NEW YEAR – NEW YOU
An elderly man moved into a retirement community. It wasn’t long until he had made a number of friends among the other residents. There was one lady he was especially attracted to and she was attracted to him, also. They spent a lot of time together. Finally one evening he proposed, asking her to marry him. The next morning he woke up remembering his proposal, but he couldn’t remember her answer. So he went to her & said, "I’m really embarrassed to admit this, but I know I proposed to you last night but I can’t remember if you said `Yes’ or `No."’ "Oh, thank goodness!" she replied. "I remembered saying ‘Yes’ to someone last night but I couldn’t remember who asked me."
Do you ever feel that way when it comes to New Years resolutions? The New Year is a time to reflect and do a course correction. It is often a time when people make decisions and turn over a new leaf. Maybe they decide they are going to exercise regularly & lose weight. They are going to do all kinds of things to improve themselves physically & spiritually. The problem is too soon we forget and slip back into old habits and patterns. As we start this new year let me suggest to you the attitude you should have:
Phil 3:10 I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11 and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.12 Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. 13 Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, 14 I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.
In Philippians 3 Paul writes about how to succeed in life. There are lots of books today on success. Everyone thinks they have the key to making life fulfilling and solving all life’s problems. The ironic thing is that many books on success are written by unsuccessful people. They have no real experience - they just wrote a book! When I want to learn about success, I want somebody who's done it. I want to look at somebody who has accomplished what I want to accomplish. We learn much more about success -- life -- from models than we do from manuals.
Jesus is our ultimate model. Next to Him, one of the most influential Christians who ever lived would have to be Paul. He was an man who lived life to the fullest. In Philippians 3 we have Paul's autobiography. The first part of the chapter talks about his past. Here he talks about his present and future. Let’s look at the example of Paul. In this passage he briefly explains four keys to successful living.
1. EVALUATION (vs. 13a) – consider myself
Successful living starts in admitting that you don't have it all together, that you still have a long way to go and grow, that you haven't arrived yet, you're not perfect. You do an inventory of your life. You've got to know where you are before you know where you want to go. You start by looking at where are the areas that need improvement.
In verse 13 Paul says “Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it.”
Paul himself was honest about his faults and aware of his weaknesses. In the Good News translation this verse reads "I don't claim that I have already succeeded or become perfect."
To me, that's an amazing statement. Paul is an old man now. If anybody had the right to claim he had arrived it would be Paul. He wrote most of the New Testament. He single handedly spread Christianity throughout the Roman Empire. He made an incredible impact on the world. Yet Paul, at the end of his life, says "I don't have it all together. I haven't arrived. I'm not perfect. I'm still growing." The point is that successful people never stop growing. They are always developing, growing, expanding, learning.
That is so contrary to people today. Many Christians will give you the impression that they never have any problems. They have somehow arrived at sinless perfection. They have no problems or doubts! The longer I grow as a Christian the more acutely aware that I am of my own inadequacies, limitations, weaknesses and faults. Rather than saying "Look how far I've come," I have to say, "Look how far I have to go!" Paul says this is the starting point for successful living -- to face your faults, be honest, do an evaluation.
I remember going to Seminary and thinking I would graduate knowing all the answers. After 4 years and two Masters degrees I left with more questions than before. My focus was not in how much I had learned but how much I still had to learn.
Proverbs 28:13 You will never succeed in life if you try to hide your sins. Confess them and give them up; then God will show mercy to you. (Good News)
Successful people are honest about their faults. Transparency is a mark of joy. A lot of people are miserable trying to be something they are not, afraid to admit their weaknesses because they are more interested in having a reputation than they are in being successful. Sometimes you have to choose between the two -- Do I want to LOOK good or do I want to BE good?
John Wesley was a great English preacher of the 1700’s. He was considered a rather spiffy dresser. One Sunday morning he wore a bow tie that had long ribbons that hung downward. After the sermon was over a lady walked up to him & said, "Brother Wesley, are you open to some criticism?" He said, "I guess so. What would you like to criticize?" She said, "The ribbons on your tie are entirely too long & inappropriate for a man of God." And she took out her scissors & cut them off. A hush fell over the people standing there as Wesley calmly asked, "Now may I borrow the scissors for a moment?" As she handed them to him, he said, "Ma’am, are you open to some criticism?" She answered, "Well, I suppose I am." He said, "All right then, please stick out your tongue."
