We are all a work in progress

It is the end of January, and my local gym is thinning out. In fact, all the stuff I wanted to organize in the new year is still sitting where it was at the end of December. Still, I'm not certain which is worse, the fact that my stuff I wanted to organize is unorganized or that the list of goals I wanted to make for the new year is still a work in progress.

A recent article said that 75 percent of all resolution makers will be successful in mid-January. Fifty percent will still be sticking to the end of January -- which is why my gym is thinning out. Forty to 46 percent of people will have stuck with their resolutions by midyear.

I'd like to know from those who are sticking with their newfound goals what made the difference between succeeding and giving up.

In the New Testament letter of 2 Peter we find a man who had many reasons to give up engaging in what for many is a tedious task. He is reminding people he loves of things they shouldn't forget. In four consecutive verses he says in three ways "I want to remind you." It must be important.

Reminding encourages you to remember. Reminding that's not nagging engages in looking back at where you've come to keep moving toward where you'd like to go.

When my wife and I were expecting, we were given the Dr. Seuss book "O Baby the Places You'll Go." This little book is full of dreams and of possibilities. Oh the things that could be seen. Oh the things that could happen. A great little book to encourage dreaming.

Yet often we wind up dreaming of what things could be and forget what things used to be like. In the possibility of where we'll go we forget where we've come and sometimes get stuck where we are.

From time to time we just need a reminder that we are a work in progress. That while we may not be where we want, doing all that we think we should and our spiritual lives are as just as much as a mess as our sock drawer. God is still working on us.

I'd rather be reminded that God is still working on me than be ruled by the 25 percent.

Rob Hurtgen is a husband, father, minister and writer. Read more from him at www.robhurtgen.wordpress.com.