It’s February. How are your resolutions coming? Maybe you’re still going strong. Maybe you messed up by January 10, so you gave up. Maybe you didn’t make any because you knew you wouldn’t stick to them.
Me, I made a couple, but ringing in the new year was a little anti-climactic for me. Maybe you didn’t make any resolutions this year because, like me, you felt like you were entering the new year with unfinished business from 2015. So, in all honesty, it doesn’t truly feel like a new year, a new beginning.
You see, I’m not a patient person and I don’t like it when things feel unfinished. But God has been teaching me, in a very hard-knock lesson sort of way, that patience is something I need to start practicing. Someone very smart told me, “When you’re not listening, sometimes God gets a bigger hammer.”
So, I started focusing on baby steps. People tell you when you’re going through something difficult to “take it one day at a time.” The Bible tells us that “his mercies are new every morning” (paraphrased from Lementations 3:22-23). So, that’s what I’m doing. I’m focusing on progress, one day at a time and it’s working. So much so that I’ve let this bleed over to all areas of my life.
But what happens on a day that we don’t show progress? Heck, what happens on a day where we take a step (or a leap) backwards? His mercies are new every morning, people! You don’t give up on your resolutions, your goals, your hopes and dreams, just because you make a mistake one day, or something outside your control just didn’t line up when you wanted it to. Say a prayer, ask for forgiveness, or comfort, or patience, go to bed, wake up the next morning knowing it’s a new day!
There’s a great quote from Lysa Terkeurst, president of Proverbs 31 Ministries, that says, “There’s this beautiful thing called imperfect progress. Slow steps of progress wrapped in grace.” I love this. It’s written on my chalkboard at work. It reminds me every day that progress doesn’t always look the way we want it to, but that’s okay.
2016 is going to be my year of imperfect progress. What’s it going to be for you?