CHRISTIAN COMMENT Can you see your vision?

HOW are your New Year resolutions going?

The gym visits, the early morning jog, no late night snacks?

I gave up New Year resolutions several years ago – I knew I’d only be setting myself up for failure.

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And besides, I had my sights on something bigger – not a resolution, but a vision.

What’s a vision? No, not an apparition, but the goal which gets you out of bed in the morning.

Visions come in all shapes and sizes, but the remarkable thing is that there’s at least one tailor-made for you.

How do I know?

Well, I remember life Before vision – and resolutions and goals which either never materialised or were only half-hearted in the first place.

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They were rarely fulfilled because they centred around me – my career or my future.

Finally, at 28, after hovering on the fringes of the Christian world for a while, looking for a higher reason for my existence, I heard a minister say that I could give my career to God.

So I told God he could have my string of non-productive, under-valued jobs, which included one sacking from a writing job.

I let them go in my mind and watched how, over the next three years, not one, but two worthwhile careers opened up in which I felt useful and even valued.

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Ironically, the second career was writing, beginning as editor of a Christian magazine – proof that God will revive all your talents, once you’ve given him carte blanche to use them for his glory, not yours.

Some years later, I received another “vision”, to start a local Christian newspaper, leading to the appearance of Heart of Worthing, succeeded by Heart of West Sussex, which is now distributed to churches across the county.

All the time I meet or hear of people who have taken God’s words to Jeremiah in the Bible literally: “I know the plans I have for you... plans to prosper you and not hurt you... plans to give you a hope and a future.”

Their lives are more fulfilling than they ever imagined possible.

So at the start of another year, don’t settle for the humdrum.

Ditch those dreary little resolutions and ask God, if he’s real, to show himself to you and what HIS vision is for your life.