I have been wondering about New Years Resolutions. I don’t know about you, but I have made many in my time. Eat less, exercise more, etc. Usually they are about me. Makes sense doesn’t it? Such resolutions are about us, hopefully becoming a better person, or at least a person able to live a bit longer! However, it is inevitable that such resolutions fail. To be sure some of us manage to succeed, but if we are really honest, then we would have to admit by about the 14th of January we are back to our old habits. Surely there has to be a better way.
On our notice board for the next week is the message “New Journey, New Beginning, New God.” The start of a New Year is an opportunity for a New Beginning, and a New Journey. However, New God? Who and, or what are most important in your life? For many of us work is important, hopefully your family is important, for others saving for a house, saving for travel, getting a job. All these are important in our lives, and usually our New Years resolutions will be around helping us to achieve these more fully. Yet, if we are honest with ourselves, they don’t really satisfy, because we don’t achieve them to the level that would make us happy.
I along with my wife and family, have had many ups and downs through our almost 30 years of marriage. Difficulties through courtship because of my being in the Navy in Sydney and she in Adelaide, after marriage me being in the Navy at sea so often and she left at home with a small child, leaving the Navy and going to Theological college, establishing ourselves in new homes and new faith communities, the death of our second child at the age of 7, and many others. Our journey has been difficult and also incredibly rewarding, but as I look back on our journey together I see one constant. God at the centre of our lives individually and as a couple and as a family. When we have not had God fully at the centre, but have put other ambitions to the fore, and God relegated the difficulties have increased because we end up doing it in our own strength, not his. Having God at the centre of your lives will not mean that you don’t have difficulties, but it does mean that you will have a new perspective on those difficulties and a new sense of hope that you can and will survive, and thrive.
Can I challenge you in your New Years Resolutions to consider trying to put God in the centre of your life this year, and see where that Journey, that new beginning takes you.
Fr. Keith