Do you make New Year’s Resolutions? I don’t as a rule. But I
do have projects or habits I wish to continue in the New Year. I have also
chosen a word to pursue as an ever-increasing characteristic in my life next
year. I have chosen “Joy” or rejoice as part of the fruit of the Spirit to live
more intentionally. I am carrying along previous year’s words of “faithfulness,
kindness and gentleness.”
I tend to watch news too much. The treads running through
news programs are: pain, destruction, fear, crisis, illness, scandal and
happy. You can choose you own, but
clearly the attention and headline grabbers are all negative, except happy.
We say, “Happy New Year!” The ball comes down at Times
Square and clocks tick midnight around the world, ushering in a new year. The
old is gone, the new has come. But has
anything really changed? Do you still have the same bad habits and
relationships? Is the world still a mess? It is hard not to answer yes to these
questions. So what do we need to do to change things? How about trying harder
to be happy? Yes, we can develop disciplines that will help us lose weight or
exercise more in the New Year. Some might try to read more or even start going
to church. But do these things really change you to be new?
There is really only one thing we can do to become brand
new. That is to respond “yes” to the invitation to join the family of
Christians, to be a “child of God,” to be “born again.” “But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to
become children of God, to those who believe in His name” (John 1:12). God created all people, but not all are
children of God. Paul talked a lot about
becoming new. “Therefore, if anyone is
in Christ, he is a new
creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new” (2Corinthians
5:17). This speaks of our pasts being forgiven and how our way of life will be
totally changed.
This
passage from old to new is a spiritual one that changes all things in the life
of a believer. This is a change that he speaks of in Romans 12:1 wherein we are
“transformed
by the renewing of your minds.” This is a process of leaving our conforming to
the world to a new one of pleasing God and doing His will as the Bible details.
This is not magic or something we can buy, this is giving our lives over to the
One who made us in the way He designed. This is the “new creation” that
brings peace and mercy through the circumcision or surgery on the heart as
Galatians 6:15 tells us. The world has been cut out of us. We may be in the
world, but not of it. You will become set apart, alien and brand new.
So, what
do you choose? Do you want the same all problems and solutions or a whole new
view and perspective on all things? I for one am joyful in the New Year that I
have chosen God as my Good Shepherd and I will want for nothing. He is my
guide, guardian, leader and power within me through His Holy Spirit. This world
is a mess within which to live. “But Jesus looked at them (the disciples) and said to them, ‘With men this is
impossible, but with God all things are possible’” (Matthew
19:26). Happy New Year!
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Thanks for sharing your thoughts.