1-2-23<\/p>\n\n\n\n
New Years is a sort of anti-Lent. We resolve to do<\/em> things as New Year resolutions; and many people vow to give things up<\/em> for Lent. There is a similarity, however: very few of us carry through on either category of intentions. The more interesting survey would be to track the average number of days people \u201ckeep\u201d such pledges.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I have a new idea for New Years resolutions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It involves neither self-sacrifice nor a \u201cself-help\u201d box to check, although you will feel good for having done it. But you will make others feel better \u2013 a pretty good way to start the year. Of course it does not have to be on the first of the year\u2026 but many of us need some \u201chook\u201d to hang our good intentions on. (I think that is the justification for a lot of holidays on the calendar.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n There is not one among us who does not know, or know of, an \u201cangel.\u201d Not a literal, sent-from-Heaven angel (maybe), but friends who do good deeds. People who reach out to folks in need, even in mere moments of loneliness. They encourage. They involve themselves in local causes, perhaps with no fanfare. They sacrifice or volunteer. They smile when smiles are hard to come by; they weep with you when nobody else understands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Praise God, every family, every neighborhood, has these people. Sometimes they never know how they are appreciated, because they go through life without being thanked\u2026 but they do not bless others in order to garner praise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I suggest bringing a few of those people you know \u2013 because surely you do \u2013 to mind. One of them; three of them; whatever. And let them know they are appreciated, sincerely. Arrange to see them\u2026 write an anonymous thank-you note\u2026 send a non-anonymous, personal, thank-you note or e-mail\u2026 express your appreciation over coffee\u2026 whatever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The form is not as important as the will to do it; and the will is not as important as the deed. I will name three or four such people I know. I will decline to use their names here, although that would honor them. But angels like this do not operate for glory or honor, and I want to inspire similar outreaches among you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One friend has been a teacher in Texas, also is an author, a church worker, a selfless volunteer at conferences. She has managed difficult family situations, and may never get over the loss of her husband to cancer. She is chiefly, however, an encourager of others. She has blessed uncountable other people, not the least with her famous sense of humor; but some of us know she cries as many tears as she causes smiles. In all, an angel \u2013 a saint \u2013 and the type of friend who deserves the type of note I suggest for a New Year resolution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n No less spiritual, but active in other realms important to Christians these days, is a friend whose faith motivated her to be active in local, then state, politics. School curricula, mask and vaccine mandates, governmental intrusion, moved her to attend school board and legislative hearings. Often stonewalled, she climbed the ladder of activism, only to be frustrated further. Even at her state capital, deliberate snubs. She and other \u201cmoms\u201d banded together and ran for offices. She challenged her state\u2019s senate majority leader. She lost but, again, was frustrated when she requested to see vote totals. Time, trouble, and expenses racked up. She and her fellow moms \u2013 Christian Patriots all \u2013 are now primed for future crusades. Our whole nation should be filled with selfless angels like her. Her children are out of school, but she battles for the Kingdom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I have another friend who similarly believes that Christians must be active in the public sphere \u2013 that we are seeing the heritage of our faith slip away. He had been brand-manager for a well-known international fashion company, jet-setting around the world doing consequential work. He gave it up, returned to his family\u2019s fifth-generation home in rural Michigan\u2026 and still is a jet-setter of sorts, but now he attends conferences, speaks at events, organizes large meetings. His two spheres, now, are Christianity and the political crisis we face. As the previous angel is doing, my friend does not merely complain or advocate; he has rolled up his sleeves as a poll-watcher and attends meetings from the local to the highest levels. And his greatest joy \u2013 I have seen this over and over \u2013 is sharing Christ, witnessing to others. Baristas, handymen in town, celebrities he knows. It is what angels do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Another friend is an angel in work overalls. He was an assembly-line worker who was obliged to retire when he developed a disease that made it unsafe to continue on his shifts. In his wonderful family he has a wife and two beautiful daughters who have debilitating, degenerative afflictions. I have never heard any of them complain or display anything but smiles and good cheer, goodwill. My friend uses his skills to manufacture or retrofit lifts for people\u2019s vans, or stair lifts for their homes\u2026 and many of these folks are virtual strangers to him. Angels come in all forms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In situations like these I have described, the \u201cangels among us\u201d do not have to be old friends from their address books\u2026 but are, after all, the best friends many folks could want.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Or need.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You surely know some Angels Among Us. Bless them with a warm reminder that you know about, and appreciate, their ministrations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n + + +<\/p>\n\n\n\n