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It is a good thing to take time every now and then to evaluate what has come before and what is coming head. God gave us days, months, seasons, and years to build a rhythm into our lives. Many use this time to make New Years resolutions.
But what would it look like to focus on what really matters as we look back and look forward? In 2 Corinthians chapter 4, the apostle Paul exhorted the church in Corinth to be courageous in the things that truly matter.
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Thanksgiving is not an attitude for one time a year but a consistent mindset for life.
The celebration of thanksgiving is not a new thing nor is it an American thing. No this goes back to ancient times in Hebrew culture, in fact, Thanksgiving feasts are God’s idea. If you look back in Leviticus you will see instructions for how to do thanksgiving sacrifices and they had festivals for thanksgiving like the festival of booths or tabernacles. God instituted regular times of thanksgiving for a reason. Why? Because our thanksgiving doesn’t come from our circumstances but it comes from knowing and experiencing God.
In Psalm 100, the psalmist instructed all the earth to offer thanksgiving to the Lord because of who He is. We too can offer thanksgiving to the Lord.
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Would you say you are living a fulfilled life? What does that even look like? Is maturity just growing old? Or is there a target to our growing up? What is the aim of your life? If you spent the rest of your life doing what you are doing on a weekly basis, will you look back and say you were fulfilled?
Paul taught the church in Ephesus that Jesus equipped his church with all of the gifts they would need to grow together to spiritual maturity. We can grow together to spiritual maturity.
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Is tolerance automatically a bad thing? Should we tolerate some things and stand firm on others? How do we come to a biblical understanding of tolerance?
In his letter to the church in Thyatira, Jesus commanded them to hold fast to His truth in the face of excessive tolerance. We can hold fast to God’s truth in the face of excessive tolerance.
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Around the New Year is when we start to notice our wallet is a little slim and our waistline is a little plump and we look to make changes. This year, instead of focusing on what is wrong and what needs to be fixed, we can experience the joy that comes from our salvation in Christ.
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Fables teach us work hard, to work for what we want, and that our hard work will be rewarded. Or they teach us to keep working until the end, or not to lie.
Parables, though, are stories Jesus told to help us understand what the kingdom of Heaven is about. In the Parable of the Lost Son, Jesus taught the Pharisees and other religious leaders that God’s forgiveness was freely given because of how generous God the Father is, not because we earn his love by how good we are.
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Jesus taught his disciples how to pray. Instead of jumping onto self improvement plans and goals to hit the gym and lay off the sweets, we can look ahead to a new year and pray like Jesus taught.
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The question is not if, but when you experience doubts about God, what should we do? Should we bottle them up and pretend they aren’t there? Should we give in to them and turn them into unbelief? In Psalm 77, Asaph found encouragement in midst of his doubts of God’s character when he reflected on God’s faithfulness to the Israelites. We too can find encouragement in the midst of our doubts when we reflect on His faithfulness.
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Rather than making New Years Resolutions that we try (usually unsuccessfully) to keep, this year, let’s look at 3 requests we can make of God in prayer for 2018. Based on a what Paul prayed for the Philippian church, we can pray that God would grow us in love, wisdom and spiritual fruit.
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In today’s media-soaked world, we have access to so much information, in near real-time about what is going on. We see every tragedy, every crisis, all the hurt, all the pain going on world-wide. How do we engage with the hurting and vulnerable children in our world without becoming overwhelmed?
In Romans 8, Paul taught the Romans about the 3 movements of spiritual adoption they experienced when they became children of God. These movements can help us understand how to share in Christ’s sacrifice on behalf of orphaned and vulnerable children.