New Year

Gym Memberships And Other Failed Resolutions

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Gym owners love this time of the year, I an told. So many people take out yearly memberships in January to fulfil a New Years Resolution “to get fit this year.” Add that to the people who thoughtfully buy memberships as Christmas gifts, and it’s a golden time for the gyms.

Then, the story goes, by the end of February 90% of the people with these brand new gym memberships and good intentions just stop showing up.

It’s like that with most of our resolutions and intentions to become better people. Whether it’s losing weight, giving up smoking or drinking less, it is really hard to change our behaviours and habits. It is as if we become prisoners of our own choices.

In the Bible, the apostle Paul puts it this way: “I don’t really understand myself, for I want to do what is right, but I don’t do it. Instead, I do what I hate. But if I know that what I am doing is wrong, this shows that I agree that the law is good.”

We know what we should do, but often it is really hard to do, and we end up doing the wrong thing. Even with the best will, we find it hard to resist temptation, and we give in to doing the wrong thing, even when we know we shouldn’t be doing it.

Paul goes on to says this: “So now there is no condemnation for those who belong to Christ Jesus. And because you belong to Him, the power of the life-giving Spirit has freed you from the power of sin that leads to death.”

The way out of these addictions to doing the wrong thing is to surrender them to Jesus, and ask Him to change you. Change comes from the inside and flows out to our actions not the other way around.

Now, where’s that gym card. I might just give it a go.

Life Matters

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Our local newspaper, The Courier, has started publishing articles from local pastors.

I was up for the first one of 2021, published today

Life Matters

Keith Bates

Congratulations! If you are reading this, you survived 2020!

While last year seemed for many people to have more challenges than most years, 2021 stands before us seemingly bearing many opportunities and possibilities.

Any New Year, but especially this time around, feels like an opportunity for a new start, a new beginning, a new chance to be the person we would like to be. It’s ridiculous to place so much value on what is just another date on the calendar, but we have this wired- in expectation that we can do so much better if we try a little harder.

This is the appeal of New Year’s Resolutions of course. We take the opportunity to make a new start at doing those things which we know we should be doing. That is why January is the busiest month for gym operators and February, not so much.

Did you make a Resolution this year? How is it working out for you? I find that the chocolate is still calling me from the fridge as much as it ever does.

So we want to be better people, in some way, and most of the time we find it’s too hard. We can’t do it ourselves because we are too trapped into old patterns of living.

In the Bible we read this interesting passage: “But to all who believed him (Jesus) and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God. They are reborn—not with a physical birth resulting from human passion or plan, but a birth that comes from God.”

Being reborn sounds like the ultimate restart. You can get to do it all over and maybe not make so many mistakes this time around. Better still, the things we have done that separate us from God are swept away and we get a new start with Him.

Maybe this year’s resolution could be a prayer: “Lord I want to follow you. Please come into my heart and give me that new start.”

Forget Your Resolutions

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resoluition

I woke up in the night with this thought: “Actions flow from values. That’s why resolutions usually fail.”

At this time of the year, there is a lot of pressure to come up with a “new you” for the new year. There is a tradition for many people of making a resolution to change our actions in January, but very few of these make it into February.

We do the things we do because we value them in some way. To find out what are the important things in your life mark on a calendar everything you do in a typical month. Then write down what you spend your money on. That is the map of your values.

We all have 168 hours every week. Knock out 100 hours for work and sleep and you still have 68 hours every week that is yours to spend or invest, to waste or do something fruitful with.

People say, “I should pray more” or “I need to go to church more often” but they don’t do it because they don’t really value what they are saying they need to do.

To change your life you have to change your values and priorities, because you will do what you value.

Want to pray more? Read books about prayer until you love praying and can’t get enough. Then set aside a time every day and just do it.

Want to get fit? Find some activity that you really enjoy and you won’t have to worry about a fitness plan. I’ve tried a few things, but riding my push bike is the best exercise ever- if I miss a couple of days, my body and brain just miss it.

Need to go to church more? Well what stops you? Is it because you feel entitled to the Sunday morning sleep in, or coffee with friends? Go to bed earlier. Reschedule the coffee time. Determine in your heart that church is higher priority than anything else on a Sunday morning and put it in your phone calendar.

Don’t make resolutions you won’t keep because that just doesn’t work. Instead look at what your time and money say about what you prioritise and make a decision to value more highly the things that are really important. Cultivate a love or a passion for the good stuff and then go for it.

 

 

 

 

Beneath the Surface

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sydney-harbour-fireworks

All over the world last night there were events such as this, where millions of people gathered to celebrate a new year.

While they had the public’s attention, the real power in 2014 was being unleashed in thousands of smaller gatherings ranging from 5 or so to perhaps a thousand.

New Year’s prayer vigils in every little town and many little churches invoked God’s blessing in their communities in the year ahead.

I took part in such a meeting, from 9pm to midnight- and it was the best three hours I have invested in a long time.

Happy New Year!