Someone has said that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. If so, then New Year’s resolutions are responsible for several lanes of that highway to perdition. Every year we complete our Christmas festivities just in time to drag ourselves to the end-of-the-year finish line.

On New Year’s Eve, weary of the failures of 2010, millions of Americans will watch the tube, waiting expectantly for the Waterford Crystal ball to drop in Times Square, New York. Those viewers will join the mob in Times Square as they count down to midnight, marking the entrance of a fresh New Year with noisemakers, firecrackers, and lots of partying.

As the ball drops, the meter is reset, the slate is wiped clean, and off we go into unblemished territory. And—we have a new chance to redeem the resolutions we made last year and didn’t keep: to change our diet, cut out the carbs, lower the intake of red meat, lose a few pounds, stop smoking, cut back on the drinking, join the local gym, or exercise a bit more each day.

Perhaps your resolutions are more spiritual in nature: pray a bit more every day, stick with the “read through the Bible in a year program” (at least until February!), get involved in a small group, or overcome some besetting sin.

Any way you look at it, nothing like a fresh start!

Historically, world religions have focused on fresh starts of one sort or another. Greek mythology told of Dionysus who was the “twice-born” son of Zeus, and the god of wine and intoxication. Worshipers participated in the “Dionysian” mysteries by engaging in rituals of intoxication and immorality. In their return to a more primitive, more “authentic” reality, followers were filled with wine and thus the god of wine.

This is the origin of the word “enthusiasm” which meant to be filled with the divine. Those who participated in these mysteries experienced a “new reality.”

In ancient Egypt, the cult of Osiris celebrated the annual death and rebirth of the god, manifested in the daily death and rebirth of the sun and the annual flooding of the Nile which brought about the renewal of crops and harvest.

In Greek mythology, a similar theme was associated with Persephone who is bound to the underworld during winter, but returns every spring to renew the earth. At her return, everything is made new again.

Who wouldn’t like a fresh start? Long ago Hollywood identified this theme. As long as we have had a film industry, we have had movies about fresh starts and new opportunities. Consider three random selections from the last few decades.

In 1979’s “Starting Over,” Burt Reynolds, a newly abandoned husband, slowly comes to grip with his divorced status and develops a new relationship with a shy schoolteacher played by Jill Clayburgh.

In 1993, Bill Murray and Andie McDowell gave us “Groundhog Day.” Murray portrays a self-centered Pittsburgh TV weatherman who was assigned to do a story on Punxsutawney Phil. After doing the story, he is snowed-in. Waking the next day, Murray finds himself reliving Groundhog Day over and over again. At first, Murray indulges himself, but eventually he strives to become a better person. When he finally becomes this better person, he breaks the loop, wins the girl, and presumably lives happily ever after.

In 1997 the film industry gave us “As Good As It Gets” with Jack Nicholson, an eccentric writer, and Helen Hunt, a sharp-tongued waitress. They develop a relationship that leads Nicholson, the recluse, to become a better man.

These movies are real to life in one particular, at least: new starts are tough! It is hard to start fresh when you are still dragging around the baggage accumulated over a lifetime.

Pulitzer-prize winning author, Marilynne Robinson, writes in Gilead: “There’s a lot under the surface of life, everyone knows that. A lot of malice and dread and guilt, and so much loneliness, where you wouldn’t really expect to find it, either.”

Yeah, the “new” would be great if it weren’t for all the “old” that continually sneaks up behind us, covers our eyes and asks, “Guess Who?” Too much of life is like the used car salesman who keeps spraying the ’74 Gran Torino with Chemical Guys’ New Car Scent. That heap has 1974 written all over it and no amount of new plastic smell is going to fool anyone. The old is with us always!

Or is it? Can the old become new? Years ago, Keith Green gave us this praise song:

“My eyes are dry, my faith is old; my heart is hard, my prayers are cold. And I know how I ought to be, alive to You and dead to me. But what can be done, for an old heart like mine? Soften it up, with oil and wine. The oil is You, Your Spirit of love; please wash me anew, with the wine of Your Blood.”

Ah, yes! The washing anew with the wine of His blood! Well, Presbyterians do believe in the blood of Jesus, and we preach it, and sing about it. But I will tell you, if you really want to hear about being “washed in the blood of the lamb,” you have to hang out with the Pentecostals or the Fundies. They both love to preach about the blood of Jesus because it is in the Bible. And the Fundies doubly love to preach about the blood because it also really irritates the theologically liberal!

I grew up in a Fundamental Baptist Church and I still remember the words of those great songs about the blood of Jesus.
· Nothing But the Blood: “What can wash away my sin? Nothing but the blood of Jesus; What can make me whole again? Nothing but the blood of Jesus.”
· There Is a Fountain Filled with Blood: “There is a fountain filled with blood, drawn from Immanuel’s veins. And sinners plunged beneath that flood, lose all their guilty stains.”
· Grace Greater Than Our Sin, vs. 3: “Dark is the stain that we cannot hide. What can avail to wash it away? Look! There is flowing a crimson tide, Brighter than snow you may be today.”
· Arise My Soul, Arise: “Arise, my soul, arise; Shake off thy guilty fears; The bleeding sacrifice in my behalf appears . . . .”
· Finally, There’s Power in the Blood: “Would you be free from the burden of sin?
· There’s pow’r in the blood, pow’r in the blood; Would you o’er evil a victory win? There’s wonderful pow’r in the blood. Chorus: There is pow’r, pow’r, wonder-working pow’r, in the blood of the Lamb . . . .”

Can the old become new? Many desire to take that which is rusted, moldy, stained, and broken and make it shiny and new. And so we rebuild old automobiles and restore old homes. But a new life? A chance to start over? Well, that was the hope of the ancient pagans, and it is a prominent story line for today’s filmmakers.

More to the point, every heart that is weary with self-loathing, failure, guilt, and shame cries out for a “Reset” button and a fresh start, a do-over. But there is only one way to get that do-over, to be made shiny and new, and that is to be washed in the blood of The Lamb! Neither the rivers of blood shed by pagan sacrifices nor the endless Old Testament priestly offerings could ever take away sin. No level of education or legion of therapists can cleanse the guilty conscience. All of the gold in Fort Knox cannot buy peace for one riddled with shame, and no government program has ever transformed one dead in trespasses and sin.

No, there is only one cure for what plagues the human race, and it is not a 12,000 pound Waterford Crystal ball. The Apostle Peter gives the answer:

“For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect” (I Peter 1:18,19).

So, would you be shiny and new? Then turn to the one fountain that can make you whole again! Seek the one flood that washes away all guilty stain, the crimson tide that makes you brighter than snow. There is wonder-working pow’r in the blood, and “if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!” (II Corinthians 5:17).

R. J. Gore, Jr. is a minister in the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church and currently serves as Professor of Systematic Theology at Erskine Theological Seminary in Due West, SC. This article first appeared on the blog of Covenant Presbyterian Church in Easley, SC and is used with permission. Source: http://mycovenantpc.com/blogs/item/123-waiting-for-christmas

[Editor’s note: the original URL (link) referenced in this article is no longer valid, so the link has been removed.]