“…our inner nature is being renewed day by day.” -2 Corinthians 4:16-

Another year has come before us and I want us to be encouraged with possibility thinking. I want us to explore the possibility that Year 2020 will be the best year any of us has ever had. I realize that for some of you that will sound flippant and trite. You are facing mountains – mountains you are not certain you can climb. Notice, though, I am not saying that this will be the easiest year we have ever faced. Only that it can be the best year. How can we know and experience year 2020 to be our best year? 2020 will be the best year not with our New Year’s Resolutions. It will be the best year when we begin by asking an honest question: “Do I ever thank God that the old has passed and new has come-whether it’s the first day of the new year or the emergence of a tender spring flower. Have I ever walked on the beach after a wave has erased the footprints and imperfections of the sand, leaving it smooth and clean?” Thanking God renews life to its best. A fundamental difference between a person and nature is renewal. Whenever a person goes, that person pollutes the environment, but God applies the natural principle of restoration, and in time, renewal begins. Remember also that renewal is a spiritual matter-the work of God’s Holy Spirit. Yet spiritual renewal is possible only when we allow God’s Grace to work in our lives. Being grateful always to God reveals that God’s Grace is at work in our life. Some of us continue to live in a world of broken pieces; renewal means change, and we’re afraid of change. In a Charles Schulz cartoon, Charlie Brown says to Lucy, “You’re going to be proud of me, Lucy. I’ve decided that this next year is going to be my year of decisions! I’m going to be a better person!” Lucy responds, “Not me! I’m going to spend this whole year regretting the past. It’s the only way, Charlie Brown. I’m going to cry over spilt milk and sigh over lost loves. It’s a lot easier. It’s too hard to improve. I tried it once. It drove me crazy. Forget the future is my motto. Regret the past! Why did I do this? Why did I do that? I regret it all! Oh, what remorse! What anguish!” (PEANUTS cartoons copyright United Feature Syndicate, Inc., 200 Park Ave., New York, NY 10166.) Are you like Lucy who would rather live in a shattered world than allow God’s Spirit to affect renewal in your life? Paul proclaims, 13  Beloved, I do not consider that I have made it my own; but this one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, 14  I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 3:13-14 NRSV). Thank God for renewal of God’s Spirit and presence, and press on. Happy New Year!