A CONCLUDING THOUGHT FOR THE BEGINNING OF A NEW YEAR

This is the time of year when most of us will look back on 2009 with a critical eye. Some of us, depending on how hard we are on ourselves, will hate what we see at best or feel like hiding under a rock at worse. As a result, we will resolve to do better - better with our money, better with our relationships, better with our careers, better with our health and better with our spirituality. Then there are those self-deceived souls that harbor illusions of grandeur and feel that they are just fine - no adjustments necessary.

Purse and Pride

Most people look at how well they fared in 2009 in terms of their net worth and self worth. Net worth has to do with our purse, whereas self worth relates to pride. The year 2oo9 with its economic downturn tested the survival of both. According to the Federal Reserve, household net worth hit its lowest point ($48.5 trillion) during the first quarter of 2009. That new low was preceeded by three consecutive quarterly declines in 2008. Many experts are saying that it will be quite some time before household net worth reaches the historic high just two years ago.

According to some experts, King Solomon, the wealthiest person in the Bible, had an estimated yearly income measured by today's value of over $280 million. Yet Solomon near the end of his life, saw the folly in protecting his purse and pride at the expense of pleasing God. I want to echo his concluding words about life at the beginning of this new year,

"Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is the whole duty of man." Ecclesiastes 12:13

Actually, the word duty in the verse was added by the translators. We can say that fearing God and keeping his commandments are the "whole of man." In other words, fearing God is the sine qua non of a life pleasing to Him. Without it nothing else really matters in comparison. Regardless of your self-assessment of how well you did in 2009, what really matters is fearing God and keeping His commandments.

What is the fear of the Lord?

The fear of the Lord is a desire or longing within us and a drawing outside of us to be close to God in reverential obedience.

God is the source of the longing within and the drawing without. He gets all the glory. Oswald Chambers wrote, "The remarkable thing about fearing God is that when you fear God, you fear nothing else; whereas when you do not fear God, you fear everything else." So, the big question is this, "What do you fear?"

Remember, whom you fear determines what you fear!