Tag Archives: new year

New Year, New Resolution

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It seems that people are always trying to come up with something new.  A new gadget. A new plan. A new way of doing something old. A new resolution.

A new resolution. This is the time of year where the whole world is coming up with resolutions. People who vow to themselves and to God and others that they are going to quit smoking, lose weight, be a better worker, to… do something new or improve in something old.

The last few months I’ve been going through my journals which cover the last 30 years, and I realized that in those last 30 years I have made many of the same resolutions over and over, only to have failed. Perhaps it’s failure all by itself.  Perhaps it’s forgetfulness, perhaps it’s poor discipline. In light of my discovery, I have decided to do the one thing that matters most. The one thing that may tie all the others in and help me to accomplish my 30 year goals. For, within those thirty year goals, there are great plans to lose weight, eat better, walk more, be a better wife, a better daughter, a better friend, be a better mother, be a better whatever. However, those great plans have been fruitless, yielding no significant evidence of success in the past.

The other day I gave much thought to New Year’s resolutions. The desire of my heart was to be part of the sharing of a meal alongside the homeless. To offer hope to the hopeless. To be part of a work that offers shelter, protection, love,  food, and care to the orphans. To befriend the elderly. To encourage the disheartened. That’s a lot of resolution for one year. However, it can all be accomplished if I do that one thing that matters most. To love Jesus with all my heart, with all my soul, and with all my mind.

If I can do that, I will seeclearly the opportunities to aid the homeless, to offer hope and encouragement, and to care for children. I will see the elderly who are alone, I will recognize discouragement in another, and the opportunities will be endless to serve Him. This can only be accomplished by loving Jesus with all my heart, with all my soul, and with all my mind. It is only through discipline and diligence and keeping my focus on Him alone that I will be successful.

I guess then, that is my resolution for 2011… simply – to love Jesus most.

A New Year, A New Decade

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Tomorrow is the end of another year
Followed by the beginning of a new year
A new sunrise
Old plans with new ideas
Old habits desiring new disciplines
Old dreams with new hopes

Tomorrow marks the end of another decade
Followed by the beginning of a new one
Ten years ahead of me
To change a habit
To change my community
To change the world

I have a vision
To see the orphans loved
Clothed, fed, and sheltered.
To see the homeless loved,
Clothed, fed, and sheltered.
To see the widows loved,
Protected, cared for.
To see the lonely befriended,
The hopeless hopeful,
The weary strengthened.

Can it be done?
I don’t know.
I do know I cannot do it alone.
But if I can encourage just one heart,
Offer food to just one who is hungry,
Give a coat to just one who is cold,
Give my time to be a friend to the friendless,
Offer hope to the hopeless,
and rest for the weary -
It can be done.
I will not have changed the world,
But I will have changed my life and
My heart will have been changed in the process.

**A New Year

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This day, which began twelve short moments ago, is a new day. A new day to say anew “Have a super day” to someone new. Could be a new shopper ahead of you in a new line at an old store. But, just imagine that it could be a new experience for that individual in this new day.

It’s a new moment of this new day to thank God anew for his grace. To experience his grace once more, for putting up with the ‘old man’ that tends to reappear in me. Oh how I wish that each moment, each second of the day I could stay right there – right in His arms.

I get so distracted and so busy with lesser important things and before I realize it, all the new days so graciously given to me have become like the old days and spent on those lesser things. If Jesus really is my first love, then why do I let that happen? And I do let it happen by saying yes to all of the things that take me away from Him and on to those lesser, frivolous things.

How do I do that? How do I stay focused?

When I was young, I could see near and far very well. My vision was great. As I have aged, however, it has needed readjusting. I lost the ability to ‘focus’ well on whatever it was I was trying to see. I’ve needed glasses and as long I keep those glasses on, my vision – my focus – has been good, once again. My inability to focus has been renewed.

So… that’s the answer. In order to stay focused on God I need glasses. Glasses that have the ability to see what I can’t. Glasses that won’t come off. I need God-glasses that help me to stay focused when my vision wanders and I get off track.

I think in this New Year I will ask God for glasses. God-glasses that keep my eyes dependent on Him – for everything.

In 1 John 4 it says, “We love because he first loved us.” He loved us first. He pursued us, wanted us. He taught us what love was all about. Revelation 2 says, “I know your deeds, your hard work and your perseverance… You have persevered and have endured hardships for my name, and have not grown weary. Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken your first love.”

My first love… Jesus Christ. I have to confess that there have been times when I have lost the life, the fervency of when that first love appeared. Sort of like being “in love”. There can come a time when we grow ‘comfortable’ and can even take those we love for granted. Our affections cool off if we don’t care for those who are important to us. We forget that in order to keep the relationship strong, we must constantly be working on it. If we neglect to take this approach with the Lord, He will be grieved.

Therefore, He advises us, “Remember the height from which you have fallen!” Yes, if we just take a few moments to remember… remember how much better it was when we were focused and obedient. When peace filled our lives even in the midst of chaos. When strength ran throughout us even when I felt weak. His peace. His strength. Hope abounded in the midst of trials and faith did not falter.

Yes, how much better. So, what to do…

I have grieved over my lack of attention and neglect. I have been ashamed of disregarding the presence of the One who loves me more than anyone else ever has or ever will. I must return to the place when I fell away. The place when we walked and talked throughout the day, without end. The place where peace covered me and where strength held me. The place where nothing else mattered. The place I constantly long to be.

Matthew Henry says we should “endeavor to revive and recover [our] first zeal, tenderness, and seriousness, and must pray as earnestly, and watch as diligently, as [we] did when [we] first set out in the ways of God.”

So here I go. I want to endeavor anew and recover my zeal for Jesus. I want to display a tenderness towards Him as Mary did as she sat at his feet. I want a seriousness about this wanting – a seriousness that says no to frivolous things that distracts me and leaves me inattentive to Him. I want to pray as earnestly and to watch as diligently as I did before I fell from the height where I was set in the ways of God.

I’m going to find where I set down my God-glasses and put them back on. I need a new view.