It’s a new year and an old me.

Isn’t it amazing how we are conditioned to want to start over every year? We want to erase the old and live in the new. But I find after about two weeks (I’m being generous with myself here) the same old same old seems to be rolling in again. A cousin of mine on facebook this week, posted this as her status:

Thankful that life is broken up into months and years. Increments of time that contain our memories. I stand in awe of how God has moved in years past and wonder to what lies ahead…

I thought that was so poignant of how I feel. But if I am honest, I am going to forget this in a month. I am going to forget that Christ has called me to be a new creation, and I will get back to being the same old me. But is that so bad? Is the same old me really so bad?

The end of one year and the start of another should be a time of reflection and memory, as Erin so aptly stated. As I reflect on 2010, I remember the hard times. I remember how at one point last January, everything was crumbling down around me. I remember how work was falling apart fast, I was suffocating inside our small apartment, I wasn’t sure if Fuller was the right place for me, I felt like I didn’t have any friends, and it was all around a no good, very bad month. But I also remember March too. I remember planning my sisters wedding, I remember finding out we got a house, I remember having my grandma share my birthday with me, I remember finding some good friends at school and taking classes that spoke to me in the deepest of ways. But I also remember the Fall – school was hard and really wearing me down emotionally and spiritually.  Work, while it stabilized, became more intense and forward-moving at a rapid pace. I remember not seeing Seth for what seemed like weeks upon weeks. Sure, we saw each other, but we weren’t really “seeing” each other. And I remember not feeling God close, even though I was reading all about him. But then again, I remember now. I remember this morning – and I how I got new mercies when I awoke. How the old me was made new, yet again. Yes, today happens to be New Years Day, but tomorrow won’t be. Tomorrow I’ll be the same me – but I’ll still have another chance at a new day.

So as my day comes to a close, I lie in bed and reflect on the old year, and the old me. But really, I think I am okay with it all. Because all those months and years have made me…well, me. The increments of time that contain my memories hold both the good and the bad. Just as I am. I contain both good and bad, old and new. For we cannot know the new without knowing the old, right? If that’s true – I have to know the old year before I can begin to know the new year. I have to know the old me – before I can begin to know the new me.

I think that’s why so many people’s resolutions fail…they don’t know their “old” selves. They don’t know who they are – they just know they want to change. But here’s the kicker – we don’t have to wait for a new year to change. Like I said – our mercies are new EVERY morning. Every second of every day, we can be made new. So as we reflect on our memories from this past year – embrace the old, for in it, the truly new will be found. Oh…and Happy New Year.