Do you believe in New Year’s resolutions? I do.

I believe in New Year’s resolutions. I am not one of those people who make resolutions and forget all about them.

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New Beginnings

I love new beginnings. However, I don’t actually make any resolutions until at least mid-month. This is my “thinking” time. I may not keep any of the first ones but the process alone gets me to the final resolutions.

Some questions to ask

Some of the questions I’m asking myself are these:

What does God want?

What do I want?

I think they’re usually the same by the way.

I mean, think about it.

God uses us according to the gifts He gave us

Why would God ask us to do anything we don’t already have an interest in? Don’t you think God wants us to use the talents He gave us? Why else would he equip us with certain gifts of the spirit, certain talents, and abilities?

Does anyone really believe God creates us willy-nilly, gives us our gifts willy-nilly. God is very intentional, wouldn’t you agree? There is a purpose behind everything God does.

Wouldn’t God want the most qualified person for the job?

God sees our potential

Sometimes we don’t make resolutions because we don’t see our potential. We don’t see our possibilities. Therefore, we don’t even think we can even have goals or make resolutions.

When Scripture addresses how God uses the weak and least-equipped of us, I think it might be referring to how we view ourselves. But God sees something else. He sees our potential. He sees what we can do, not what we can’t do.

Godly examples

First, think of the Apostle Peter. Seriously. At first glance, his arrogant and headstrong personality seemed ill-equipped to preach about love, peace, all the “soft” parts of the Christian faith. However, God needed someone just like him to fearlessly spread the gospel. I’ll bet Peter certainly felt like the “least of these” after he denied Jesus, not once, not twice, but as you know, three times!

Next, there was Moses who felt inferior to speak to Pharoah. Gideon was a young man who told God he was from an interior tribe and God made a mistake picking him for a big task. (How many of us have looked at our background and used it as an excuse.) Esther, a Jewess, from a humble background, felt ill-equipped equipped to save her people.

And the apostle Paul. Could anyone imagine God would use a former persecutor of Christians to actually spread the Good News? The early churches needed someone of Paul’s intelligence and education to organize the first churches. Without these qualities, Paul wouldn’t have been as effective.

Don’t you think Paul, during those three years after his conversion and before he started teaching and preaching, felt like a “less than”? Wouldn’t you wonder why God chose you after all you said and did to persecute his chosen ones?

God sees what we don’t

So with those examples before me, I trust that God sees in me what I don’t see. And with those examples before me, I trust that God’s plan for me fits my interests and abilities.

I’m asking questions of God and of myself. I already know what God requires of me in some areas. In those areas, it’s the refinement I’m looking at.

I know some things for sure.

My own New Year’s resolutions

  • I want to pray more.
  • To know my bible as thoroughly as I can.
  • Make good every day.
  • Leave my personal world in better shape.
  • I want to love the “loves” in my life better.
  • I want to learn to really cook.

How about you? Have you considered making this first month of the new year a time of reflection? A time to make resolutions.

Praying for each other

Finally, when you have a moment, I would appreciate your prayers. I mean that sincerely. We are strangers but strangers can pray for each other. I do it a lot and, oh, that’s one of those other areas I want to do more of in 2020, pray more for strangers. It’s one of my resolutions.

So, that’s it for today. I hope this is truly a good day for you and that by the end of the day, you will have sensed God’s love for you in a mighty way.

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