Lasting Newness

They say the day after Christmas is the greatest shopping day of the year. You would think we’d had enough of the new things of this life! Yet we always seem to want something more, something new.
The word new carries an element of hope, doesn’t it? Well, New Year’s is coming. How about making this a year of lasting newness, of continual hope? What might happen if your life, beginning today, centered not on the world’s newest or latest great things but on reveling in all that is new to us because we belong to Christ?
There’s the new self – what you became when you received the Christ of Christmas. “[You] have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him” (Colossians 3:10). This new self “has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth” (Ephesians 4:24). The new self also includes a new mind, a mind tuned to truth. You’re able to appraise things to see if they’re true because you “have the mind of Christ” (1 Corinthians 2:15-16).
Colossians tells us to “set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth” (3:2). Why not make it your goal this year to study some portions of the Bible that you’ve never really studied before? Discover new insights, new precepts, new promises as you study book by book. It will give you a new appreciation of what it means to be His and will keep you from being caught up in the world.
- Kay Arthur