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A Better Year Starts Here

                  A year ago, if you had told me that, in 2020, I would walk into my bank while wearing a mask, I would have thought you were crazy, but I did.

                Had you said that I would spend most of the year working from home instead of in my office, I might have guessed that the church building burned down.  It did not.

                If you noted that, by the end of the year, I would be sick of Zoom, I would have asked, “What is Zoom?”  I had never heard of it before this year.

                2020 was certainly a strange, sad, and hard year in many ways, both big and small.

                Happily, 2021 is upon us and with it comes the hope of a new and better year.  While numerous situations are still out of our control, it is wise to remember that there are some things that we can do to make this coming year a good one.

                One day Jesus was asked, “Which is the greatest commandment in the law?”  The questioner wanted to know what his major focus should be.

                Jesus’ answer was both simple and powerful: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.  This is the first and greatest commandment.  And the second is like it: Love your neighbour as yourself.  All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments” (Matthew 22:37-40).

                Love God and love people.  That is the filter through which everything needs to run.  Those two thoughts are the test by which everything else is measured.  Love is the standard and the starting point for every interaction.

                When this principle is applied, suddenly faith has less to do with our Sunday morning meeting and more to do with how we live each day.  It regulates how I act at work.  It influences how I spend my time, energy, and money.  It changes how I treat those around me, especially those with whom I do not see eye to eye.

                In short, if taken seriously, love God and love people would make me better.  It would make my friendships better.  It would make my days and my year better.

                Jesus said that everything we need starts right there.

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