You are invited on a spiritual New Year journey where you and I can discover the ONE WORD that God can use to guide us to become the disciple that the ONE WORD can focus us into becoming. The first disciples focused on different words that explained what God was doing in their life. Words like FOLLOW, LISTEN, LOVE, HOPEFUL, FORGIVENESS, DEEPER, and BALANCED. Like the disciples, we will discover MY ONE WORD that Jesus is inviting us to identify and use to help transform us. Not a list of resolutions that will result in failure, but ONE WORD that will keep it simple and focused.
MY ONE WORD. If you’re like most people, each January goes something like this: You choose a problematic behavior that has plagued you for years and vow to reverse it. In fact, you can probably think of two or three undesirable habits—make that four or five.
Thus begins the litany of imperfections to be perfected commonly known as “New Year’s Resolutions.” All of which are typically off our radar by February. “MY ONE WORD” is an experiment designed to move you beyond this cycle. The challenge is simple: lose the long list of changes you want to make this year and instead pick ONE WORD.
This process provides clarity by taking all your big plans for life change and narrowing them down into a single focus. Just one word that centers on your character and creates a vision for your future. So, we invite you to join us and pick one word for the next twelve months.
In Psalm 119:5 (NAS) – GOD’s WORD lays it out for us…“Oh, that my ways would be established in order to keep the Word.” I believe that God has a WORD for us and invites us to focus on MY ONE WORD that will help us establish ourselves as a disciple of Jesus. I believe that the change and growth we hunger for in our church begins with us. Our church will be transformed as we each practice our discipleship by the keeping of MY ONE WORD so that “our ways would be established – as we GO BE THE CHURCH!”
PICKING MY ONE WORD Over the next three weeks, you and I will be challenged to abandon the New Year’s Resolutions in exchange for MY ONE WORD. Instead of making a list of promises to keep, you and I will pick ONE WORD that will serve as a lens through which we will see our life and through which we will see God’s work in your life.
We begin on Sunday morning, January 6th. Invite someone to join you! The challenge is easier when two or more are “lifting together” in encouragement and support. See you then… You’re invited!
