Happy New Year!!
Where do we get this idea that God’s plans for us include starting strong and finishing poorly?
Think of every person in the Bible that waited until the turn of a calendar year to be who God called them to be, to do what God called them to do.
“Yes, Lord! …In January.”
Not much of a list, is it?
Why do we think that the Lord waits for us to purchase new planners to intervene in our affairs?
What if the Lord commands you to do something you don’t have a sticker for? What if the Lord allows a circumstance that makes a mess of all your pretty planned out squares?
Let Him.
He is God, there is no other.
He is good, there is no gooder…
(I couldn’t help myself lol)
The Lord commands. We respond. Period.
We either promptly obey or we promptly disobey. Seriously. Think about that.
Now, we would never call it that. We would call it “considering, thinking,” “praying about” or in moments of slightly more transparency, “procrastinating.”
But there’s nothing mature or wise about delayed obedience.
Nor anything admirable about running ahead of God’s calling or wandering in directions He does not lead us.
My, how we have forgotten our place.
We spend this time every year making new resolutions, telling ourselves and others (and God!) what WE have deemed a priority.
But how many resolutions are things we simply carried over another year? How many “to-do’s” for next year are really just “not quites” from this year? How many came from the mind of man, but not the heart of God?
Friend, He wants more and better for you.
More than feeble frustration. More than your best effort could possibly muster on its own.
You are made in the image of God Almighty. He leaves no project undone. He executes every plan fully and faithfully. He is fruitful, efficient and brilliantly creative. And HE empowers you to do ALL that HE calls you to do.
But He makes no guarantees for the stuff you decided on your own.
What if your only resolution this year was to be more obedient this year, than you were last year? To walk in more grace or freedom, than before? And then, beyond that—let the Lord show you what that should look like.
Make goals. But inquire of Father first. Let him call you to impossible things you could never manage on your own.
Then trust Him to make a way.
What would next year’s New Years, look like if we were celebrating what only God could do? And did do?
It makes just drinking more water seem small.
