new year vs New Creation

I really don't understand all the enthusiasm about new years day.

I don't capitalize stuff I don't respect.

It seems in particular that Christians are very excited about it and it's "new beginnings." Ah. A chance to rededicate yourself? I guess instead of the yearly animal sacrifice, we make the yearly oath of trying harder, and year after year there is a continual reminder of sins.

Perhaps I am just being a Scrooge, but I get an agitated feeling when I hear of such things. Jesus Christ has already made you new. The resurrection of Christ is your new beginning. You don't get a new chance to try harder each year. You rest in the once for all sacrificial death of Jesus Christ. He has bought and paid for you, and the punishment that God put on Him was more than enough to satisfy His justice against sin.

It's okay to celebreate new years, but don't act like this new year marks another chance for you to, "be better for God." Good grief, did He not already make you righteous!? You would think the wrath and agony He bore would have satisfied your hunger and thirst for righteousness!

And if you speak of anything you have accomplished for God, speak only of the things which He has done through you.

Are you really ready to count all your righteous deeds as rubbish? Are you willing to stand before God as Abel did, with no fruit to bring, but only the blood of a lamb? Have you an honest, and sincere faith that clings to nothing but Christ alone? Anything else is a counterfeit faith.

Be honest; why are you really doing the things you are doing for God? Examine the foundation your works are built on and consider Paul's words concerning the zeal that comes from an effort to have God accept you.

"What shall we say, then? That Gentiles who did not pursue righteousness have attained it, that is, a righteousness that is by faith; but that Israel who pursued a law of righteousness did not succeed in reaching that law? Why? Because they did not pursue it by faith, but as if it were based on works. They have stumbled over the stumbling stone, as it is written,

"Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offense; and whoever believes in Him will not be put to shame."

Brothers, my heart's desire and prayer to God for them is that they may be saved. I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. For, being ignorant of the righteousness that comes from God, and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit to God's righteousness. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes."

You see? He created us zealous for good works, NOT in order to get Him to accept us, but BECAUSE we are accepted in the Beloved. From love and not fear.

"If you love Me, you will keep My commandments."