The first question you ought to ask yourself this new year is, "Where do I need to change?" Take a personal inventory and be honest about what you see.
2. ELIMINATION (vs. 13b) – forgetting what is behind
Paul goes on in verse 13 to say “forgetting what is behind…”
Stop being manipulated by your memories. Paul says if you are going to be all that God wants you to be you need to stop wasting your time on yesterday. It is behind you. As Pumba the Warthog said to Simba, “You’ve got to put your behind in you past…” Later, when confronted with the wise Rafiki he is struck on the head and told “Yes the past can hurt… You can learn from it”. You need let go of the guilt, grief, grudges. You can’t walk into the present holding on to the past. Success involves learning to forget.
Isaiah 43:18 "Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See I am doing a new thing!"
How do you forget the past? Our brains store everything we do. So how do I forget the former?
The word here for forget is ZAKAR and means REMEMBER NOT. To forget does not mean that you no longer remember. It means you choose not to dwell on it. You do not let the past affect you anymore and let it control you or have power over you or manipulate you. You can learn from the past without dwelling in it. Move on.
This is true of God. God is not forgetful but he chooses not to remember our sins.
Psal 25:6 Remember, O LORD, your great mercy and love, for they are from of old. 7 Remember not the sins of my youth and my rebellious ways; according to your love remember me, for you are good, O LORD.
A retentive memory is a good thing, but the ability to forget is the true token of greatness. -- Elbert Green Hubbard
After the Civil War Robert E. Lee visited a Kentucky woman who showed him to the remains of a grand old tree in front of her home. She cried bitterly that its limbs and trunk had been destroyed by Union artillery fire. She waited for Lee to condemn the North and sympathize with her loss. Lee paused, and said, “Cut it down, my dear madam, and forget it.”
Forgetting should not be like raking leaves into a big pile and then just walking away. That just mean you have to rake the yard again. It is not passive but active. It is a choice you make. There are two things you need to forget if you are going to follow Paul's pattern:
a. Forget your Failures
Don’t rehearse things in their heart that God has long since forgiven and forgotten. Satan's favorite desire is to paralyze us with the past, to manipulate us with the memories. Paul says "I learn to forget the past." Do not sit around beating yourself up for mistakes. Everybody here has blown it. We have things we regret doing.
Paul, of all people, probably had many regrets that could have haunted him. He was a persecutor of the church. He hounded people who were believers and had them locked up and stoned. He could have let the guilt from his past cripple him, instead he used it for motivation. Nothing you ever do will change your past. It is gone, over. Since you can’t change it, let it go. Learn from it but then let it go.
b. Forget your Successes
Just like failure, you can learn from success but don’t live in them. It is easy to rest on your laurels, to live in the past, to base your security on past performance, to think, "I've got it made!" The good old days are done with. Let them go. Success tends to make you complacent and fills you with pride. Then you stop growing and learning and then you're going to fail.
Over 2,000 years ago a young Greek artist named Timanthes studied under a respected tutor. After several years the teacher’s efforts seemed to have paid off when Timanthes painted an exquisite work of art. Unfortunately, he became so enraptured with the painting that he spent days gazing at it. One morning when he arrived to admire his work, he was shocked to find it blotted out with paint. Angry, Timanthes ran to his teacher, who admitted he had destroyed the painting. ‘I did it for your own good. That painting was retarding your progress. Start again and see if you can do better.’ Timanthes took his teacher’s advice and produced Sacrifice of Iphigenia, which is regarded as one of the finest paintings of antiquity.
Luke 9:62 Jesus said, ‘Anyone who starts to plow and then keeps looking back is of no use for the Kingdom of God.’ (Good News)
You can’t move forward looking back. You have to live where you are.
3. CONCENTRATION (vs. 13c) – one thing I do
Paul says here in verse 13 “one thing I do.” If all you do is forget the past, you may just have amnesia. Successful people are goal oriented. They focus on the future.
