Declare a New Year's REVOLUTION!

Why is it people spend so much time planning for a new year, setting different things in motion, promising themselves they're going to stop this and that, beginning anew in areas and starting fresh in others? They set resolutions that they assure themselves and others they will follow but rarely continue with them through even the first month, much less the entire year. Yes, yes, I am guilty of this myself. I'm not being hypocritical - I just think we have more within us. I am beginning to stir over a new year because frankly I'm so over this one. I feel that so much has changed in my own life and in those that I love and care about, and it's time to take some things back and set some new vision in place.

I think this year it's time we set New Year's REVOLUTIONS!

It is so easy to get wrapped up in trying to make the next year better than the one that's ending. We evaluate what we've done, what we didn't do, what worked, what failed, all to create a greater sense of urgency and busy-ness for the coming year so that it produces more than its predecessor. Our goals in all areas of life get loftier because we think maybe the past year didn't mean much because we didn't aim for much. We finally get to our level playing field and are so overwhelmed with new things to do that we don't really know where to begin. I don't think planning is bad, but I think people plan themselves to death at times, all the while creating this vulnerability and places for the enemy to slink in and plunder for the next year, the same he did the previous year..and the one before that...and the one before that...see the pattern?

I was reading in Nehemiah today and something came to me for this coming year that I had never officially made part of my "new year's plans". The people of Israel had rallied with Nehemiah to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem, a task that many "officials" in that time thought to be incomprehensible. As they were planning, working, and making progress on their goals, their enemy (Sanballat, Tobiah, and other regional officials in the surrounding areas at the time) positioned to attack to stop the work they were doing. Nehemiah's response? He armed the laborers to be ready for the attack, but the work continued.

I sometimes fall into the trap that I am either armed Spiritually (having been in the Word, praying, devoting my every dream, desire, plan, and step to God) or I am hard at work. In years past I have promised myself I would study the Word more than I had the previous year so I would know it and have it available to combat the enemy, but then that same busy-ness crept in and that goal seemed to get less and less attention. I look around me all the time and view people who are powerhouses in God's Kingdom only running with half-power because the labor has become so toilsome and burdensome that they cannot as easily fend off the onslaught of Hell, leaving many of them crippled and on the verge of collapse.

Nehemiah wrote in 4:17, "Those who built on the wall, and those who carried burdens, loaded themselves so that with one hand they worked at construction, and with the other held a weapon". That's why this year needs to be a year of revolutions - a year when we as God's people declare that we will not only continue in our labor, but we will also have our swords within reach in preparation for the attack we know is just around the corner. Sure, we all should still set goals and dreams in motion for the coming year, but they cannot be the reason the enemy triumphs over us time and again. It's time to get smart in our approach to our enemy. It's time to get on the wall, for real!