Like it or not the calendar has again come full circle, and we find ourselves once more at the place of new beginnings . . . January 1st. Where has the time gone so quickly, you might ask?
The supply of time although gloriously regular is restricted.
We have, and always have had, all the time there is!
(unknown author)
With all of the uncertainty regarding what tomorrow and the rest of 2012 may bring into our lives this much we can know for sure - all of us on the planet will have the same 24 hours each day to live as well as the ability to choose what we will do with that time, which God has provided for our use. Someone has suggested that life is a grindstone. Whether it wears a man down or polishes him depends on the stuff of which he is made!
Elder Jeffrey R. Holland, an apostle of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, said, "The start of a new year is the traditional time to take stock of our lives and see where we are going, measured against the backdrop of where we have been." Have you stopped to consider how many New Year's resolutions are made on or around January 1st each year and subsequently broken and abandoned in less than 30 days? A cartoon appearing in the Washington Times some years ago suggested, “The road to ruin is paved with good intentions, and you keep making potholes."
Many of us fail in our efforts to change because we haven't learned that the past is to learn from rather than to live in as we often seem to do. To continue on the same course we have already been traveling while expecting different results is a good definition of insanity. To redirect ourselves into a new path that offers the promised hope of measurable positive change, requires faith and diligence.
Elder Holland points out that faith always points to the future, which means that we cannot expect to arrive at a new destination while we remain seated in the soft easy chair of our past experiences. The Gospel of Jesus Christ requires that we earnestly seek to become more like the Savior by acquiring Christ-like attributes to replace our past sins, weaknesses, and bad habits.
As missionaries, Sister Lindsay and I wish to help bring positive, permanent change into the lives of other people. We must each live every day in such a way that we can see firsthand how the miracles of repentance and forgiveness, of trust and unconditional love, can change our lives for good. Now that's a New Year's resolution we should want to keep every day in 2012!
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