The Resolutions that Matter

I have a love/hate relationship with New Year's. 

On the one hand, getting sloshed and insluting your wife or driving drunk and wrapping your car around a tree just doesn't seem like the right way to celebrate anything in life. I also have a hard time with the comments that stem along the line of we made it through this year! because what about the ones that didn't make it through the year? In my admittedly oversensitive heart you just called a bunch of my loved ones failures and they are nothing of the sort. They simply didn't have the choice to finish off the calendar year here on earth. And that hurts. Thanks for the reminder.

But on the other hand, I love a makeover. There is something incredibly empowering  about washing over the old color of a wall with a new one, symbolizing a new start, a fresh start, a chance to finally get it right.

Resolution suggestions abound the interwebs: lose 10 pounds, stop smoking, drink more water, save $10,000 and finally take that trip to Fiji. They all seem so.... selfish. 

How does it improve the world if you vacation in Fiji? Yes, yes, I know... you'll be better rested and relaxed and therefore more pleasant to the populous at large. I get it. I really do. But, well, I want more.

I want to make resolutions that matter.

I want to spend less on frivolous things (like soda and pens) so I can sponsor children that otherwise won't have access to safe drinking water or an education. I go out to dinner and it's an easy $30 -- if I eat out just one time less each month I can sponsor another child. So maybe you stop smoking and use the money you would normally spend on cigarettes to sponsor a child of your own.   {you can go to www.gvcm.org to do just that} 

I want to travel internationally - by going to Haiti on more mission trips and encourage others to go, too. I know people who have served in Honduras and Costa Rica and Moldova... and they keep going back. They need to go back. Their heart calls them to it. So, maybe you save Fiji for another year. Why not consider a short term mission trip? You could always stay on for another few days or a week to view things as a tourist. 

I want to save more so I can give more. Clipping coupons and Kids Eat Free deals are great... but  they're even better when it means the free meal is being shared with a foster child. Have you considered fostering? Have you considered a program similar called Safe Families? Save $25 extra out of each paycheck and use it to buy supplies for your local homeless shelter. Take those buy one get one free foods and donate them to your local food bank. 

I want to lose weight - but the weight I really want to lose is the heaviness of a materialistic life that tries to convince me I'm not successful unless I am surrounded by the $78 frying pan and the $65 shower curtain. Instead I want to live simply so I have the means to provide more for others. I want to pack food for the hungry and deliver Meals on Wheels and mentor a single mother who has somehow bought into the lies that all she knows how to do is make mistakes. I want to lose the weight of the world and pack on the pounds of love needed to serve God's people of the world.

I want to make resolutions that matter.

Because if I don't make it through 2015, I want to at least be known as someone who tried to make a difference with the time she had.