New Year Resolutions

As we have now entered into the New Year I wonder what the purpose of my life will be over the next twelve months. We all know the futility of making New Year resolutions. I believe they fail because they are so often self-centered. ‘I will lose weight,’ ‘I will spend less,’ or even ‘I will give more to charity.’ Any New Year resolution must be God-centered. It probably would be wise to ask God to write the list!

What does God have in mind for me this coming year? He alone knows when the difficult patches are coming and where I will need His extra care. It is in God’s provision when there will be sunny days and we will be full of rejoicing. It could be that illness will be looming on the horizon and to have lost too much weight would have been harmful Maybe there will be some heavy expenses coming and having saved money it will be useful.

How can I make resolutions about the future when I don’t know what the future will bring? I will leave it in God’s safe hands.

It’s almost a joke; we make New Year Resolutions and then break them within days. We resolve to lose weight, be kinder to friends or start a new hobby. I wonder how many of these resolutions will reach February. This all points to how really weak we human beings are. If we can’t keep to these small changes, how can we ever turn our lives round for the better.

How often have we promised God we won’t act in a certain way only to stumble very quickly. It goes to show we can’t do it on our own. No wonder God said we are as frail as dust. We are weak while He is strong. We can’t make it on are own. Maybe the only New Year Resolution we need to make is to rely on God more.

Have our resolutions started to wane? Are we finding it more difficult to keep to what we promised ourselves? Maybe we didn’t expect to keep them knowing our past record?

More importantly were they the right resolutions in the first place? To eat less and exercise more are worthy ideas but not earth-shattering. If our resolutions were more worthy, we might be able to keep them. What about to love God more, walk closer to Him, be kinder to others especially those we do not like? We need to ask God to help us keep these standards, without Him we will not succeed.