New Year's resolutions

How many of your New Year's resolutions have you kept into day two of the new year?  In the past, if I kept my resolutions into the second week I felt I was doing good.  I was so bad at keeping New Year's resolutions that I quit even making them several years ago.  I found it was much better to set goals for the new year and to develop a plan that would enable those goals to be achieved.  I keep these goals in front of me throughout the year, and they really do influence how I spend my time.  After all, if they are not important enough to demand your time and energy they probably shouldn't be goals anyway.  I set goals for my ministry, my family life, and my own personal life.  Let me briefly share with you four of my 2009 goals and how I did with them.

Goal #1 was to lose weight.  I know...I know...almost everybody sets that as a goal at the start of the year.  (That was one of my New Year's resolutions for several years, and I never got to week two with this one.)  I not only wanted to lose weight; I wanted to lose quite a bit of weight.  45 pounds to be exact.  Even though I was faithfully going to the gym 3-4 days a week I wasn't losing the weight I wanted.  This was due primarily to the amount of ministry-related travel I do.  Mid-year I took another step and joined Weight Watchers.  Following their program and continuing to go to the gym I managed to lose 41 pounds by the end of the year, and I will lose the other four pounds before January is out.

Goal #2 was to increase our enrollment in our Church Leadership Institute (CLI) by 20 percent.  CLI is a leadership development program we offer pastors and lay leaders in our region, and it is one of my responsibilities.  Enrollment had been falling over the past couple of years, and I wanted to see it turn around.  We were able to increase our enrollment of new students by 17 percent and put some new policies in place that should help our enrollment continue to climb.

Goal #3 was to complete my DMin work by the end of 2009.  I was able to complete my coursework in 2009 and write my thesis.  The thesis has been submitted to my mentor and reader, and I look forward to hearing from them regarding any changes I need to make.  I should be able to graduate this May,and that was the purpose for this goal.  I wanted to complete my work by the end of the year so I could graduate in the spring of 2010.

Goal #4 was to continue to develop resources for small church leaders, and this also was achieved.  I had a new book come out in the spring of 2009 and signed a contract for another book that will be released this spring.  I also conducted several workshops for various denominational groups in the US and Canada.

I have new goals for 2010 that I am excited about, and I pray you do as well.  If you haven't already, set some goals for your family, some for your ministry, and some for your own personal benefit.  Some of your goals should be short-term and others long-term.  Make sure some of them are fun-related.  If you can keep your New Year's resolutions, great.  For me, it is much more effective to set goals so I have some specific targets to aim at throughout the year.