Choose this Year

Whether you are a ‘resolutions person’ or not, the beginning of the year gives the sense of a fresh start.  The holiday food is done and maybe you look toward eating healthier and exercising.  Perhaps you reconnected with some old friends or relatives and you want to keep up with them starting in 2026.  You attended church sometime through Advent and Christmas for the first time in a while, and you want to make it more regularly.

Whatever you may be thinking for the direction ahead of you, it involves a choice.  As Christians we often have choices that alter the trajectory of our family.  These choices can moves us toward God or away from Him.

We choose how to spend free time, what to read, what to watch, and how often to worship both in a church and at home as a family.  One way to view this choice is to ask “Who will I serve” As Bob Dylan famously said,  “Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord, but you’re gonna have to serve somebody”.  These choices can have lasting impact, sometimes on generations to come, whether for the good or not.

In the Old Testament, Joshua led the people into the promised land after Moses died.  He was a great leader and toward the end of his life he put before the people a choice for their future generations.  He gathered all the Elders and leaders of Israel together and gave them this important choice.  This is a speech probably influenced Dylan’s lyrics as it can us today:

Choose you this day who you will serve…but as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord. Joshua 24:15

Sometimes the courage to choose God in the future comes from remembering his faithfulness in the past. Joshua reminded the people of Israel the history of how God was with them throughout past generations. He reminded them of God’s faithfulness to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Joshua 24:1-13). He retold the familiar stories of how they lived in Egypt, how God rescued them miraculously, then how he gave them the land he promised.  At the end of this farewell address he even took a large stone of remembrance and placed it near the sanctuary of God.  It became a marker of remembrance to God’s faithfulness.

How has God been faithful to you in your life?  At this start of 2026 take the time to remember the things he has done for you.  Has he given you the strength go through the troubled times that you never thought you would survive?  Maybe it was a health problem, a divorce, a wayward child, or something else.  He was there for you then, and he will be with you not matter what is ahead.  Don’t forget who has brought you through and you will be able to choose afresh the Faithful God who loves you.

If we rewind to the beginning of Joshua’s leadership of the people, he had another wise challenge that I will leave with you. He encouraged them towards obedience by remembering and following the Words of God.  He said:

This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success. Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go. Joshua 1:8-9