My life has never settled into the rhythms of all I wanted. A year ago, anticipation thrumming under my skin, I thought I would be in a very different place by this point. Half-pieced visions of finished poems, a set stage for speaking out, a romantic relationship in bloom beckoned me to hope for things I yearned for and to reach out for what God could have in store for me.

When the last day of the year arrives, sometimes you can’t help the shame and disappointment that trickles in when you realize all that has been unfulfilled. I know I am tempted to sort out my life into the should’ves, could’ves, and the little good eeked out that offers marginal comfort. I could easily view this year with the same lens. Where is that book I said I would write? Those people I was supposed to reach out to? That guy who was supposed to show up? Wasn’t I supposed to be braver, bolder now?

That strain of thinking represents remnants of an old life, before the Gospel took hold of me, before Jesus. It re-emerges in the vulnerable moments when I still wonder if I am enough, but as this year has reminded me, it no longer has to dominate my vision. It is easier to feel like God has denied me what I desire; it is also easier to blame myself for how paltry my movements forward feel, but God does not view my year with those eyes.

He does not view my days as a waste to be winced over and eagerly left behind. Neither does he pin an evaluation of them on my estimation of my goodness. How grateful I am for that!  I live no longer as a summary of milestones like marriage or job promotions or great good acts I should do, but instead as a beneficiary of Jesus’ actions at the Cross. The performance anxiety ebbs in the face of my Savior, who sustains me with what has eternal resonance: His love.

This does not absolve me of the responsibility to continue taking steps of obedience to serve the communities I am part of, to love all the peoples God created and cherishes. We have witnessed great losses this year, not just of iconic celebrities, but of black women and men bleeding out from police brutality, Syrian families caught in the crossfire of war, LGBTQ individuals gunned down. We saw the devastating loss of trust between racial communities in the U.S. as this past election ripped away the curtain of pretense and revealed how deeply the wounds of racism affect each of us. These stand as the stark realities of 2016, and I am still accountable to my neighbors.

But there is a verse I keep coming back to–the other 3:16, this time in Philippians:

Only let us live up to what we have already attained

The verse follows Paul’s declaration to press on to take hold of what Jesus has for him, to strain toward what is ahead and run the great race. Through these words, the Past becomes a coach spurring us into further action instead of a colossal relic halting our progress. We get a glimpse of God’s eternal gaze and realize that we have journeyed farther than we knew and must keep going, even as we trip and hurtle forward.

We take into the future all the little realizations, the invisible turning points, the conversations that shifted the gears of our thinking, the tears we wept over every death we witnessed, the steely words of our mothers and fathers who warned us not to stop caring, not to stop fighting, even if all we can do in the moment is exult in our next breath.

That is living in its unfettered dynamism, and every single moment of it matters. Nothing is wasted, even our trembling in the face of giants.

Our lives cannot be a cosmic To-Do List where we needle ourselves for not doing enough or loving enough. That thinking helps no one, and it is too feckless and feeble to confront injustice or even face our own demons. We enter each day trundled in a grace outside ourselves, captive only to Jesus, author and perfecter of our faith. Our expectations may waver, our entitlements sour, but He does not change. Our actions on Earth are framed in that grace He extends, and we act on behalf of others because He demonstrates to us each day what love looks like. That is the hope of the Gospel that extends past Christmas morning, past New Year’s Day, and vibrates in every new year to come. It’s the grandiosity of God, not our ambitions, that we must abide in. We move with conviction, not guilt.

Now, we show up and follow Him. That is all He asks, and He will not shame us when we stumble, nor mock us for the yearnings yet to be realized–for ourselves and for our world.

There is much still wrong with the world to be reconciled, and our arms are able to reach that much farther than those before us reached. Not only that, but when I look at my life with the words of Philippians 3:16 mantled on my shoulders, I do not see failure; I see promise. So let us live up to what we have already attained. 

There’s a million things I haven’t done

and I may never do them all

but they are not a weight

compressing me small

I wait on my God

eyes forward

He calls