It’s a new year, and I’d like to welcome you to 2012! This will be a year full of opportunities, challenges and changes in each of our lives.
Some of these changes will be the result of a commitment or resolution that you’ve made. These commitments have been made to drive our lives in a different direction and catapult dreams and hopes into reality.
Unfortunately, statistics are not on our side to see these commitments take shape and form in our life. Forty percent of New Year’s resolutions are broken by the end of January, and 75 percent are broken by Feb. 15.
These statistics lead me to ask a question: “Why do most of our commitments or resolutions fail?” I believe the answer lies in our intentions. We make these commitments based on “good” intentions, not “God” intentions. You see, good intentions have a tendency to focus around us. For example, “What is it that I think needs to be different in my life?”
We make these commitments with the intention of keeping them, but when things become difficult to maintain, we slowly see the excuses move in. Quitting then becomes an option, and ultimately we give up. The commitment lacks staying power because we are relying on our own strength and abilities.
God intentions are drastically different. They are focused and centered on God and His desires for your life.
God becomes the author of that change, making His power available to bring about success.
“But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore, I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me” (2 Corinthians 12:9).
Now there is staying power, because it’s by His strength and His abilities that things are being accomplished.
Maybe we need to change the questions we’re asking.
Instead of asking “What are some things I’d like to be different in my life?” we could ask “What does God want to be different in my life and why?”
When we attach the “spiritual why” to the “what” God is asking you to do, the Holy Spirit empowers the accomplishing of the “what” because it is based on God’s principles.
For example, if the “what” is to get in better shape, the physical or wrong “why” is so I can fit into my skinny jeans, but the spiritual or right “why” is that my body is a temple of the Holy Spirit.
“Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore, honor God with your bodies” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20).
As believers, our lives shouldn’t be governed by what we think is best or what we want our lives to be. God is the author of your very existence, creating you for a good purpose (Jeremiah 29:11) — a purpose that fulfills you like no other.
“Ask God the question, “What do you want to be different in my life?” Whatever God is asking you to do, no matter how large the task, He will provide you the resources, people and support you need to make it happen. I dare you — ask!

Darsey is the lead pastor of Restoration Church and a member of the United Ministerial Alliance.