Happy New Year and Newness of Life
My name is Sharon. I am a Jesus follower. I love to share the bits and bobs of my life's journey, what I find beautiful and transforming, and what I learn from the Bible, especially what I learn about God's unfailing faithfulness (Psalm 46).
If this is something that sounds interesting to you, I invite you to subscribe so you don’t miss a single post.
Hello friends!
I’ve been home for nearly two weeks. For the majority of that time I was home sick trying to get over a head cold and chest congestion. I didn’t accomplish much during this time except trying to reset my internal clock and get well. My sleeping patterns were all over the place. I was up at weird hours and going to bed early in the evenings.
I am happy to report that I am feeling much better now, I’m going to bed at normal hours, and I’m sleeping through the night. It’s good to be back to a regular life schedule.
Happy New Year!
Original photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash
First, I want to wish all of you a beautiful and wonderful New Year! I pray that the difficulties and troubles that may have weighed you down in 2023 will roll off of you.
And I wish for you that all that brought you joy in 2023 will continue and flourish.
Resolutionary Thoughts
Over the past week or so while I was sick and not able to do much, my mind was active and my mind tended toward resolutionary thoughts as I watched the last days of 2023 tick by and the first days of 2024 come into view.
While there were some parts of 2023 that were meaningful and uplifting (like my recent trip to Indonesia and Japan), the majority of the year came and went without anything significant happening in my personal life. I lived 2023 pretty unintentionally. Basically life happened TO me, rather than me having an intentional impact ON my life.
So I began to think about what I intentionally want 2024 to look like. I definitely want to accomplish things. For example, I am learning the Indonesian language and want to put in the time and effort it takes to acquire proficiency in a new language. I also have a recorder sitting my home office gathering dust. I want to put time and effort into learning this musical instrument.
And while these activities will enrich my life and, hopefully, others’ lives, there’s a part of me that longs to also be involved in deep and meaningful ventures in 2024.
I can exercise more (which I definitely need to do), I can study Indonesian, and I can learn to play my recorder. But these activities will not necessarily change me into a different person.
Newness of Life
So in addition to the more traditional New Year’s resolutions mentioned above, I want to intentionally focus on newness of life in three areas of my life that, I believe, will fundamentally change who I am for the better.
1. My personal relationship with Jesus. As with any relationship, there are always new depths to plumb in getting to know another person and in learning to love that person more deeply. I know there are things I can do and time I can spend to linger in God’s presence and learn to love Him more. (John 15:1-5)
2. My relationship with myself. I have lived the majority of my life wrapped in a mantle of shame — from my childhood through my adulthood. Even after giving my life to Jesus and building my relationship with Him, that shame lingers in the shadows. The fact that I still see the shame means that God’s truth in His Word has not seeped into my soul. (2 Corinthians 5:17; John 1:12, 13) It’s time to turn the light of God’s truth into the shadows and let Him remove my shame. (Isaiah 54:4)
3. Building a community. My work keeps me pretty busy. And, normally, I’m fine with that. I work with a ministry that focuses on sharing the Gospel in Asia. And while I don’t want to diminish anything about the work I do, I do want to be more intentional about building a community outside of work that I can belong to. A community that can help me grow in the ways I want to grow and in one in which I can support as well. (Ecclesiastes 4:12) By the way, you all are part of that community.
My Encouragement to You
This is the time of year when the majority of us create our New Year’s resolutions, whether they are written down on paper or in a list in our minds. We use this time to think about the changes we want to make in the new year, and these changes are usually behavioral.
In addition to everything that’s on your list, I want to encourage you, if you haven’t already, to also include on your list those things are that deeper and more meaningful and which will bring a more lasting change to who you are.
Your deeper change list will probably look different from mine, and that’s OK. We are all unique. But do take time to dig deeper and make 2024 a year of meaningful change that will last. Then you and I can look back on 2024 and smile at who we have become in the past year. Are you in?
Until next time,
Sharon