June is the new January

June is the new January…

June 2, 2016

Megann Graf

Often by the time June rolls around . . . .

we forget all about New Year resolutions and have fallen back into our old habits.  I was reading a blog today by Ann Voskamp titled “How you can do a reset in the middle of the year…June’s the new January.”  I don’t know about you, but I could probably stand a reset about now.  I’m about to steal some of what she wrote, and I encourage you to check her blog out on aholyexperiment.com.  She made a statement that I think was profound…”A pail with a pinhole loses as much water as the pail pushed right over. A whole life can be wasted in the minutes wasted…in the small moments missed.”    I often recognize the moments when I’ve totally spilled the bucket.  I can see my error and understand my loss.  But, how many little moments do I let slip by, leak away?  How much time am I wasting on the meaningless things in life?  

Philippians 2:4-5

“Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.  Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus.”

Jesus was interested in others, because he didn’t want to waste any moment of his time here on earth.  Everything that he did on earth had meaning.  Everything had a purpose.  Notice that it doesn’t say not to look to your own interests at all…it just says, don’t ONLY look at your interests, but also to the interests of others.  His intent is not to have us lose who we are, but to enhance who we are by also acknowledging that others matter as much as we do. 

Sometimes, I think we let ourselves get overwhelmed by worrying about the meaningless.  The sneaky sin of the suburbs…worry.  It steals not only our time, but our joy.  We get so wrapped up in our interests, in our schedules, in our to-do lists, that we forget that some of them really aren’t that important.  Not in the grand scheme of life.  And we are losing a lot of moments from those little pinholes that are in our buckets.  We are losing moments of joy from small leaks, not from big spills.  And we risk letting years pass and looking back and wondering how time slipped away by being overwhelmed by things that aren’t really worth our worry.  So, June is the new January.  We need to reset and take time to refocus our eyes on the One who will lift us out of worry.  The One who will transform our worry to joy.

Ann Voskamps writes, “Make gratitude your attitude of habit – there’s no other way to make joy in your life.  Every little day just has to be a little bit better.  Small things done consistently, consistently make the biggest change.  And you get to do the hard and holy things- you can do hard and holy things for the joy, for the love.  Because whatever you do for joy, you can do forever. Habits matter because: Habits are the spine of our self-control.  You can change your life when you change what you do everyday.”

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