Happy New Year!!

Don’t you just love new years? You have an opportunity to look back on the previous year and evaluate successes and failures, strengths and weaknesses. And then, make changes for the better.
Now before you think I’ve totally lost my mind for talking about new years in August, let me just say that for parents, students, and school personnel, tomorrow begins a new year. And, I have to admit that I felt a twinge of excitement as I moved all of my equipment and supplies to a new classroom and got everything set up and ready to go.
This year, I have a new room, new curriculum, new students, and new challenges. With everything being new, I began thinking about a “new year’s resolution.” At one point during my musings, I remember thinking how sad it is that other people, in other walks of life, don’t get a regular fresh start like those of us in the educational realm. Then I remembered the verse in Lamentations 3:23, “Your mercies are new every morning.”
In other words, we don’t have to wait until the start of a new year or even the start of a new week before we resolve to make a change. Every breath you draw is an opportunity to start fresh—to begin again.
We are commanded to be made new in the attitude of our minds and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness (Eph. 4:23-24). The words “put on” are the same words used to describe the action of getting dressed. So, just as each day you put on your clothing, each day you should also put on your new self which was created to be like God. And, in the same way that you remove a dirty shirt and put on a fresh, clean one when you notice the filth, as you walk your life and realize from time to time that your “self” has become soiled with the thoughts and actions of this present age, strip it off and start fresh. “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” Ro. 12:2.
It is by the grace of God we have the privilege to start over, but it needs to be immediate. Too often, however, we live in the land of mañana…tomorrow…next week…on my birthday…on January 1st…and the change never happens. The scripture says, “Today is the day of salvation” (2 Cor. 6:2). There is no better time than the present to make a change. After all, which of us is guaranteed tomorrow? Today is an important day to God. There are numerous admonitions in the scriptures regarding today:
Choose you today whom you will serve.
You have been set apart to the Lord today.
Obey what I command you today.
You are standing today in the presence of the Lord your God.
Encourage one another daily, as long as it is called Today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.
So, happy new year, happy new life, happy today. What changes will you make today as you strive to be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect? Remember, we were created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.