Well, it's that time of year again. You know the drill. We all look at the calendar, watching as yet another year comes to a close, looking hopefully toward the year to come.
If you're anything like me, you'll usually spend a good amount of time between Christmas and New Year's Eve thinking about what you'd like to do differently this year. You'll look at the bad habits you'd like to break, and you'll look at some good habits you'd like to do more of.
They say that most of the health club memberships that are purchased in this country are sold between late December and early January. While I'm a firm believer in maintaining a healthy lifestyle, I would guess that the vast majority of those memberships fall by the wayside before mid-February. How do I know this? I've purchased a few myself.
The craziest part is that, as months passed and I wasn't going to the gym at all, I refused to cancel my membership for at least the remainder of the year. Why? Because, in my own twisted little form of self-motivation, I assumed that having to pay every month would eventually frustrate me to the point that I'd return to the gym. Maybe my logic was even more twisted than that. Maybe there were times when I believed that paying the membership fee every month while receiving no benefit from it was the exact punishment I deserved for breaking my New Year's resolution.
Those of you who are laughing the hardest after reading the previous paragraph are clearly guilty of the same.
Regardless of whether it's health club memberships, or diet plans, or savings plans, or whatever we see as the most pressing issue in need of being resolved in our lives, our view is usually very narrow. We see a problem, and we want to fix it. We know what the "fix" is, and we resolve to do that very thing.
More often than not, we make a valiant effort to succeed. We'll usually last for a period of time, and do well with it while the determination remains. But for most of us, we'll eventually fall into the same bad habits we've had before.
When you think of a resolution you'd like to make this year, what would it be? What's your number one concern heading into the new year? What has been your number one concern heading into previous years?
Last year at this time, I made a relatively vague, but extremely important New Year's resolution. After experiencing all that I've been through over the past year, I have no choice but to look back and see it as being the starting point.
I resolved that, last year, I would do everything within my power to move as close to God as I possibly could. I resolved that I would no longer make any excuses for myself, but would instead seek Him out in every aspect of my life.
Funny thing about making resolutions like that...God hears you when you do.
What followed for me was an absolute whirlwind of a year, breaking me free from a commonplace, day to day life that wasn't truly living, but which was instead merely existing. I was literally ripped from my comfortable, uneventful, boring little world I had created for myself, and was thrown into a world where nothing was certain, nothing was familiar, and nothing was the same.
I was brought to a place where - in the very midst of my own confusion, frustration and uncertainty of a life that had seemingly been thrown up for grabs - I was actually being led to accomplish a number of things I had previously believed were nearly impossible.
What I learned - not merely from head knowledge, but from practical experience - is that, with God, nothing is impossible.
The only way that I can rightly describe it would be to say that the Lord Himself reached down, picked me up by the scruff of the neck, and then sat me down face to face with Him, showing me in great detail where I was going wrong, what I needed to correct, and in the end, how much He loved me.
There are two very distinct truths that one realizes when God draws them that close. First, no matter how good, moral, beautiful, intelligent, or talented we may believe we are, we are absolutely nothing without God. Secondly, when we have too high of an opinion of ourselves just before coming face to face with Him, we would be wise to humble ourselves first. If we don't, He has no problem humbling us.
The man I am today is a completely different man than the one who sat here one year ago. Why? Because it's absolutely impossible to come that close to God without being changed forever.
Do you want to make a New Year's resolution that will forever change the course of your life? Resolve to move closer to the Lord, to seek Him with far greater determination than ever before, and then wake up every morning, praying desperately to ask Him to show you how. Ask Him to show you His presence in your life, and prepare to be amazed.
If you do these things, remaining determined to draw more near to God to the best of your ability each day, I can absolutely guarantee that you'll find yourself sitting here at this time next year, being absolutely blown away by the year you have just experienced.
I don't say these things lightly. Experiencing this type of closeness with God can be terrifying. It can strip us down to absolute nothing. It can bring about changes that we never would've expected, and quite possibly never would've wanted. But in the end, when the dust has settled and the smoke has cleared, we reach a place where see more than ever before, understand more than ever before, and can be blessed by God in way we've never imagined possible.
“For this reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink; nor for your body, as to what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not worth much more than they? And who of you by being worried can add a single hour to his life? And why are you worried about clothing? Observe how the lilies of the field grow; they do not toil nor do they spin, yet I say to you that not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, will He not much more clothe you? You of little faith! Do not worry then, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear for clothing?’ For the Gentiles eagerly seek all these things; for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you." - Matthew 6:25-33
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