A New Beginning
A Theme for life can be “A New Beginning.” New beginning is not only related to the beginning of a new year because every day is a new beginning.
A story that helps us to better understand new beginnings is told by John Powell, S.J. in his book, The Christian Vision, A Nearsighted Young Man. (Powell, S.J., John, The Christian Vision: the Truth That Sets Us Free (Allen, Texas: Argus Communications, 1984) pp. 36-37
Dr. Powell writes, “I once knew a young man who was born seriously myopic. He could see clearly only those objects within a few feet of himself. when the schools he attended sent this word home, his parents reasoned, ‘When we were his age, we did not need glasses. Why should he?’ And so the boy grew up in the only world that was available to him through his nearsighted vision. He actually worked out an explanation for this world in terms of his nearsightedness. For example, do you know why the teachers at school write on the chalkboards? They are not writing for the pupils who cannot possibly read what they are writing. They are rather writing those notes on the board for themselves, so that they can remember what to teach. And do you know why cities put street signs so high up on telephone poles where no one can read them? Well, this is done for the bus drivers. They sit high up in the front of the buses and can read those signs. Then they can call out the names of the streets for their passengers. And so on.
“One day the young man, in his eighteenth year, consulted an eye doctor. The doctor sat him down and kept experimenting with corrective lenses until he had the proper prescription. The doctor then told the boy to look out the window. ‘Wow!’ the young man gasped. It was so beautiful. He could for the first time see the blue skies with white puffs of clouds. He could see the smiling faces of people, the billboards, and the street signs. Later he told me, “It was the second most beautiful experience of my whole life.’ So naturally I had to ask him about ‘the most beautiful.’ What was it?
“‘The day,’ he replied, ‘I came to believe in Jesus. When I at last took him seriously and saw that God is truly my Father, when I saw that this really is God’s beautiful world, when I saw myself as a child of the heart of God, and felt the warmth of his love, when I saw others as my brothers and sisters in the human family of our Father-this was the great turning point, the most transforming and beautiful experience of my whole life. It was like the beginning of a new life. I know what Saint Paul means when he says that faith makes us a brand-new creation.’”
The Apostle Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 5.17, “So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!” Jesus offers the option of newness. We are not instantaneously changed. We know that everything has not become new. We struggle with the same old attitudes. We commit the same old sins.
We also know that everything can become new. It is like Jeremiah writes in Lamentations 3:22-23 “The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases, his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.” God mercies are new every morning. We are reminded that every day is a new beginning. We have the option of newness, what we do with the new day is up to us. God can help us to use the time to maintain the process of becoming new.