it to the ground.  We lost everything, save the night-clothes we were wearing.

We moved out to a farmhouse some church members provided.  It came completely equipped with everything we needed for that temporary time. 

Since the house that burned was the parsonage, our church, very generously, reworked my salary package, enabling us to buy or build a home.  Pam worked hard with some builders in our church to create the home she wanted.

We lived in the farmhouse for most of 1997, moving into our new home in early to mid-December.  Though excited, we were exhausted.  Then, . . came Christmas. Seriously, we thought, now?