What's next, Papa?

This morning I was reading Romans 8 in The Message, a version of the Bible I don't regularly read. Verse 15 jumped off the page and captured my attention: "This resurrection life you received from God is not a timid, grave-tending life. It's adventurously expectant, greeting God with a childlike 'What's next, Papa?'" As I look forward to 2011, I don't want my focus to be fixed on the crosses and losses of 2010. There's a good chance this past year has been my most difficult one yet. Check that, it has been the most difficult. By God's grace he has helped me to keep the faith and to be faithful, but it's been anything but easy. I have worked to keep myself spiritually and physically fit, which always helps me to remain emotionally balanced, but it has been a fight all year long. In the verse above it refers to a "grave-tending life." Paul is making reference to a life focused on our fears, which includes all that is wrong and all that could go wrong. I recall a message where the pastor talked about choosing not to nurse and rehearse our hurts. Whatever crosses and losses have shared our journey through 2010, I hear the Lord saying, "Let it go." We can't allow what has happened keep us from being "adventurously expectant" as we welcome the new year, and saying to the Father, "What's next, Papa?"