“A New Year – New Beginnings”, writes Kenneth Lagat.
Posted by africanpress on January 22, 2007
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The New Year is exciting and a happy time because it always brings the opportunity for what seems a new beginning, a chance to “start over”. We all get to start with a new page, and it is up to us what we want to “write” on it.
The “New Year” gives us the chance to discard the mistakes, failures, and other unwanted baggage of the past year, in order to re-focus on God and move forward. This is how Paul expressed it, “This one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before” (Philippians 3:13). Like Paul, we can forget the failures and dark chapters of our past life, because of God’s Grace- His love, acceptance and forgiveness.
In Rome, Italy, the people used to have a “crazy” custom. They waited for the clock to strike midnight – New Year’s eve, to open the windows of their high rise apartments and throw out all their unwanted goods: old sewing machines, dishwashers, furniture, pots and pans, etc. Nobody dared walk the streets immediately at or after midnight.
The New Year offers us the opportunity to not only clear our homes of clutter, unwanted goods but also to consider how we want to change and improve our lives: our spiritual exercises, our attitudes toward people, our family relationships, our professional life, our business practices, and our contributions to the church and community.
Are you making any New Years’ resolutions? Where did the idea of New Year’s Resolutions come from? The earliest evidence is during the reign of The Roman Empire. They made similar resolutions, resolutions that deal with self-centered needs: diet, exercise, lose weight, pay off debts, get a better job, improve professional skills, travel more, change the lifestyle to cope with stress, etc.
The vast majority of New Year’s Resolutions, even among Christians, are in relation to the life that now is. These are good goals to set. However, 1 Timothy 4:8 reminds us to keep these things in their proper perspective: “For bodily exercise profits a little, but godliness is profitable for all things, having promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come”. Paul is reminding us that what is most profitable is improving our godliness, which can bless our present and future life.
When I think of exercising in godliness, what comes to my mind is bearing the fruits of the Spirit: “love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control”. These are the virtues that we need most today in our stressful, rushing, tension-filled lives.
Do we get these virtues by working harder on our good behavior than we did in the past? No, but by following the counsel of 1 Corinthians 3:18. It is by beholding Christ that we are changed. May this be our foremost resolution for 2007: to enrich our Bible study and prayer relationship with Jesus Christ!
By, Kenneth k Lagat
Box 2500, Eldoret, Kenya
+254724604503
Published by African Press in Norway, APN, africanpress@chello.no, tel. +47 932 99 739
