Nothing creates enthusiasm like the opportunity to start over. If you have ever messed up and wished for an opportunity to undo and then redo, you know what I am talking about. Although in life’s game, we cannot do this, the closest that we can come to doing this is presented to us at the first of each new year. This is why people make new year’s resolutions. It is the most ideal time of the year to start over. Here we are again at the first of a new year. Whatever happened last year that represented failure and disappointment, let’s start over and have a great year.

We are rapidly approaching the end of the first decade of the 21st century. The only comforting thing about time flying so fast is that soon we will be flying away to be with the Lord. I’m not talking about death. I’m talking about life, eternal life in Heaven effected by the Rapture of the Church. Whatever you planned to accomplish this year, you have one month left, one-twelfth of the time you had when 2010 began. In 2011 we may be in Heaven. If you are not ready for all of this to transpire, let your motto be, “I’m Going To Decide In December.”

If October is known for Halloween, November is known for Thanksgiving. And what is Thanksgiving known for? Turkey and dressing dinners with all the trimmings. We only have to examine the word “Thanksgiving” to understand what the meaning of this word is all about. It is a time set aside to give thanks to the Lord. I Thessalonians 5:18 says, “In everything give thanks.” It does not say, “for everything give things” but “in everything.” So in the midst of everything, good and bad, we are to give thanks. Although it is easy to give thanks when things are good, it is not so easy to give thanks then things are bad. But we can always thank the Lord that things are not worse than they are. Let us be thanks givers not only during November but every month of the year. Remember November is not turkey month. It is the month of thanksgiving.

Unfortunately, when people think of October, they often think of Halloween. And Halloween conjures up thoughts of goblins and ghosts. The ancient Celts believed that the border between this world and the other world became thin on Halloween allowing spirits, both harmless and harmful to pass through. The families’ ancestors were honored and invited home while harmful spirits were warded off. It is believed that the need to ward off harmful spirits led to the wearing of costumes and masks.

Christians do not believe this superstition. We do believe that the border between this world and the other world is thin enough for the Ghost, the Holy Ghost, to come to us and fill us. Let’s not ward off this wonderful Spirit by our costumes of self-righteousness, but let us pull off our masks of hypocrisy and allow His Spirit to go home with us.

In a Broadway musical produced in 1938 Walter Huston introduced Kurt Weill’s song, September Song. One verse says, “Oh, its a long, long while from May to December, but the days grow short when you reach September.” Concerning the last days, Jesus said, “And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect’s sake those days shall be shortened” (Matthew 24:22). The other two lines of that verse of September Song says, “ When the autumn weather turns the leaves to flame, one hasn’t got time for the waiting game.” With the days being shortened, we must not wait to give our best to the Lord.

The month that we call “August” was once called “Sextillis,” its Latin name. In 45 BC Julius Caesar monkeyed with the months and came up with what is called the Julian Calendar. Finally 37 years later in 8 BC the eighth month was named “August” after Caesar Augustus. We are not so much concerned with the noun, August, as we are the adjective “august”

(pronounced with the accent on the second syllable) which means “marked by majestic dignity or grandeur.” In August we need august men and women to stand up and be counted for God and country. This is what John Walter Foss meant when he said, “Give me men to match my mountains, Give me men to match my plains, Men with freedom in their visions and creation in their veins.”

The fourth is perhaps the most remembered day of July. It is the day we celebrate our independence from Great Britain. On July 4,1776, the Continental Congress announced that the 13 colonies were now independent states, and thus no longer a part of the British Empire. We declared our independence but had to fight for it for five years before the final victory won. It was even two years after that before the Treaty of Paris officially ended the Revolutionary War.

We can declare our independence from Satan and sin, but we have to fight for it to be a reality. Confrontation always follows declaration, but our spiritual freedom is worth fighting for.

When God delivered Israel from Egyptian bondage, He told them, “This month shall be unto you the beginning of months: it shall be the first month of the year to you” (Exodus12:2). This month was Abib, or the equivalent of our April. It was appropriate for April to be the first month of the Jewish year, for in April we see nature springing to life much like Israel coming back to life when they left Egypt.

If you have suffered a long winter of discontent, allow the spiritual sap to surge through your dreariness producing the beautiful blooms of a new beginning. Tell the devil, “My winter is over and my spring has begun.”

I am always encouraged when the month of February rolls around. Winter is a gloomy time of the year with the trees poking their naked fingers to the cold sky.

Some people allow these dismal days to depress them. But when the calendar says February, I know that the next month is March, and Spring begins in March. This helps me to get through the days when everything looks dead to the days when things start coming alive again. Let the lesson of the months encourage you. No matter how dark and dismal life may seem right now, just say, "Next month is Spring." With hope on the horizon it is easier to make it through the "winter of our discontent." Psalms 30:5 says, "Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning."

How exciting and challenging is January! Being the first month of a new year, it is an excellent time to start over and attempt to redo the things we messed up on the previous year. Everyone likes the opportunity to start over. Obviously any day of the year we could do that, but the first of a new year just seems like a better time. Why? The year is starting over. The months are starting over. Therefore we feel that it is just the appropriate time to begin anew. Let us purpose to draw closer to the Lord this year. If you have not been as faithful to the Lord, to your family, and to yourself as you should have been, the calendar is giving you an ideal opportunity to turn over an old leaf and begin a new leaf: January, 2010.