As the New Year begins, I have been pondering why we love it so much. There are thousands of quotes that encourage us to start anew, to turn the blank page and start writing a new story. We set goals and resolutions to do better and be better, but there is nothing magical about the first day of the year unless we make it so.

This year will only be new in many respects if we are new. Unless we change, we will get to the end of 2019 and look back with the same regrets and wishes that we have this year.  So, how do we make this truly a new year? We become new and begin doing life a new way.

The Bible says in 2 Corinthians 5:17 “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!” Many of us have been Christians for a long time, but we need to go back and live like new creations. Sometimes we let life creep in and wear the newness off us. David knew the feeling, and after realizing his sin, he prayed, “Create in me a pure heart, O God and renew a steadfast spirit within me.” (Psalm 51:10). He went to God to be renewed and to be put back in right standing with him.

Once we are renewed, we can have a new attitude and a new way of accomplishing our goals and dreams. Human willpower only goes so far that is why so many resolutions are broken within days of being made. God has goals for us, and we need to tune in to hear what they are and ask him to help us accomplish them. I promise God’s plans for us are so much better than anything we could come up with on our own.

So, as we face the New Year let’s become new each day, allow God to give us new dreams and goals and break our old habits so that at the end of 2019 we can give him the glory for what he has accomplished in us and through us this year.

“See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wildernessand streams in the wasteland.” (Isaiah 43:19) (NIV)