A New Year Perspective

 Readings: Psalm 2, Ecclesiastes 3:1-11, Matthew 2:1-12, Philippians 3:7-16
Preached at Bridgehampton Presbyterian Church, January 2, 2022

 "I forget what is behind me and do my best to reach what is ahead" (Philippian’s 3:13)

Paul speaks in this verse of two things - Forgetting and Going Forward.  The text is from a chapter which urges the reader to run the race of faith.  God's Spirit is the driving force that can give our lives a right perspective, A NEW YEAR PERSPECTIVE.

1. Forget what is behind us.

It is the season of the year when the media is full of retrospectives.  Who were the people who made the year what it was?  Who were the faces, the places and what will be the lasting memories?  Think for a moment about your own life.  What are the events and happenings that would fill a memorial book of "My life - 2021"?

I know that for most it has been a hard year.  Maybe events have left you feeling fearful and discouraged rather than confident and hopeful for what 2022 may bring your way.  If we have been hurt, it' not easy to let go of resentments.  If we have been troubled it is hard to let our worries go.  If we have failed, it is not easy to forget our defeats.  

Paul wrote his words about pressing onward from the confines of a prison.  Despite his constraining circumstances he writes a letter that is full of joy and hope.  Whilst he was prepared to learn from the past (something we must do) he was equally prepared to let it go.  Let me mention some things we do well to put behind us.

Resentments.  Resentment is a bitter and destructive poison to harbor within one’s system.  It breeds self pity.  Maybe we have been treated unfairly.  Maybe last year did deal us an unfair hand.  But let it go.  Sometimes others hurt us.  At other times we try to fulfill unrealistic aims or ambitions.  We can be our own worst enemies.

Now is the time to practice forgiveness.  The late Corrie Ten Boon, a Dutch writer imprisoned in Auschwitz concentration camp during the Second World War for befriending the Jews, speaks in one of her books of her struggle to forgive her captors after the war was over.  She uses the illustration of a church bell.

The bell has a clapper inside.  When the rope is pulled the clapper rocks to and fro and the bell rings.  After you stop pulling on the rope the clapper will eventually come to rest at the center and the bell stops ringing.  So, it is with ourselves and forgiveness.

Once we decide to let go of our resentments, they are gone, then they come swinging back again.  But every time we let go, the swings become less intense and eventually the bad memories stop coming and we will find our center in Christ.  Let us enter the New Year prepared to let go of any resentments and practice forgiveness.

Let us also leave some of our worries behind.  Jesus put it plainly enough. Can you grow any taller by worrying about it?  Does fretting and misplaced concern lead you onward?  Intelligent concern, that is fine, plans for the future, resolutions even, yes... we need some of that, but worry? What does that achieve?

Some people carry round with them needless worries about themselves, about others, about the world, about a whole host of things. At the root of much worrying stands a lack of faith in God's providence.  Constant obsessive worry is a kind of disguised atheism.  It affirms nothing more than that we do not really believe in the presence of God to direct us and guide us.  Faith builds us up and strengthens us.  Worry pulls us down and weakens us.

I’m not talking about clinical depression. That’s something different altogether. I am not saying we shouldn't be concerned about the crazy world we live in.  I'm not saying that there won't be times when situations come our way that make us feel, "Uh-Oh, What do we do now!"  I am talking about having  faith and trust in God over and above our worries.  Believing God’s love is strong enough and big enough to hold our life in God’s care.

As I heard in a country music song;
"Forget your worries, Forget your cares,
Let them fly into the air,
Yee-Har in the old fruit jar,
Now, we're getting somewhere"

We have the choice.  We can go into the New Year carrying a load of care or we can go into it with a faith in the Lord of the Dance.  Mind you, if you dance anything like me, that is not much of an encouragement.  We need to leave our mistakes behind as well.  

We need to forget our failures.

Looking back reveals that we have not had a perfect year.  If we have failed at something, either small time or in a big way, it is too late to do anything about the failure itself.  A lost opportunity can not be gone back to.  A moral fall cannot be picked up.  It happened.  Now it is past and over.  We must learn from our mistakes, but we don't have to build our lives upon them.  If we focus only on our difficulties, on our problems, on our defeats, then we will become difficult, problematic, defeated people.

