Ministries:
Adult | Teens | Children

Pastor's Pen's:
2008 | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 | 2002 | 2001

Sermon Series:
Following Jesus
Earthly Cross
His Name Is
Apostles Creed
Dealing with Feelings
Jonah
Get Real
Promised Land Living

Grace Church
257 Kendall Street
Burlington, WI 53105

(262) 763-3021

Email:
Pastor Scott Carson

Secretary Patti Hall

PASTOR'S PENS 2003

Grace Church of Burlington January 5, 2003 "You’ve got to be careful if you don’t know where you’re going ‘cause you might not get there!"   Yogi Berra                        Have you set some goals for the New Year. Hopefully, you have made some spiritual goals for 2003. But do you find though that each year you make resolutions only to find that by March, you’re a New Year’s resolutions dropout. Usually, it’s not from a lack of desire; we sincerely want to change. It’s not a shortage of motivation. Most of us are highly motivated when we set our goals. Our difficulty is frequently a lack of understanding of how to effectively establish goals. Our problem is that we treat resolutions as desires ("I want to get in shape") or promises ("I will be a better friend"), whereas goals give us a plan. Let me suggest Six Steps for more effective resolutions (the first four this morning and the last two next Sunday):             A. Be specific. It’s great to have goals but you must have a yardstick to measure them by. Perhaps this year you want to grow in your knowledge of the Bible. But what does that look like? How will you know if you’ve achieved your goal? What steps will you take to foster this growth? Your goal must be more specific. To make this realistic then you need defined steps such as; "I'll spend 30 minutes a day in personal Bible study." The goal now expresses not just a desire, but also has the means to accomplish it.             B. Be realistic. If this coming year you want to pray more, then you’re will have to schedule time for prayer. If you want to pray in the morning, you are probably going to have go to bed earlier. If you go to bed at midnight, it will be difficult to arise early to spend time with the Lord. When our goals begin to overwhelm us, it’s usually a sign that we’re not living within normal boundaries. As humans, we all need to eat, sleep, and relax. Yet, at times we push ourselves, ignoring these realities at least temporarily. And when we can't do it anymore, we give up. Instead, we should reassess our goal. Perhaps our goal was totally unrealistic.             C. Include a way to measure your success. A good goal will answer the questions of what, how, and when. It's measurable. If this year you determined to be more  organized, to accomplish your goal, it  must be broken down into "bite size" chunks. For example, set a goal to clean out one drawer, cupboard, or closet each week. That’s a specific, realistic, measurable goal. At the end of each week you either have accomplished goal or you have not.  It’s a simple way  to  track  your  progress.  The sense of accomplishment will also help keep you motivated to start the next week's clean-up.             D. Think short-term and long-term. Short-term goals (cleaning one closet a week) allow us to experience success at smaller intervals while working toward long-term goals (de-cluttering an entire house). Perhaps this year you want to become debt free. To do this you will need both short-term and long-term financial objectives by using weekly, monthly, and yearly goals. Looking at your overall debt may be too big to deal with. By working on it in smaller chunks, it becomes attainable. Finances and organizing things aren't the only areas in which to set short- and long-term goals. You can use them in virtually any area of life: education, child-rearing, family life, athletics, community service, church service, personal and spiritual growth, etc.             Next week look for Part II of our look at goal setting and more importantly, goal keeping!