It’s that season when many of us have launched into new scripture reading plans, health habits, budget tracking programs, and all the other New Year’s goals.
Do you want to declutter your home? Keep a vitamin regime? Say “no” to more? If you’ve got an agenda item, there are plenty of plans to keep you on track.
Perhaps you resolved to finally “deal with” that nagging guilt, recover a more hopeful outlook, or find support for triaging a relationship conflict. Maybe you’ve had a close companion or trusted mentor encourage you to give more attention to a specific aspect of your life. Whatever the thing is for you as you settle into 2025, you probably have already encountered the voice of doubt or discouragement in these first weeks.
We come across messages meant to motivate us toward change at every turn:
- developing resiliency
- finding accountability
- cultivating a growth mindset
- setting wise boundaries
- creating rhythms that protect from burnout
No matter how you might find yourself practically seeking to change this year, resistance rises quickly, doesn’t it? You, are still you. You have the same personality you had last week. You (likely) have the same body, the same job/role, and the same limitations. You live with the same people in your home and frequent the same local shops in your neighborhood. The same troubles meet us each day. The ghosts of hard decisions you made in 2024 haunt you in 2025. The broken relationships that brought confusion and sorrow several months ago still gnaw at you during sleepless nights.
Maybe you’re moving into February disappointed that you’ve already given up on a goal you set, or frustrated that the conversation you hoped would welcome renewed connection has been quickly forgotten. Perhaps you’re wondering, what now? What should I do next? A few months back, I stumbled across this statement from a fellow counselor:
“A good clarifying question: when you seek God’s perspective on your situation, what is he inviting you to do? And a helpful reminder: it may be less about doing and more about receiving, resting, or releasing?”1
After pondering this for a few days, I began asking variations of those questions in the counseling room.
What aspect of God’s character do you need to receive?
What might you need to rest from? Rest to?
How would a particular form of resting benefit you in your current situation? Let’s imagine together what that would look like.
What can you release from your grip? Here, I might also ask my counselees to practice a physical form of release in prayer, intentionally opening their hands freely to God as they ask for his help in letting go of the clenching grip they are holding to in a difficult decision, troublesome relationship, or distressing thought spiral.
We often seek out a regimented program or accountability system to affect change, which certainly can hold value in the process. But we find the greatest help and hope for our troubles in a Person rather than a system. From improved health habits to career growth to increased relational connectedness, God has offered us the blueprint for transforming our lives. Not a spiritual platitude, we find the breadth and depth of its reality in God’s very words to us:
We all, with unveiled faces, are looking as in a mirror at the glory of the Lord and are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory; this is from the Lord who is the Spirit.
2 Corinthians 3:18, CSB
If we have come to know the redemptive work of Christ, we reflect him more and more each day — not because of what we do, but because of what has already been done for us and in us. Take heart, believer, whatever “isn’t working” for you in 2025 so far does not have the final say on who you are, your value, or the outcome of your goals. Of course, there are practices, ways of being, and adjustments you may want to consider alongside those who love you and are interested in your well-being. In this winter series, you’ll find more from our team on the discomfort of wandering and the tension of spiritual disciplines. The circumstances and challenges you face today may not be very different than where you left off at the close of last year. But, friend, we can thank God that we are promised a continual renewal of our whole person — from the inside out — until Christ returns and our transformation is complete.
Melissa Affolter has served in various aspects of counseling and discipleship ministries for nearly twenty years in the local church.
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