A Year of Starting

This is a look forward.

It's the first week in the new year, so if I was ever to write about my future goals and resolutions, this is when you'd expect that sort of post. But I've never been one attracted to the bullet point resolution items or the "every day I will…" list.

My desire is for my heart to be molded and changed, to become more like Christ. How do you make this goal into a checklist? How do you even define this in measurable terms? Is that really the best way to conduct my life and my aspiration to become a better lover of Jesus?

In September, I spent a weekend in the woods, learning out to disciple better worshipers of God in my small group at college. One thing that really encouraged and challenged me was that we must never stop starting.

Such an idea really undermines the year-to-year goal system. We tend to take the need to change, to challenge, to becoming a better person and we put the "start" at the beginning of the year. January 1st is the time to start things. We don't wake up on July 22nd and think, "Yes, today I start praying better."

But what if we never stopped starting obeying God's instruction? Would it drastically change your life?

My continual goal is to be a better worshiper every day. But specifically this year, I want to consider the wondrous works of God and remember His abundant steadfast love—and to never stop starting to do this.

Why this immeasurable goal? Why not something practical like "read the Bible everyday." Because God has been teaching me something very weighty over the past couple years.

God showed me that my weakness will never ever amount to more than who He is.

When we hit challenges in our life, when we have stress and anxiety, our own weakness is revealed to us and to those around us. There is something I've observed in my life and in the life of others: we tend to dwell in our weakness.

We hold tight to our weakness and we live in our struggle, focusing so much on what makes living life difficult, that we end up worshipping our own frailty. Our own weakness becomes all we think about, all we talk about. We make our weakness the biggest thing in our life, and we too easily forget that God is bigger than our biggest struggle.

For me, physical pain and continual migraines are my constant reminder of my weakness. The pain, the doctors visits, the changing medication, the numerous supplements are often overwhelming. It is so easy to focus on my hurt, on my struggle in doing little things like walk to class with the sun in my eyes. I make my pain the biggest thing in my life, when it is so small compared the power of the God I worship.

Psalm 106 has become a favorite of mine this semester. The psalmist talks about the history of the nation of Israel and the faithful God who cared for them. He says, "We and our fathers have sinned; we have committed iniquity; we have done wickedness." If you are familiar with Old Testament at all, this might seem obvious. The people continually sinned and rebelled against God. But, the psalmist says that their sin was that they did not consider the wondrous work of God and they did not remember the abundance of his steadfast love.

How often do I focus on myself and my struggle, on my pain that I forget about the love that God has poured into my life? I forget to consider His beautiful grace that He has demonstrated to me every single day.

We so often focus on things besides the wonderful God that we have. We worship our own weakness instead of giving all of the glory to our powerful God. This takes me back to my desires for this year.

And the only way to keep the wondrous works of God and His abundant steadfast love at the forefront of my life is to be in the Word daily and to live a life of worship. I desire to daily be in awe of who God is and all He has done, and I never want to stop starting, worshiping my big and powerful God.

// Alyson Jennie