Opus 2024-451: Sounding Like an Optimist

What an amazing time of year this is.  We have three of the greatest holidays, right in a row.  It starts with Thanksgiving, moves on to Christmas and then gives us New Year’s.

Thanksgiving is a time for attitude adjustment.  When we take a long road trip in my wife’s late model Lexus it will send her these cute little messages that it is time to take a break.  We usually ignore the car’s advice but that might be a bad idea when the calendar tells us to take a break.  We take the opportunity to stop and meditate on our blessings and think about all of the great things in our lives.  Instead of worrying about the future, we are encouraged to contemplate the past and enjoy the present.  The great thing about it is that it reminds us that God is the supplier of everything that is worthwhile.  The government is simply an agent when it’s doing its job the right way.  It is a hindrance when it thinks it is in charge.

So we start with Thanksgiving.  And one of the great things that we have to be thankful for is the incarnation, Christmas.  It’s the day in which we celebrate the fact that God broke into history and began the process of the Savior moving toward the cross to die for our sins. If you don’t have anything else to be thankful for that’s a good place to start.  If you don’t celebrate Christmas then celebrate the incarnation.  When you do other things become clear.

New Year’s offers us the opportunity to start new.  It is an arbitrary date.  There’s nothing in any eternal document saying that January 1 is significant.  It’s just a handy handle to hang our new expectations on.  Pick another day if it works for you.  We’ve heard a lot of criticism of the idea of resolutions.  The problem is not the resolutions.  The problem is that we don’t really plan on making any changes.  It becomes just a calendar version of a video game.  The resolutions themselves are probably very good, but we don’t act on them.  So maybe we need to look at New Year’s as a time of revival.  When I was a kid, we would have revivals at our church.  It was a time when you would seek the face of God, and listen to what He had to say.  It was a time not only of contemplation, but have repentance and brokenness.

New Year’s can be transforming if we let it.  I challenge you to stop and take a deep look at who you are and what your priorities are and work on making some changes.  I’m sure your family will help.  Families like to give advice.  In my family we have lots of people who have ideas about how I could change.  That’s not what I’m talking about.  I’m talking about looking down inside yourself, listening to the voice of God and calling up on him to make this the best year ever.

Wow. I’m starting to sound like an optimist. Maybe I need to change that.

homo unius libri