happy new year!

It's almost impossible to enter a new year without at least giving some small thought to resolutions. For so many of us the association brings a nagging sense of dread, as we take inventory of all our failures and shortcomings and determine (yet again) to be better, stronger, more disciplines, more faithful...more whatever we are not.

As an imperfect perfectionist I find myself overshadowed by shame and wondering if I'll ever become the woman God created me to be. As the saying goes, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Not that the thought that I need to lose weight or keep my apartment cleaner will keep me from my destiny in Christ, but so many times I decide to muster up the willpower to complete change in my life, only to find myself once again in the shame of failure. I cannot change on my own. So where does that leave me? Isn't the New Year naturally a good season to take inventory and chart a path of positive change in my life and my sphere of relationship? I have to answer yes to that, but in that act of taking inventory I now realize I must look at the big picture, beyond myself and what I've done or can do.

As I look back at the last twelve months of my life I see one common thread. Everything that worked in my life worked because I took my eyes off myself and looked at Jesus. Hebrews 12:1-2 says, "...since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily hinders our progress. And let us run with endurance the race that God has set before us. We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, on whom our faith depends from start to finish.".

So does that mean I should not try to make positive changes in my life? No, but the way to do that is not through a list of resolutions, It is by one simple thing - keeping my eyes on Jesus. That verse clearly says that by keeping my eyes on Jesus I am stripped of everything that hinders me from laying ahold of what He has for me. everything. As I focus on Him, as I know His face, I understand Him more and know His desires. It's not about me anymore. It's about the prize, the path. Life becomes less about the act of running the race and more about why I'm running.

Later in the same passage it says that Jesus endured the cross because of "the joy set before Him". The amazing thing is the transposition that this represents. There wasn't joy beyond the pain for Jesus because of some vague prize of niceness in heaven with the Father. I was the joy set before Him for which He endured the torture and pain of the race He was given to run. It was me! His love for me, and His desire for me to be able to know the Father's love and live in relationship with Him. And now, because Jesus ran with endurance on my behalf I have been made able to run with endurance to lay ahold of that for which God has laid ahold of me. I now run for the joy set before me, and that joy is Jesus, and everything that matters to Him. As I keep my eyes on Him I find myself far better able to lay ahold of the joy that comes through faith in God's ability to transform me, my community, my family, my city, my country and the nations beyond. I begin to be filled with the joy that comes from His divinely enabling me to love the same things He loves, the way He loves.

I think Isaiah 50:7 says it best; "Because the Sovereign LORD helps me, I will not be dismayed. Therefore, I have set my face like a stone, determined to do his will. And I know that I will triumph."