Anchor Friday - Resolved

Here is Joan's post for this week's Anchor Friday:

On a dark night at sea, two lights were approaching each other. As they continued to get closer, the captain of a ship sent out a message: "Recommend you change course." The immediate reply came back: "Recommend you change course!" The captain, being somewhat miffed, signaled again: "This is CAPTAIN Smith. Again, I recommend you change course!" The reply came back just as quickly: "This is SEAMAN Jones; I recommend you change course!" By this time the captain was reaching the limits of his patience. He ordered an immediate, uncompromising message: "I am on a U.S. battleship. I order you to change course!!" to which the reply came back: "I am on a lighthouse. I recommend you change course."

Resolved! I can be pretty stubborn in my sin. Sometimes so stubborn that I can't change course even when I know I'm headed for danger.A new year is a time to set your course and look back where you've been and to look forward to where you want to go. I can see the horizon ahead and it holds promise and possibility. I know that storms await me and I know that I am stronger now. I am ready to make the journey. I am resolved.I am resolved to make my goal weight this year. I am resolved to spend more time in the word, more time praying and less time obsessing about food. I am resolved to share what I learn with others and to encourage others. I am resolved to hang on to the Anchor!The new year is full of promise. A clean slate. What will you do in 2009? What changes do you want to make? Do you need to change course?

Let us hold tightly without wavering to the hope we affirm, for God can be trusted to keep his promise. Let us think of ways to motivate one another to acts of love and good works. And let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage one another, especially now that the day of his return is drawing near.
Hebrews 10: 23-25 (New Living Translation)

Almighty God, I confess that without you I cannot make this journey. I need your guidance, strength and perseverance. Fill my sail with your Spirit and keep me in your will. Help me to discern what is danger and what is the lighthouse. In Jesus' name. Amen.

Thanks Joan for that great post. Here is Martyn Lloyd Jones from Spiritual Depression. Let's put 2008 behind us, and look forward to an awesome 2009 with Christ!

"Would you like to be rid of this spiritual depression? The first thing you have to do is to say farewell now once and forever to your past. Realize that it has been covered and blotted out in Christ. Never look back at your sins again. Say: ‘It is finished, it is covered by the Blood of Christ’. That is your first step. Take that and finish with yourself and all this talk about goodness, and look to the Lord Jesus Christ. It is only then that true happiness and joy are possible for you. What you need is not to make resolutions to live a better life, to start fasting and sweating and praying. No! You just begin to say:

I rest my faith on Him alone
Who died for my transgressions to atone. (35)