I am not one much for making New Year’s Resolutions.  Many years ago, I learned that I could not follow through with them, so why bother.    And then I learned the reason I couldn’t follow through with them was because I was always trying to do them under my own ‘steam’ – of my own initiative.

Also, not being a person who was ever in love with Mondays, I remember several years ago, grumbling aloud in my kitchen, “Oh, Lord just help me get through this day”.  Consequently, I never felt like I gave my Monday students, my family, or the Lord, my best.  I operated at half-steam on those days.  My youngest son, Jonathan, about 17 at the time, heard my grumbling and piped up, “I love Mondays!”  I turned to him, lowered my voice and said, “Why?!”  His response, for a teenager, astounded me – ‘Well, if I didn’t do so well last week, this gives me a chance to start all over and do better this week’.   It gave me pause . . .

So I go into this New Year of 2016 still not making resolutions, but with the attitude of ‘Oh, Lord, if I didn’t do so well last year, You have given me the opportunity to re-start and do so much better this year’ – with Your guidance. My prayer is that God will give me a new love for, and commitment to Him – that He will be pre-eminent in the work He has given to me – that He will be in all my  relationships – be the controller of my tongue – and that He will have mercy on me in bestowing me wisdom, wisdom, and more wisdom.

A most blessed New Year to you all!  May we all find ourselves closer to Jesus a year from now than where we are at this time.