New Years Resolutions

Last updated on: January 2, 2012 at 5:23 pm by Nick Fox

New Years Resolutions 2012-01-02T17:23:43-06:00 Nick Fox

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With the New Year upon us, it is the time for New Years resolutions. These have become sort of a joke in our society for the propensity for being dropped in a few months or weeks or days.

However this does not stop the marketing machine in America. You can expect to get an assortment of opportunities for gym memberships or dietary supplements in the next week (I have already gotten several) with specials such as waived entrance fees and discounts for signing up for a whole year, etc. We laugh at these because a large number of these new accounts the gym down the street will acquire will not darken the door of the gym after January 31st (though the automatic debit from the credit card will continue). Gyms/diet/fitness products are just on of myriad marketing pushes happening this month. Studies vary on the numbers, but some say about two thirds of all New Years resolutions in America are not kept.

But, if this is true, about a third of them ARE kept and maintained. Imagine what that means. Of the approximately 300 million people in America, if even 10%, or 30 million, of them make New Years Resolutions, then 10 million people will make commitments to better their lives in someway this year and follow through with it. That is pretty cool!

As people of faith, it seems to me that it is so fitting that we should set some time aside (at least) once a year to consider what changes need to be made in our lives. These tend to be big changes, life-altering changes. Isn’t that appropriate? Isn’t that humble? What was missing in your life this last year spiritually, physically, emotionally, mentally, relationally that God would call you to remedy in 2012? How does God want you to grow and improve?

How about as organizations? Might it make sense to take the first few weeks of this new year and ask the question: as a business, what do we need to do better or improve on or change this coming year? As a church, what do we need to do better? As a family, how can we challenge ourselves to grow and improve? When I was a youth pastor, I dedicated the first Wednesday night youth service of every year to ask some of these questions and to evaluate us as a group. It led to some great conversations.

Some of us will try and fall short. But to me, that is much better than not trying. May we swing for the fences with our new years resolutions. May we better ourselves and those groups we are a part of. And, may we honor God in the process.

Happy New Year

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