I wonder how many people have already broken their New Year’s resolutions?
I stopped making resolutions when I was just a teenager. I figured out fairly quickly that setting goals of this sort was an invitation to failure. Once I had failed, I would feel bad about myself and whatever it was that I had wanted to do. Rather than double down and work harder, I would head the opposite direction.
Setting goals is something that I also avoid. I either do or I don’t. I might have short term plans – things that I need to do and/or want to do. I don’t consider them goals but things on a to do list. They are things which I can accomplish, sometimes with a little more work and time than a regular task but not a goal. If for some reason, life intervenes and changes my plan, so be it. It is not as if I have failed, just changed.
Maybe it is just a matter of wording and something that I need to do to be in the right mindset. Goals seem to be something not quite in reach. I refuse to be depressed or sad because I haven’t accomplished something that I myself set as a plan.
In a workplace, goals can and should be set as a measure of productivity. Based on the results, you are rewarded or not. That is understandable. But in life outside of work, I don’t understand it.
Some people take their “goals” too seriously. It can be a matter of do it or literally, die. I know someone who had this type of thinking but was able to get his head on straight before he did something drastic. He did this before he became a Christian and he thought it was of his own work to accomplish. Having failed, he thought death was the only solution.
Once he became a Christian, he realized that God was working with him and that God’s love was the key to his happiness in life. He was given a reprieve from his earthly path which would have ended in death by his own hand. He saw that God wanted him to live and to live abundantly, no matter the circumstances, no matter which goals were attained or not attained. That the only goal that really mattered was living for God.
We’ve been asked by our church to set an attainable goal for the New Year. I won’t do that. I will schedule a plan for something to do. Something that I currently don’t make the time for but which is important for me to do. That way, I am sticking to my plan but if I fail, okay. I’ll just start again the next day and continue on.
Maybe for some, the idea of a goal works well. Maybe it does for you, too. If not, perhaps doing as I do will work. Part of my schedule is spending time reading the Bible and spending time in prayer. This is something that I try to do every day. I had some problems recently reading the Bible as the book was too heavy for me to lift (as is any book right now.) I was sad about this and prayed about it asking for help.
My husband was able to download a copy of the Amplified Study Bible to my iPhone that works great for me now. The thing is, don’t give up. Look to God and ask him for guidance and help with what you should do. Perhaps the goal was good to begin which or, perhaps, it was wrong. In failing, you may have done the best thing you could for yourself.
There are some things in life that we really have to do. They are the purpose of our lives and those are the things that God has for us to do. Not really goals at all but, instead, the reason we are alive to begin with.
Jesus came to this earth for a reason. He was God, the son, who created the entire universe. We are his creation and he loved us so much, rather than let us wallow in sin in eternity without him, he put on the flesh of his own creation to become one of us.
He was God and man in one flesh. He did this so he could live without sin. He had the same temptations, the same pains and suffering that we do. As God, he was able to go through these without sinning as we do. He did so by obeying the words of the Bible. By being sinless, he was able to communicate with God, the father.
It wasn’t that he could not sin but that he would not. Satan tempted him regularly but he was able to withstand it by sticking to the words of God. He did it for us. His purpose, his reason for being, was to come to earth and live a sinless life. And then, he was to willingly die for us and provide us with a covering for our sin.
The blood that he shed is the covering for those who accept him as their resurrected Savior. When God the father looks at man, he sees sin and as a perfect God, he cannot have sin in his presence. When God looks at a Christ follower, he sees only the blood of Jesus. He does not see sin. We are able to pray to him and have a relationship with him as our Father in heaven because of the atoning power of Christ’s blood.
Jesus had a purpose for his life and he fulfilled it. Just like him, we have a purpose that God has set for us. Part of our lives are spent trying to find that purpose and then, once found, living to accomplish it.
We aren’t sinless like Jesus, so we will fail and fall away from our purpose time and time again. Just don’t give up. Ask God to pick you back up and give you a renewed spirit. Then start again. You may find that your understanding of your purpose is altered. Not because it has altered but rather your understanding is improved by your continuing relationship with God.
One purpose that we all share is that we are to spread the good news of Jesus sacrifice and his free gift of pardon for everyone in this fallen world. It does not matter who they are and it does not matter what we think of them (or what they think of themselves), they are still a creation of God and he loves them. He loves them so much that he died for them. That’s true of a child who lies or a mass murderer or a child molester. He still loves them and they can find his salvation.
That is not an earthly pardon but one in eternity. Those who break the rules of this world will have to pay the price that society dictates. So, in earthly terms, each person’s sins or rule breaking are measurable. To God, the sins are all the same and will keep you from his presence.
If you are not a Christian, no matter what you have done, God loves you. Look to Jesus for your redemption. He will by no means turn away from an earnest and sincere prayer for forgiveness. Once you have accepted Christ, ask for his help in living each day. He has sent the Holy Spirit to live in us and guide us and to keep us on track for the purpose of God that we are here on this planet to accomplish. Just like with my friend, learn to let God’s love be the key to your happiness in life.
Mark 8:34-38
Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.
For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it.
What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?
If anyone is ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will be ashamed of them when he comes in his Father’s glory with the holy angels.”