I start on my New Years resolutions early. Usually around November. I feel like I have more success that way and honestly, I'm usually so sick of myself by that time of year it's pretty easy to start.
My list looks similar to last year's, and the years before. It probably even looks like yours, if you made one.
Be more organized, be less messy, exercise more, eat more whole foods, shop less. This year I'm adding "read the Bible straight through chronologically". I've never done it before and my husband bought me a chronological study Bible months ago that had been sitting on my desk until recently. I cracked it open January first and loved it. It has some of the best commentary I've ever read (my version of "best" is probably different than yours; I like it short & simple) and I'm really enjoying it so far. It pointed out something I've never really heard before, or if I have heard it, it didn't stick with me. After the chapter about Eve eating the forbidden fruit, it notes that:
"Satan helped Eve shift her focus from all that God had done and given to the one thing he had withheld."
That's a fairly obvious observation, but I guess I had never really phrased it that way. I can really relate to struggling with contentment, can't you? It got me thinking of how many of my sinful tendencies are rooted in being discontent; in the things God has withheld from me. I so quickly measure and record what I don't have, I compare with others and become ungrateful. For example, God blessed me with an amazing, godly husband who loves me despite my neurotic tendencies and yet frequently I find myself zeroing in on how often he leaves his socks around the house and whether or not other husbands do that. This is laughable when I think about all the things he does do (like, stay married to me, for example). That's a lighthearted example, but it's a small version of a fairly big problem. Whether it's not being at the job you want, struggling with infertility, losing an important game or being single, it's easy to fixate on the one thing you don't have instead of all the things you do.
With this in mind, my true goal for the new year is to find contentment in God alone. To remember what I have, what he's done and who he is, and not shift my focus. Sure, there are tangible things I need to change in order to do that. But designating a specific laundry day in my schedule and losing a few pounds aren't going to truly satisfy me or change me.
I have to agree with the author that this sin, shifting our focus away from all God has done and can do, is responsible for many, if not all, sins. It bleeds in to everything! I believe that it's why we're overweight, or life-threatening underweight. It's why we have storage units of belongings rotting away. It's why our schedules are exploding. It's why we're obsessed with youth. It's why we border-line exploit ourselves on social media. Because Satan has undermined our contentment.
In the next couple posts, I'll be suggesting some ways to cultivate joy and contentment in your relationship with God that I've experienced lately. If nothing else, to follow through on my New Year's goal of writing more frequently.
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