“Ring in the New?”

Every time a new year shows up, the talk is constant about doing something different from what we did the year before: stop eating so much, lose weight, give up bad habits, be kinder to the unpleasant in-laws, seek forgiveness from the pleasant ones. Learn another language. Write the Great American Novel. Join the community service organizations so long ignored. Call that best friend and highschool classmate to renew acquaintances after 35 years. Memorize the list of US Presidents, in order. Memorize the books of the Bible, in order. Memorize the state capitals. (What we forget is that we did these memory exercises once but it was so long ago that we can’t remember them . . . .) And on it goes. Along about February or March, the list has shortened, and by June we wonder what it was we had decided to do this year.

What if we make promises to ourselves that won’t be forgotten? What if instead of changing old habits we simply adopt new ones? Some years ago I read a book on tennis in which the premise was that rather than struggle with changing or conquering old habits of swinging the racket and serving and other ways of playing, we should develop new and better ways to play the game. The mind was likened to a record (remember those disks we used to hear music on?) with the grooves set into the vinyl which were then set permanently. Rather than try to remove those grooves, far better to set new grooves which would replace the old ones. So let’s resolve to forget about changing our habits, and create new ones which override what we used to do.

Far be it from me to tell you what you need to do, other than suggest that you find new ways to live your life that will be an improvement on the former ones. Think about your attitudes, your use of time, your expectations. Can they be replaced with better ways? I find that guilt plays a big part in how I don’t act in ways that are best for me. I eat way too much of the wrong food groups, for instance. Friends are always giving me ideas and recipes for a healthier lifestyle. I find these most helpful and interesting, and one of these days I’ll probably try some of them. Because I haven’t done so yet, I feel guilty, and to assuage that guilt, I find that a good bowl of ice cream is most comforting to the spirit, if not so comforting to the body I inhabit.

You may have noticed I’ve not mentioned our church life. I’ve ignored the features of our faith journeys. I have not mentioned the importance of community and its imprint upon our belief systems. The value of faith is not so much how well it benefits us, but how well it benefits others. If we really want to find a better way of living and develop the patterns that will take us there, the focus begins to turn outward rather than inward. It is, strangely enough, when we forget ourselves that we remember others. It is when we become willing to give up that we receive. These are more than platitudes that we discover on those emails our friends send to us. They are the real, nitty-gritty requirements of living a life to the fullest.

We can’t embrace the whole gamut of what calls to us in this world of great needs. But we begin somewhere. My one suggestion is to begin with discovering how membership in Fellowship Presbyterian Church can stretch our perspectives so that we see the world as it is and not our own small space unless it connects beyond our comfort and beyond our present understandings. Let’s take some stretching exercises and see where they take us in this chaotic world of 2009.