New Year's Resolutions 2014

Two thousand fourteen is here! Another new year has dawned. Looking back to 2013, all I can do is give thanks unto the Lord Jesus for all that He is and all that He has done. At the closing of 2013, I was enlightened to consider how many of my days in 2013 were counted in the Lord's eyes. I mean not to be introspective and be gloomy about it, but to have a new beginning with repentance and returning to God Himself. It's been a refreshing experience!

Also, the month of January is usually the month where people make new year's resolutions. A lot of people have decided to buy new exercise clothes to start living healthy this year and so forth. So I took some mornings to sit before the Lord and began to converse with Him concerning what kind of resolutions I should make this year.

During those times, item by item concerning my past, present, future life flew by. In a brief moment, where my whole being stopped, laid bare my anxieties and cares, my contingency planning to deal with those issues, and all the decision-making blueprints in my head and my heart. I realized how much I internalized all these concerns but simply forgot to open and tell the Lord about them.

And so right then, at the tip of my tongue were promises that I would do better. Yet before I could muster up determination to make such new year's resolutions, I was reminded of the Apostle Peter, a person of good intention and resolution to defend the Lord Jesus yet failed miserably by denying the Lord with cursing in his mouth.

So, in the end, going back item by item concerning this coming year, only these words come forth, "Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you."

I'm not saying we should not have determination to choose the Lord Jesus in our daily living. I'm just saying that instead of putting demands on ourselves, we shall turn to Him and receive the supply to meet God's demand.

Finally, this hymn has touched me again and again as I sit upon this topic this week. Hope you'd find it inspiring and faith-and-love-infusing as well. Happy new year, everyone!

O Love, that wilt not let me go,

I rest my weary soul in Thee;

I give Thee back the life I owe,

That in Thine ocean depths its flow

May richer, fuller be.

O Light, that followest all my way,

I yield my flickering torch to Thee;

My heart restores its borrowed ray,

That in Thy sunshine’s blaze its day

May brighter, fairer be.

O Joy, that seekest me through pain,

I cannot close my heart to Thee;

I trace the rainbow through the rain,

And feel the promise is not vain

That morn shall tearless be.

O Cross, that liftest up my head,

I dare not ask to fly from Thee;

I lay in dust life’s glory dead,

And from the ground there blossoms red

Life that shall endless be.

Source: http://www.hymnal.net/en/hymn.php/h/432#ixzz2pqL4ScLT