The year is ending, it is New Year around the corner. How prepared are we for the new year, 2023?
Being the best that I can be is a mantra, a slogan, a guiding statement worth aspiring to now, in the coming year, and always.
It translates to the following practical statements.
- In my profession, I shall seek to be the best that I can be.
- In my relationships at home, I shall seek to be the best that I can be.
- In my relationships at work, I shall seek to be the best that I can be.
- In my community, I shall seek to be the best that I can be.
- In my own small world, irrespective of its size, I shall seek to be the best that I can be.
- In trying to earn an income, I do my level best, diligent and determined and work hard with transparent integrity.
- It is convenient and easy to criticise another person, what about me, what about you, are we consciously making efforts to be the best that we can?
- It is the in-thing, the politically correct practice, to criticise and even condemn politicians. No one says that what is bad is good. But what about you?
- Do we make deliberate efforts to do what is right all the time to glorify the Lord, who always watches and sees what we do?
Some Bible verses to consider on this subject, include the following:
- Matthew 5: 48: “But you are to be perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect”.
- Leviticus 11:44: “Be ye holy even as I am holy.”
- Titus 2:11-14 : “For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works”.
Conclusion: The debate has been on-going, whether a person can be perfect here on earth. Certainly, it borders on lack of humility for anyone to claim to have arrived. No one is good but God alone, so the Lord says, Mark 10: 18.
This of course does not encourage us to continue in any unwholesome and bad behaviour of which we may be guilty at present, because it is the Lord who also commands: “Be ye perfect as your Heavenly Father is.” Matthew 5: 48. Therefore, we need to make efforts to discard such undesirable behaviours.
In spite of our personal views on attaining perfection, none of the passages quoted in the foregoing paragraph encourages us to be quarrelsome and always overly negative and critical in almost all our public and private statements.
The challenge is for us to be a reflection of the Lord in seeking by His help to live a life of moral excellence and be a blessing to others.
A writer suggests that “the basic call to a person in this world is to be a reflection of the character of God. That is what it means to be created in the image of God.”