The turning of the calendar from December to January, marking the start of a new year, is seen by many as an opportunity for a new start in life. You may be into New Year resolutions or may be you want to put in place changes of lifestyle - veganuary perhaps, or dry January, or a new exercise or weight-loss regime, or a stop smoking campaign, or want to sort out your time-keeping or get rid of a bunch of old clothes and other accumulated stuff from your home - there are so many ways you hear of people wanting to get a bit of a reset at New Year. This year, I guess, we all feel it more than ever and are wishing that 2021 will bring some sort of reset as we (hopefully) move into a post-COVID world at some point.
It seems that so much of this has to do with our health and general well-being, yet we pay scant regard to our spiritual health. Strangely, it doesn't occur to us that we need a new start in our relationship with God our Creator. We live in His world, we have life because He gives it to us, He is the ultimate ruler of all of history and, yet, we never think it matters that we live with a disobedient and disdainful disregard for Him. The message of Christmas, with which we still mark the end of the old year, is just as relevant at the beginning of the new year. Jesus, the Son of God, came into His world in order to make possible a new start for us in our relationship with God. Instead of it being a broken relationship, we can experience a real, spiritual and life-changing renewal of that relationship by believing in Jesus as our Saviour.
Unlike, our New Year resolutions and commitments to new starts, from which we so quickly depart and backslide, a brand new start in Jesus in our relationship with God is something that not only really does make a difference for the better, but it is also a permanent difference. And when God makes commitments to those who come to Jesus in faith, He never departs from them, forgets them or changes His mind. Being a Christian is for life now - and forevermore.
"...if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself" (2 Corinthians 5:17-18, ESV)