First Day of a New Year

 Other than serving as a day off to take down Christmas decorations and for others to watch football, I'm not sure about the purpose of this day. Perhaps it does nudge us to reflect. In my life I have seen people be much less likely to (1) go out partying and drinking on New Year's Eve and (2) make a big deal about resolutions. Folks still do both, but not to the same extent. 

Every day is a new year, really. My friend Sh--- from Iran, a Muslim, who attends our church more faithfully than some of the people on the membership rolls, told me yesterday the Middle Eastern new year is spring, which really makes far more sense. Why is it in the dead of winter?  Sheesh. 

However, since we're here, I did think of one serious resolution. 

Face the difficulty of being a Christian believer/follower. 

In the next few days I will elaborate on this, as I have 8 or more ways I mean it. As to why I choose this as the resolution and theme here, see my aforementioned dig at people who are still "laying out" of church, supposedly due to COVID. Please. If we can't get to church once a week, we aren't ready to live in 2024 as a serious Christian. Maybe not as an unserious one. 

First, facing the difficulty of being a Christian means facing the reality of the brokenness of the world we live in. 

People are mean. People lie. They act in the most extreme ways out of self interest. At the same time, people are hurting because (go to the beginning of this paragraph.  I don't know if we are broken--I've written elsewhere on this blog about why I don't think saying "we all are broken" is right or helpful. But the world is broken. And the world knows it, no matter what it says. And it's groaning about it: 

^{Romans 8:20} For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it in hope; ²¹ because the creation itself also will be delivered from the bondage of ^[f]corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. ²² For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now. 

Labor pains result in joy; but this is a really, really long labor--pick your viewpoint on the age of the earth! No Lamaze for this kind of labor. 

Flippancy is not the answer here. The world as people (cosmos) and as physical system is corrupt, in bondage, in futility because of humanity's sins and crimes.  Not a pretty picture. That's the first thing to face in 2024.