My Yo-Yo Computer

My computer is back from the shop again, same problem. Hopefully I have it for good this time. If you ever want to understand how much we rely upon computers just go without your computer for a while. It’s a scary realization how much of our life, what we do and our information is tied up in a computer. If you are lucky, which I now am, you have a flash drive or someway to access your data without that computer. I guess that is one of the benefits behind Cloud computing. Makes sense if you can live with some company having your information. I am not there yet. I have a flash drive that I am using for my data and work which I copy on an external hard drive. At least this way I will be able to access my files and data if my computer goes down again.


I am supply preaching this Sunday and as I am writing my sermon I stumbled upon a different realization behind the popularity of New Years. Most of you will probably read this and go “duh” but it never occurred to me this way before. One of the reasons New Years is so powerful is it represents one of the few start over points in secular society. It is the one time every year where we get to put the past behind us and look forward in hope to the coming year. It is going to be better, we just know it. I wonder how much it would affect us if we didn’t have a secular start over point? If we just went years and years of daily challenges with no time when we said; “stop, time to start over, fresh start.” It is crucial to us not getting too low or overwhelmed in our life I think. We emotionally and mentally need to have this reboot button (I hope you like computer terminology), when we have been running on the same session for so long. Without it we might crash.

It made me happy while writing my sermon to realize that in Christ we get this same fresh start, a reboot every day at least. We don’t have to worry about going forever with the same issues dragging us down and never getting a fresh start. I feel sorry for people who hold on to things that God has let go, things like shame and guilt. (Grief is not one of these things we are holding on to usually. It takes an amount of time to deal with loss and grief that is different for everyone, but is usually not a short time.) It is this fresh start that gives us the energy that the secular New Year gives to the world. It is a detectable energy. We want to use this fresh start to be better, exercise, quit smoking, deal with stress better, or lose weight. We put a lot of money and energy into this reboot. If we put this same energy into our daily reboot what could we accomplish? When we do something wrong we are forgiven. We may not get out of a difficult situation, but in Christ we see that we will live beyond the difficult situation. Being forgiven does not mean all consequences of what we have done are removed. Being forgiven means our sins will not be held against us by God. Did you realize that forgiving someone their sin agasinst you is just as much about freeing you from the captivity of that sin as freeing the other person? How do we live through this tough time though, when all the walls seem to be caving in, when our whole world seems turned upside-down? My professor used the term "realized eschatology" (these terms are actually in tension: realized meaning now, eschatology meaning end time). We have the promise of eternal life, forgiven sins, our salvation in Christ, but we are realizing it now and it is helping us get through each day and each situation. While the resurrection has happened the second coming and salvation are still something that will happen, they are promised, but the power of the resurrection, the promise and the hope are all things we feel and live with today. These promises and the hope are how we survive in our world where we can’t control what happens, no matter how good we are or how good we think we are. God never told us it would be easy. God only told us that He would be with us and that in the end He wins. In the end the promises of sins forgiven and life eternal in God’s glorious Kingdom will be realized. Until that time, we continue to live in the hope of the reboot, the fresh start that we are given through the resurrection and the promise of sins forgiven and life everlasting. May your New Year’s fresh start be all you desire. If it is not, use your fresh start tomorrow to try again. Happy New Year everyone!