New Year Resolutions

Another new year is upon us! Many are hoping for a new start, a fresh or a refreshed beginning. One way we usually try to achieve this is by making New Year resolutions that, if held to, can bring change – change for the better. Maybe it is as simple as a diet (although there is nothing simple about losing weight), or a choice to exercise more, or pick up an interest (either never picked up or one that's gathering dust on the shelf), maybe to display more kindness, or to be more financially disciplined. Something new, something renewed, something gained, something regained.

There is something about having completed another lap around the sun that gives us impetus to set up the next lap with better habits that will propel us forward. What are you considering? What resolution (plus action) could change your life?

Of course, for some people, the very idea of a new day, a new beginning is beyond reach, beyond resolutions being made to affect change. Their needs and aspirations aren’t those of us living in relative peace and safety, where resolutions can bring change. Sometimes survival is their only resolve.

It was to people like this that Jesus came – people oppressed and downcast, sheep without a shepherd. Jesus wasn’t suggesting New Year’s resolutions to them. He was in fact God’s New Creation resolution for them. God had long ago resolved to forgive their sins, to heal their waywardness, to reconcile them to the Father and one another. It was to be a new exodus, a new creation. This would bring a revolutionary change to their lives, that no amount of personal endeavor or resolutions could ever hope to achieve.

This is God's New Year resolution to all who believe. The benefits far outstrip that of any New Year resolution – no matter how noble or selflessly resolved. They simply don’t compare.

This is the fresh start, the new day, the new year, everyone needs, resolved in and by God’s great love for us.

Happy New Year! May it be a year of new beginnings.