Bucket Lists and Resolutions

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  The new year is fast approaching and the annual feeling of throwing off the old and running toward the new runs rampant in the air like an electrical charge. Normally, I'm not that into setting new year's resolutions. We all know what normally happens with those. We keep them with zeal and vigor for the first two weeks if we're lucky, and then we slip back into old habits before the hearts and flowers of Valentine's Day saturate the stores, or, if we're particularly motivated, eggs and bunnies fill every aisle. 

     However, this year I feel a bit different. I've been thinking about New Year's resolutions and bucket lists and what their purpose is or should be in my life. Most people make both to give their life meaning. To somehow prevent their lives from slipping by before they squeezed some life out of it. I, like many people have at least a mental bucket list of things I'd love to do in my lifetime. Visit Italy and see the historic sights of Rome and the ancient Roman world. Speak at least one language (other than English) fluently. Learn Tai Chi (or some martial art) and practice it regularly. Finish writing a novel within my lifetime. Goals. Dreams. Aspirations. Things I'd love to do because I would enjoy them, or perhaps, because I feel they'd give me meaning. Who knows. 

 But in the process of thinking about my goals for the new year I was struck by this thought: What are God's goals for this next year? What are the resolutions He's made for my life? Who does He want me to be in 2016? Who does He want me to become and what does He want me to do? What is His bucket list for me? 

 That's a different question entirely than what I want for this coming year. What I want to become. What I want to do and accomplish. The last few years I've thought that I knew what was coming. I had it all ironed out. My goals, how I was going to get there. Yes, I did consciously decide to involve God in my decisions, pray about them before I made them and have Him involved in my decision making process. But I could see what was ahead and what was coming. What I didn't know was, that I couldn't see at all. This year, I feel as though there's only a small light on my path that shows me just the next step. There's no five year plan. No big picture strategy that I can see. Just one foot in front of the other. I have to let God plan because I'm in the dark (in a good way) and all I can do is hold His hand as He leads me through each and every day. 

 So, my goal for 2016 is to set my gaze, the faith-gaze of my soul (A. W. Tozer, the Pursuit of God Chapter 7), on God and allow Him to set my goals and bucket list for me. To throw off the things that hinder and entangle and set my gaze on Jesus so that I will not grow weary or discouraged (Hebrews 12:1-3). He is enough, and if my goal is to abide in Him this coming year, I will be enough too. Enough for every goal, challenge, hurtle and victory. Here's to a new year with a renewed focus on Christ. May the gaze of your soul be fixed on Him too and in that, "May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit." Romans 15:13

 Happy New Year my dear friends and may God's grace, peace and favor rest on you!

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