One of the most common diseases in the Church today is Fragmentosis -- trying to do 100 different things at the same time. Jack of all trades; master of none. Most people are spread out too thin. Paul says, find out what counts. He's talking about the power of concentration. If a river spills over its banks you have a marsh, a swamp. But if that river is confined between certain banks, dam it up, channel it and it is a tremendous source of power. Light diffused is powerless, weak. If you take light and concentrate it you have a laser. That is the power of concentration. Life focusing on one thing.
The secret to success is concentration. Pros concentrate on one thing. They specialize. You can't know everything, be everything, do everything. You need to have clear goals. Less than 5% of the people in America ever write down a life goal. It is not by accident that the 5% that do are the top leaders in their field. Write it down and focus on specific goals.
1 Cor 9:24 Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize.
In the 1920s there was a young African American child who was growing up in Cleveland. One day a famous athlete named Charlie Paddock, came to his school to speak to the students. At the time Paddock was considered "the fastest human being alive." He told the children, "Listen! What do you want to be? You name it and then believe that God will help you be it." That little boy decided that he too wanted to be the fastest human being on earth. The boy went to his track coach and told him of his new dream. His coach told him, "It's great to have a dream, but to attain your dream you must build a ladder to it. Here is the ladder to your dreams. The first rung is determination! And the second rung is dedication! The third rung is discipline! And the fourth rung is attitude!" The result of all that motivation is that he went on to win four gold medals in the 1936 Berlin Olympics. He won the 100 meter dash and broke the Olympic and world records for the 200 meter. His broad jump record lasted for twenty-four years. His name was Jesse Owens.
Spiritual growth is not an accident. It is intentional. You must intend to grow. You must make a choice to grow. I don’t know how to say it any clearer than this. You are as close to Jesus Christ as you choose to be. If you are not growing spiritually don’t blame your wife or husband or kids or parents or pastor. You are as close to God as you choose to be. If you don’t feel close to God right now, guess who moved? God didn’t move.
What are you living for? What is your goal in life? What's most important? If you don't know where you're going, nobody else does. Focus on the future.
4. DETERMINATION (vs. 14) – straining towards what is ahead I press on
Paul ends verse 13 “straining towards what is ahead I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.”
This is the principle of determination. Absolutely nothing worthwhile in life happens without effort. The only way you coast is when you're going downhill. If you're coasting in life right now you're headed downhill. Paul said, "I run to the finish."
The great people in life are just ordinary people with extraordinary amount of determination.
They never give up. The word PRESS ON is the Greek word DIOKO which means to run swiftly. It is also the same word as persecution. Before Jesus Paul would persecute or DIOKO the church – chase after them with all his might. Now Paul is chasing after Christ. He's a man of intensity, maximum effort.
There are three kinds of people -- rowboat people, sailboat people, and steamboat people. Rowboat people need to be pushed or shoved along. Sailboat people move when a favorable wind is blowing. Steamboat people move continuously, through calm or storm. They masters of themselves, their surroundings, and their fate. In your spiritual life do you always have to be pushed along or only move with the “next best” fad that comes along. Or is your course set and nothing will stop you from moving forward.
Acts 20:24 However, I consider my life worth nothing to me, if only I may finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me -- the task of testifying to the gospel of God's grace.
This is Paul's life verse. Paul said he's not going to stop or give up or quit. He's going to keep on keeping on until he's experienced all that God had for him in life. Paul said he was going to finish what he started. Is that your life goal as well? To finish the race and complete the work that God has given you to do?
Jonathan Edwards, the 18th-century revivalist, sat down at age 17 and penned 21 resolutions by which he would live his life. Throughout his lifetime he would add to this list until, by his death, he had 70 resolutions. He put at the top of his list: "Being sensible that I am unable to do anything without God’s help, I do humbly entreat Him by His grace to enable me to keep these Resolutions…. Remember to read over these Resolutions once a week." Edwards didn’t casually make New’s Year’s resolutions with an expectation of eventually breaking them. Each week he did a "self-check." He regularly summed up how he was doing and sought God’s help in the process. Christ calls us to commit to actively work at becoming conformed to His image. This coming year resolve to be come a person committed to a godly transformation. If you faithfully do this, you will see your life begin to focus on the spiritual rather than on the passing, material world.
