Time For a Change

“The years teach much which the days never knew.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson

I think, the New Year’s Eve celebration could use an upgrade. The whole drop the ball thing has never caught on with me. Does this really count as a holiday? It doesn’t even have any great holiday movies or cartoons to look forward to. Nor could you make any; “How the Grinch stole New Years” doesn’t stir up the same emotional response, He doesn’t have to steal it, I’ll gladly give it to him. As for festive music, there is none, nada. Well, maybe Auld Lang Syne, but I think that hardly qualifies as a song. Just how many people know and understand the words except for those living in the Scottish highlands? As a kid I thought people were singing “Old hanging sign” and I wasn’t sure why they wanted to remember it. Maybe if we just had one of them I could enjoy it more but there are too many of them to count. There is the Jewish New Year, the Chinese New Year, The Muslim and Ethiopian New Year. There is actually a New World Order New Year, none of which fall on the same date. Exactly when does this gig start anyway?

Now, nothing happens when the stroke of midnight occurs, its not like we shed our skin or anything (wouldn’t that be something!). Still we make a huge deal over this calendar-flipping event. We make resolutions, we try to break old bad habits and start new more positive ones. We plan, we dream, all this because of the motivation of the coming of a new year. Why?

In all seriousness, deep down all people need to know they can have a fresh start. That is the purpose of a new year in our lives. We need the hope the Father provides through a new year. He speaks and breathes life in the promise that it brings. He uses it to teach us the failures of the past year are nothing in comparison to what we can be in Him.

He changes our focus from the past to a brighter future, filled with the knowledge of Him. A new day, a new year, the way we measure our passage through time can either freeze us with fear or free us to move mountains. A new year was fashioned for us to remind us of the purpose for our lives, to help redefine with clarity our walk with Him.

It repositions our eyesight towards Kingdom things and off our temporal situations. This  fixture of time identifies a place for us, calling us on to greater things. A starting place, a remembrance place, a launching place and a place of marking, this defines a New Year for us. Speaking from this place is a declaration of trust in the new beginnings of God. When the Father calls your name throughout this New Year; I pray that you would hear Him clearer than ever before. As He builds hope in you, stirs up faith in you and brings you closer to His heart your new year will take on a greater dimension. There is purpose in us and purpose for us, just think what a New Year this can be!

“The LORD bless you and keep you; the LORD make his face to shine upon you, and be gracious to you; the LORD lift up his countenance upon you, and give you peace.”
Numbers 6:24-26

Blessings, Jay

P.S. I like New Years a lot more now, but I’m still holding out for a new song.

On a historical note:

AULD LANG SYNE

At least partially written by Robert Burns in the 1700's, it was first published in 1796 after Burns' death. An old Scotch tune, "Auld Lang Syne" literally means "old long ago," or simply, "the good old days.