The change to a new year always prompts new resolutions, goals intended to be met within the confines of a year. Anything can be a resolution: losing weight, talking more frequently to your mother, taking a long-desired trip, learning to play the guitar, quitting smoking. A resolution requires you to do something, to change a behavior or routine. You cannot keep your resolution if you do not change your ways, but changing is the hardest thing you will be faced with doing.
As people, we all have a love/hate relationship with ruts. We want something different, but we don’t want to do anything new to get it. We’re creatures of habit – good or bad – and it takes a strong commitment to shore up weak or sloppy places in our lives.
One of the most powerful resolutions that I think we can make is found in Lamentations 3:40-41. It says, “Let us search out and examine our ways, and turn back to the Lord; let us lift our hearts and hands to God in heaven.” To examine means to “inspect in detail to determine the nature or condition of something.” When was the last time you inspected in detail your habits and behaviors?
I encourage you: as you’re putting into action your 2015 resolutions, take some time and examine yourself. In those areas where you’ve veered a little or a lot off course, turn back to the Lord. Lift your heart – that’s your thoughts, desires and emotions – and your hands – your actions and resources – to God. In this way, you will consecrate yourself anew to His plan and purpose for your life… and you’ll give yourself a better 2015 than you can imagine!