I remember reading somewhere, "Just because you failed, that doesn't make you a failure". The point being that some people go through life with a failure attitude.  Somewhere along the way, in the home, at school or in their work they have been told "You'll never be anything". "Look what you've done now. Failure. Good for nothing".

The Good News of the gospel is that all alike have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, but we don't have to live our lives crawling around like miserable, defeated sinners. Jesus died to forgive us and grant to us the victory.  Our God looks at us not in terms of what we have become, but in the light of what we can be if we give His love free reign in our lives.  Wasn't that how Jesus dealt with people?

A fallen woman by the Samaritan well encounters Jesus and life is new again.   A blind beggar by the road, Bartimaeus, calls out “Master, let me see" and he is given a whole new vision.  A hated tax collector, Zacchaeus, hiding up a tree.  "Zacchaeus" says Jesus, "I'm coming to your house today. I am going to eat and drink with you." An encounter with Jesus reminds that though we have failed, the doorway to opportunity and new life is opened before us by the love of God.

To have a right perspective on the New Year there are things we need to forget.  Paul writes about forgetting what lies behind him and I suggest to you that we forget our resentments, our worries, our failures.  They are not baggage we need to carry into a New Year with us.  Having left some things behind there are other things we need to take up.  Paul writes of forgetting what is behind him and pressing on.

Do our best to reach what is ahead.

Think of the New Year as a book yet to be written.  What words, what pictures, do you hope to see on the pages of your life in the coming year?  Maybe your aim is high.  This is the year when you will.....     (Fill in the space for yourself).

Maybe we will be content with having a peaceful and hopefully prosperous New Year. Whether we aim high or low there are still steps we need to take if we are going to "Do our best to reach what is ahead".  Call to mind these two things and they may help us on our way!

a) Remember we are creatures of paradox! We sometimes get it wrong. We sometimes get it right.  Though made in the image of God in each of us that image is tarnished by our sin.  At times we rebel against God's ways in favor of our will being done.  Sometimes we become so accustomed to going the wrong way that it's the way we naturally follow.  Other times we are so blind to the consequences of our actions that we act in ignorance.  Sometimes we know we're not doing the right thing, but we carry on just the same.

We make resolutions. We do not always keep them.  We are only human.  And that is the whole problem.  As "only human" we are creatures of habit and inconsistency.  Remember that we are creatures of paradox.   Because of that we need to focus on a second thing. We need to;-

b) Remember the strength available to us in Christ.  The Christian calling is not one that tells us to bury our heads in the dust, to grovel before the Almighty in some hope of getting off the hook for the situations we find ourselves in. It is a calling to lift our heads up high.  Paul knew that in his prison cell when he wrote these words about pressing onward.  Though behind bars he looked past them and saw stars.  The light of Christ has come.  His voice calls us to take up our cross and follow.  

And if we are to run that race, be sure, it must be in the strength that only God's Spirit can bring to bear on our lives.  To fulfill a high calling, we need strength from on high.  We have known that strength in the past.  We would not be here if God had not, albeit in some small way, broken into our lives with God’s spiritual strengthening love.  God has enabled to reach this point in our lives.

Now God has so much more available for us.  Available strength in times of temptation, available strength in times when life is filled with burdens or problems.  None of us goes through life in isolation or with only our own meager resources but with the help of God.

By the grace of God, I pray that by the end of the year we will have an album that is full of pictures and stories that testify that God has been with us and that we have lived our life with Him always in mind.  That our life has been subject to the encompassing presence of an Almighty God.

So, hear again Paul's words to the Philippian church; "I do not think that I have already won the prize.  I forget what is behind me and do my best to reach what is ahead." (Philippians 3:13).

Forget what lies in the past.  Resentments, worries, failures.  Learn from them and leave them behind.  Do your best to reach what is ahead. Remember that you are only human and that the only way to make it through to the end of the year, having known God's blessing, is to travel through 2022 in the available strength of God's love; the strength of the Holy Spirit, the living presence of the Lord Jesus Christ in our hearts and lives.

And what better place to begin the Year than around a table laid with bread and wine, visible signs of God’s commitment towards us as a New Year dawns. Use this moment to recommit your life to God. You will be glad that you did! Celebrate. It’s a New Year,

May God's blessing be with us all in 2022!

The Reverend Adrian J. Pratt B.D.