This year (2012) New Years Day falls on a Sunday – and it’s the first Sunday after Christmas. Many Churches are either celebrating Epiphany or the Naming and Circumcision of Jesus . However, for many more people – well they will be just getting home from there New Year’s Eve celebrations.

In the hype that often surrounds New Year’s Eve is the promise of a fresh start and a determination to make something of the year ahead. New Year’s resolutions are common. Yet many resolutions never see the light of day.

To make a resolution is an act of determination. It’s the mental state of being determined to do something, of having firmness of purpose.

Strangely, New Year’s Resolutions are often not made in isolation. We share them with our friends, telling them of our determination to live a new life. Further, we are drawn to where others are. Many of us like the crowds who are celebrating with us. Deep inside we fathom that there is more to life than us and for a fleeting moment we may feel a sense of the eternal.

Eternity was the theme that was splashed up and immortalised on the Sydney Harbour Bridge at the turn of this century – again reminding us of our place in eternity. The phrase ‘Eternity’ was originally chalked all over theSydney pavements by Arthur Stace, an illiterate Church cleaner who could barely spell his own name. The church he cleaned, the Burton Street Baptist Tabernacle has now been turned into a theatre – and the Sydney City Council has renamed the building Eternity Playhouse in remembrance of Arthur.

But what of Eternity ?

Yet God has made everything beautiful for its own time. He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God’s work from beginning to end. (Ecclesiastes 3:11)

And here is the connection with Epiphany. The word ‘epiphany’ means a revelation of the basic nature of something; a perception of some essential truth. The bible reading for Epiphany is the story of the wise men coming from the east, following a star, and seeking Jesus. The wise men in seeking Jesus recognised God’s presence in our world and their lives. They saw something of God’s work.

And the New Year ?

Now is the time to make a New Year’s resolution about eternity. By all means celebrate and have fun, but also act on that sense of eternity in your heart. New Year is an appropriate time to meet the Jesus that the wise men met long ago.

Suggested Bible Readings for the New Year.

• Ecclesiastes 3:1-13
• Psalms 46 and 62
• James 3:13-18
• Luke 12:35-40

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Archdeacon Kevin Russell. 

Archdeacon Russell is the Anglican Head of Denomination for Air Force and the Director of Chaplaincy Air Command. He is married to Debra and has two teenage children.