Who to Follow In the New Year
Filed under {!-- ra:0000000049e825d0000000005ce80918 --}{if 'Who to Follow In the New Year' == '52home' && category_name == '52home'} Biblical Womanhood {if:else} Biblical Womanhood {/if}
(The New Year presents a new temptation for me to sinfully compare my life and productivity to other people. This biblical counsel from my mom—which she first shared with me over a decade ago—still redirects my gaze to Christ. See a link to her excellent message on “The Snare of Compare” at the end of this post.)
Sinful Comparison: A Pain in the Neck
It’s January again, and social media is clogged with New Year wishes and resolutions, reminiscences of the year past and predictions about the year ahead.
But the New Year can come with an unexpected side effect: the crick in our neck that we can get from looking around at everyone else and worrying that maybe they’ve got it better than we do. With every glance at our Facebook feed, the strain gets worse, the knots tighten.
Maybe 2015 wasn’t such a great year for you. Maybe it was full of set backs and frustrations, disappointments and challenges. Yet it seems (if Facebook is to be believed) like everyone else had an exciting and successful year. Everyone else got married and had babies. Everyone else’s home business took off. They made new friends, had great vacations, and their kids excelled in school. Everyone else lost weight.
They have and we have not. The more we think about it, the more restless, anxious, and dissatisfied we feel.
In search of a cure, we may pour out our sorrows on social media, and watch the sympathy likes pile up; but somehow they never fill our empty love cup to its tippy top.
Or we protest (too much, methinks) that we don’t care a wit what people think; we’re proud of our messy house and messed up life. We call it “being real.” We may try to release the tension by taking jabs and digs at others. If we can’t feel better about ourselves, at least we can create some company for our misery.
It’s not that we resolve to bigger complaining and better envy in 2016, but when we start to sinfully compare, we’re well on our way. If we sow seeds of “bitter jealousy and selfish ambition” at the start of the year, they are sure to sprout up as weeds that choke our growth in godliness the whole year through (James 3:14).
Our Savior graciously confronts our sinful comparison in John chapter 21. The scene is following his resurrection. He has just restored his disciple, Peter, and then he gives him the news: you will die a horrible death. We have a lot of sympathy for Peter, who strains his neck to look around at his buddy John and asks, “What about this man?” “What is that to you?”Jesus says to Peter. “You follow me.”
Our Savior’s loving rebuke echoes in our ears. He meant for it to. He meant for his words to protect us from sinful comparison that would distract us from our calling, stifle our growth in godliness, injure our relationships, dishonor his holiness, and make us miserable. And he invites us, or rather, commands us to “follow me.”
We follow him by meditating on his Word instead of longing for what others have, by taking whatever steps of obedience he requires from us today, and by rejoicing with others when they receive blessings from God. At the beginning of the New Year, let’s receive our Savior’s loving rebuke and gracious invitation.
Yes, everyone else may seem poised to be faster, better, prettier, smarter, and more successful in 2016, but “What is that to you? You follow me.”
{If you find yourself tempted to sinful comparison at the start of the New Year let me encourage you to watch this workshop.}