A New Beginning

Believe it or not a new year has begun. No matter how quickly you or others have felt like the last few months have flown by, the fact remains that we all have to get used to writing “2011” on our checks (it could be March before I get that right). Yet with a new year we all look forward to a new beginning.

What is it about the change of the calendar from December to January that gives us the sense of having a fresh start? Perhaps it is the thought that our mistakes and failures of the previous year really are in the past. We can leave the past and move into the coming days with a clean slate. The possibilities of the new year are before us. Seize the day!

Perhaps that’s why each new year so many of us make resolutions. We want to lose weight, get in better shape, or stop smoking. Relationally we plan to be a better husband or wife, a better friend. As Christians we resolve to pray more, to read through the Bible. Yet whatever our resolutions many are broken and abandon before Valentines Day.

I have some goals and desires that I would like to accomplish in the 365 days we call 2011, and with God’s help I will look back at the coming year, not with regret or amazement at how quickly time flies. Instead I intend to be thankful for what God has helped me accomplish.

• Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart.

Psalm 37:4 NIV

Ultimately each of my goals for the new year boil down to this one thing. The more I purpose to keep God first in my life, the more I will see my desires being fulfilled. Not that God will simply give me everything I want. Better than that, God will fill my heart with His desires. God wants to transform me in to the person He knows I can be. Losing weight and exercising more is part of taking care of the Holy Spirit’s temple. That’s why I’ve joined a health club and got up early this morning when I would have liked another hour of sleep.

You can call these new year resolutions if you want. I choose to see each day as a new beginning in which God fills my heart with desire, not for a new year, but for this moment to live and breath and be the person He is making me to be.