One New Thing

2015 is here. A new year, full of new possibilities and fresh starts. It’s our annual mulligan; a do-over to begin anew. We all want to start a new year off on the right track, but what’s more important is staying on the right track for the long haul, not just for the first week or the first month. It’s a time to think about who we are and where we are and what we are going to do.

               Check out these words from Isaiah 43:18-19:

               “Forget the former things, do not dwell on the past. I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland.”

               I wonder if God speaking to any of us today saying, “I am going to do something new in your life right now”. Maybe you have made a New Year’s Resolution, and if so that’s awesome. But here are some New Year’s statistics: 40% of New Year Resolutions are broken by the end of January, and 75% of Resolutions are a thing of the past by Dec 14^th. I don’t mean to be the bearer of bad news or say that nothing can change, and I’m not completely sure why New Years Resolutions don’t stick, but it might have something to do with the perspective, with the good intentions behind the wanting to change something in a New Year. Good intentions just won’t get you there. Good intentions are ‘me-focused’. What we need to see changes have to be ‘God-focused’. It is God leading the initiative of change, God calling something new and something to change. So I believe that if God is speaking something new into our lives this year, that maybe God is the One that will show us what One Thing to focus on.

               We all have areas of our lives we would like to change in 2015. For some of us these areas could compile a notebook filled page to page. But instead of focusing on all of them at once, what One Thing is God speaking to you about today?

               Here are some questions to help you determine your One Thing in 2015:

1.      What One Thing do you desire from God?

In Psalm 27:4, David writes, “One Thing I ask of the Lord, this is what I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple”.

2.      What One Thing do you lack?

When Jesus was answering a question from a man about what is needed to inherit eternal life, Jesus summed it up by saying, “One Thing you lack. Go and sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then, come, follow me.”

3.      What One Thing do you need to let go?

In his letter to the Philippians, Paul wrote, “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.”

4.      What One Promise do you need to claim?

In Psalm 56:9 David again wrote, “This One Thing I know, God is for me!”

 

Take this week and answer these four questions for yourself. Prayerfully let God show you His One New Thing for 2015 that He wants to do in your life. Tell God your desires, acknowledge what you lack spiritually and a change that needs to be made in your life, let go of your past, your regrets, your bitterness, and claim the promises that God has laid out before you in a New Year, and be ready to experience the One New Thing that God has planned for you.