I work all day today and our pastor has invited the church over to his house tonight for a New Year’s Eve party. Seeing as I have no desire to get home after midnight and write a blog before I go to bed, I have decided to write a New Year’s Eve blog early.
As I start writing this blog, it occurs to me that this is the first full year I have spent in my new home. Now I’ve lived here for over a year, but 2008 will be the year I lived here start to finish. It will also indicate the year I really began taking classes in Seminary. Should all have gone well with my last class, which I anticipate, I should have 15 hours of classes done and be well on my way to graduation. This year also marks finally escaping my old job and getting a new position that I enjoy much much more.
There is this aspect of new beginnings that makes us want to try our hardest and begin anew as well. Many people will make New Year’s Resolutions. Exercise equipment will be bought that come February, will be gathering dust in a basement while the owner sits on the couch eating oreos watching Prime Time television.
Yes. Discipline is a hard thing for many of us.
I recently had this conversation with a friend and told him that if he wants to change his life, the time to do it is now. Discipline isn’t easy, but you have to do it. I have begun to turn off my computer much earlier in the day and just sit on the couch at night and read. Sometimes, I don’t really want to do it, but when I start, I find out that I am enjoying myself.
What the new year will be for each of us is up to us. I reckon though that most of us don’t want to go through life and have each year be essentially the same as the last. We’d like to say that this year, we really accomplished something. The only way that we’re going to be able to do that is simply by doing it. We must go out and accomplish something that we deem worthwhile.
Maybe for you it might be learning to exercise some. Maybe you’ve got extra weight you want to burn off. Maybe you want to learn to study more and go back to school. Maybe you were in school and you want to go back and finish getting that degree. Maybe this is the year the young man decides that he’s finally going to pop the question to the girl that he’s been dating for a long time. Maybe this is the year you’re going to begin to take your Christian walk seriously through prayer and Bible study.
I read Rev. 21 this morning and I plan on reading 22 tonight. I think these chapters are appropriate for a new year. It shows the end of the old and the beginning of the new. It means a chance to celebrate the newness. Now I’m not giving an interpretation of Revelation that is cyclic in that way. I do believe there is a final consumation of things coming. However, the words “I am making all things new!” brings a joy to us.
I hope to watch that ball come down, which is something I’ve always enjoyed on New Year’s Eve, and realize that this is a new year ahead that can be a year of exciting adventures and ways to make a difference in this world. What about you? Are you going to change something this year, or will it just be same-old, same-old?
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