Imagine! Before the Fall there was no need for New Year’s resolutions. Everything was already perfect. In His perfect love God had created a perfect earth and a perfect garden luxuriously designed for the pleasure of our parents, Adam and Eve. There was nothing to be improved; there was nothing to long for; there was nothing but absolute bliss enjoyed through personal fellowship with their loving God. When they listened to the lying serpent, Adam and Eve gave up all of that perfect paradise. Their fellowship with their loving God was lost. Their delight in everything surrounding them was gone. Such is the enormous price we pray when we allow the serpent to entice us with lies so that we begin to doubt what is good and choose what is evil. We choose to destroy ourselves, and in so doing, we deeply wound those we care about most. So, maybe it’s not New Year’s resolutions we need. It’s confession–admitting we have sinned and made horrible choices. It’s repentance–laying down our baggage filled with sin, turning around and choosing to walk the other way, towards the Father who waits for us and calls us and shows us the way back home to Him through Jesus, our Savior and the Holy Spirit, our guide. It’s faith–giving up all we are and taking up all God will surely make us. New Year’s resolutions may help you to lose weight or get more sleep or work harder; but only Jesus can save us.

he would gladly make my personal idol my belly
as I bow down daily to my exaggerated needs
so that I can please darkening cravings he implies,
though his counterfeits never quite reach the depths
of my heart nor the heights in my mind—though
his wiles do entice, they never deliver, though his
promises are sweet, he never fulfills, though he
cleverly disguises his murderous schemes, he
never quite hides the sneer on his made-up face;
he would make me like him a slave to the fruit
that poisons forever—but praise God, for my Savior,
Jesus, promises eternal life only He can deliver.

M.S.
January, 15, 2020

Genesis 3: 6-7

So when the woman saw
that the tree was good for food,
and that it was a delight to the eyes,
and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise,
she took of its fruit and ate,
and she also gave some to her husband
who was with her,
and he ate.
Then the eyes of both were opened,
and they knew that they were naked.
And they sewed fig leaves together,
and made themselves loincloths.