Four more days and the old year of 2007 will come to past. How has this year been for all of us? Is 2008 going to the same or is there going to be something different? Again I am in my reflective mode.
I have to and I want to be in this state because I know the baggage I carry in me from this year will definitely be carried over to the next if I do not consider how to deal with them before entering into another 365 days of a new calendar. Then next year if I do not deal with this same baggage, it will be accumulated to the next with another set of baggage and it goes on and on and on till one day I cannot take it anymore and totally give up on life. This can happen to anyone. The result - some will become skeptical; angry; frustrated; pessimistic; etc.
I know many have given up on making resolutions for the new year because they say these goals do not work. Of course they will not work if we do not do anything about them! Resolutions work! I shall confidently proclaim that! I see the effectiveness because this year I made sure I stick to what I have planned to do and God showed me so many sides of life that I am actually enjoying living it.
I am not sharing this to put people down but to affirm in all that if we have the desire to overcome certain weaknesses or struggles in our lives - with God's help and our determination, they can be conquered and our lives liberated!
I have set countless resolutions since I became a Christian some 21 years ago but it is only in recent years that I see the power of making a pact with God to deal with certain areas of life.
Try to offload all our baggages whenever possible - what is the point of carrying them all the time when they could have been dealt with if we have set our hearts to it?
Recently I have read a couple of blogs which filled my heart with heaviness because of the negative outlook of life in these writers. Have they given up on overcoming the obstacles of life hence they are in the current state? Perhaps.
If any one reading this blog feels you are in this situation, let us give ourselves all a chance to make a breakthrough. The formula to follow is simple: God's Help + our Resolutions and our Desire for Repentance - our Fickle-Mindedness and Fears = Breakthrough.
Do not believe the above-mentioned will work? Why question something you have not tried? Live it out first and then give me your comments at the end of 2008. We will then evaluate this formula and decide whether there is a need to tweak it.
What 2008 will be is how you and I see it to be now? Include God in the picture and the perception of this coming new year will be different altogether. I hope this paragraph makes sense. :)
Anyway, I had a great day yesterday - I woke up rather late as I was so exhausted. Then a dear friend came over and we chatted for a while before she left to meet another friend of ours for lunch while I went to town to settle some stuff for the two weddings this weekend. Then I met this same friend again for a time of shopping. As she needed to buy some stuff urgently, I prayed and asked God to provide us with where to go and what to buy.
Well, He heard my cries. At Far East Plaza, we got all the items needed at a reasonable price. We left the place satisfied and very happy! She went on to meet another friend of ours for dinner while I had a Christmas meal with the MacRitchie Running Fellowship.
All thanks and praise be to God!
Time to sleep now as I need to bring my God-daughters out for an outing later. :)
Oh yah, I am anxious about coordinating four of my siblings-in-Christ's big day - well, may God lead and guide all of us!
"Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. All of us who are mature should take such a view of things. And if on some point you think differently, that too God will make clear to you. Only let us live up to what we have already attained. Join with others in following my example, brothers, and take note of those who live according to the pattern we gave you. For, as I have often told you before and now say again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body." Philippians 3:12-21
I have to and I want to be in this state because I know the baggage I carry in me from this year will definitely be carried over to the next if I do not consider how to deal with them before entering into another 365 days of a new calendar. Then next year if I do not deal with this same baggage, it will be accumulated to the next with another set of baggage and it goes on and on and on till one day I cannot take it anymore and totally give up on life. This can happen to anyone. The result - some will become skeptical; angry; frustrated; pessimistic; etc.
I know many have given up on making resolutions for the new year because they say these goals do not work. Of course they will not work if we do not do anything about them! Resolutions work! I shall confidently proclaim that! I see the effectiveness because this year I made sure I stick to what I have planned to do and God showed me so many sides of life that I am actually enjoying living it.
I am not sharing this to put people down but to affirm in all that if we have the desire to overcome certain weaknesses or struggles in our lives - with God's help and our determination, they can be conquered and our lives liberated!
I have set countless resolutions since I became a Christian some 21 years ago but it is only in recent years that I see the power of making a pact with God to deal with certain areas of life.
Try to offload all our baggages whenever possible - what is the point of carrying them all the time when they could have been dealt with if we have set our hearts to it?
Recently I have read a couple of blogs which filled my heart with heaviness because of the negative outlook of life in these writers. Have they given up on overcoming the obstacles of life hence they are in the current state? Perhaps.
If any one reading this blog feels you are in this situation, let us give ourselves all a chance to make a breakthrough. The formula to follow is simple: God's Help + our Resolutions and our Desire for Repentance - our Fickle-Mindedness and Fears = Breakthrough.
Do not believe the above-mentioned will work? Why question something you have not tried? Live it out first and then give me your comments at the end of 2008. We will then evaluate this formula and decide whether there is a need to tweak it.
What 2008 will be is how you and I see it to be now? Include God in the picture and the perception of this coming new year will be different altogether. I hope this paragraph makes sense. :)
Anyway, I had a great day yesterday - I woke up rather late as I was so exhausted. Then a dear friend came over and we chatted for a while before she left to meet another friend of ours for lunch while I went to town to settle some stuff for the two weddings this weekend. Then I met this same friend again for a time of shopping. As she needed to buy some stuff urgently, I prayed and asked God to provide us with where to go and what to buy.
Well, He heard my cries. At Far East Plaza, we got all the items needed at a reasonable price. We left the place satisfied and very happy! She went on to meet another friend of ours for dinner while I had a Christmas meal with the MacRitchie Running Fellowship.
All thanks and praise be to God!
Time to sleep now as I need to bring my God-daughters out for an outing later. :)
Oh yah, I am anxious about coordinating four of my siblings-in-Christ's big day - well, may God lead and guide all of us!
"Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. All of us who are mature should take such a view of things. And if on some point you think differently, that too God will make clear to you. Only let us live up to what we have already attained. Join with others in following my example, brothers, and take note of those who live according to the pattern we gave you. For, as I have often told you before and now say again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body." Philippians 3:12-21
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