I originally wrote this post in January 2015, after my dad, brother and I nearly got into a car accident on New Year’s Day.

We had decided to go skiing. On the way there, for a short distance, we traveled through a snow squall. The roads were quickly covered with a slick white dusting. As we rounded a corner between a steep embankment and a guard rail, the driver opposite us in the other lane lost control. Her car went into a tailspin, up the embankment, and back across the road, hitting the guardrail. She came to an abrupt stop in our lane, opposite of where we had just slowed to a stop as well.

It all happened so fast, and the other driver was fine. But things like that make you think. If we hadn’t slowed to a stop as soon as we did, her car would have slammed into the side of ours. If we had left our house just a little bit later, or if we hadn’t stopped at Sheetz to grab something to eat, we might not have been able to avoid the collision. I know that’s a lot of “what ifs”, but there’s a good chance that a collision on that snow-covered corner would have been fatal.

I was reminded that we are never guaranteed another day. We’re not guaranteed another year, or another month, or another minute. Every breath is a gift from God. Every moment is another chance we get to glorify our perfect Savior in this broken world.

But we live like life is filled with guarantees.

Just think of how we treat the New Year. The calendar year changes from December to January, and people all over the country commit to “fixing” their lives. We buy gym memberships (many of which, if we’re being honest, we don’t really use), pin healthy recipes on Pinterest, promise to be kinder or more patient or more dedicated to our families, and assure ourselves that we will indeed make a noticeable, transformative change.

I think intentions are good, and I certainly have nothing against positive change. But it’s not always just the thought that counts. Someone who decides to cut out sugar from their diet and then eats half a batch of chocolate chip cookies is not successful, even if they had the best of intentions. A person who resolves to be more patient with her family, but then erupts with anger at the first opportunity, can’t just say, “Well, I tried to be more patient. It’s the thought that counts, right?”

The thing is, New Year’s resolutions are often not resolutions at all. They are re-solutions:  solutions that we try to create for ourselves year after year, but they never quite work. By February, we decide we will just try again next year. It’s as if somehow, the start of a new year gives us an excuse for waiting to start over, and waiting to make that necessary change so we can live our best lives.

My point is this: we never have a guarantee of another year. We never even have a guarantee of another day. Life is fast and beautiful and hard and rewarding and unpredictable.

Maybe instead of re-solving our problems once a year, we should work to solve them each and every day. Instead of New Year’s re-solutions, maybe we should focus on daily solutions in our lives.

Solve to be brave. Solve to be kind and patient. Solve to love God with all of your heart and soul and mind and strength. Solve to love your neighbor as yourself. Make a change. Make solutions… not re-solutions.

Each day you wake up, you wake up with a gift—the gift of life. How you choose to handle that gift is your choice. But why wait for the New Year to get a better grasp on the gift of life?

Make solutions now, not re-solutions later. Make solutions each day, not re-solutions once a year.

And never forget… you are onederfully created.

Love,
Becca