New Year's

Just listen to what Psalms 119:1-6 says. Do you know anyone like that? I only know one. Jesus Christ. This year as we launch our reading through the Bible program, looking for Jesus from cover to cover, expect God to change your life through His Word.

When I was growing up, making New Year’s Resolutions was a given for just about everyone I knew. It was a time of beginning again, a time for setting our sights, a time for new hope for a new year. I remember eating hog jowl and black eyed peas as a symbol of looking for a prosperous year ahead. Today, I’m not sure just how healthy that meal was, but I am sure that setting a plan in place is very much a godly thing. God plans and purposes eternal matters and he made us in his image. We are creatures with the ability to look into the future and imagine and envision. We must use this gift to the glory of God.

In the late 1980’s Steven Covey wrote a best selling book entitled, “Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.” It is the result of hundreds of hours of study and observation and interestingly enough, but not surprisingly, his discoveries of truth about life sound a lot like what you read in scripture. Covey says that before we can become mature, we must accept that we have the power to choose and that we are ultimately responsible for our choices. He uses the word “proactive” a lot. Does that sound a bit like Genesis 2-3 where God allowed Adam and Eve to face the liar and decide whose words they would trust? They were given a choice, but did not choose wisely. Think of the consequences of the power to choose! Next, Covey says, “We need to begin with the end in mind.” The point here is that unless Jesus returns in our life-time, we are all going to die. As the scripture in Psalms 90:12 says, “Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.” And as Hebrews 9:27 reminds us, “It is appointed unto man once to die and after that the judgment.” And as Paul wrote to the Corinthians in 2 Cor. 5:10 “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may be recompensed for the things done in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad. 11 Knowing, therefore, the fear of the Lord, we persuade men…” As an application for beginning with the end in mind, Covey makes a wise suggestion: “Write your own funeral service.” In other words write down what you would like to have said about your life at your funeral. This helps you to get in touch with what is most important to you. It also helps you realize that whatever you live for now ends up being what you eventually died for.

Are you living for what you honestly believe is worth dying for? God gives us the time and opportunity to do just that! He gives us the instruction in his word that shows us how to live for what is truly worth dying for and he gives us strength through his Holy Spirit and the fellowship of other brothers and sisters in Christ to experience just such a life!

By the way, it’s not as complex as you think. As a Christian I know that living for what is worth dying for is as simple as walking with the Lord every day. Walking with God in Jesus Christ is worth dying for! Every day that I do this, I live a day that is worth dying for. What could be greater than serving Jesus? If you serve a brother or sister in his name, you serve the Lord himself! What could be greater than helping someone else get to heaven? If you confess your faith in Jesus Christ and walk with him, you will do just that! What could be more amazing than to speak to and hear from the creator of the universe himself? If you read the scriptures and pray you are doing just that!

Loving God and loving one another, walking in Christ according to his word, this is the greatest life that you can live, period, bar none, end of story.

Here we are on the last day of the year. 2006 is about to be filed away in the archives of time and history. 2007 is on the horizon. What will we do with the coming year? God has given us 31,536,000 seconds to spend this past year. How have we spent them? Would you die for what you lived for this past year? You gave a year of your life for whatever you did. This year ahead, some of us may not live to see end. If the Lord returns, none of us will.