New Year's Resolutions

Maybe it’s the quiet after the Christmas whirl, or the way January light slants across snow and makes everything look a little wide-open. Still, I’ve been thinking a lot about New Year’s resolutions and goals, not just for myself, but for us as a community at Parkdale United Church.

Over the past year, so much has taken root here. We launched Wednesday Night Jazz and watched strangers and church folks alike tap their toes and breathe a little easier. We opened our doors to the Calgary Toy Library. We welcomed new recovery groups and Girl Guides. Our Fit and Friendship group grew from five to almost twenty. The building hums these days. Hallways echo with laughter, music, coffee cups, and the soft murmur of people finding their way back to one another.

One of our goals was to ensure our space was fully utilized, and we did. Truly. The place is bustling, and it is beautiful.

But then the next question arrives, tugging at my sleeve like a curious child.

Is this the church's goal?

Some would say the “real” goals should be: more people in the pews on Sunday, a bigger choir, more children and youth programs, more volunteers, more of everything. More bums in seats, as the saying goes. Growth you can count on a spreadsheet.

And there’s nothing wrong with those things. They matter. Bodies in a room create energy, music is richer with more voices, children bring holy chaos and glitter that somehow lasts until Pentecost. But I keep wondering: is that what Jesus had in mind when he spoke about the Kingdom of God drawing near?

Because most of our New Year’s resolutions are, if we’re honest with ourselves, about improving ourselves, we promise to move our bodies more, eat differently, sleep more, stress less, save money, read more books, and finally organize the junk drawer that feels like a portal to another dimension. We set goals around relationships, finances, health, and personal growth, all good, all human, all understandable.

But what happens if the church applies the same self-improvement lens to itself?

Would our goals be:
-increase attendance by 10 percent
-stabilize the budget
-fix the roof
-recruit more volunteers
-get more young families in the doors?

Those are practical realities. We can’t ignore them. But they are not the beating heart.

Jesus didn’t walk around Galilee with a New Year’s resolution list tucked into his robe. He didn’t say, “Heal ten people this week,” or “Convert a dozen new followers,” or “Make sure I get my 10,000 steps in between Capernaum and Jericho.” Output metrics did not drive his life.

He was moved by love.

By the stubborn, inconvenient, wide-open love of God for absolutely everyone.

If Jesus had anything close to “goals,” they sounded more like this:
Bring good news to the poor, bind up the brokenhearted, set captives free, lift burdens from tired shoulders, remind people they are seen, beloved, and worth healing, show us that God’s dream is not somewhere far away, but already breaking into this world through acts of compassion, justice, and courage

He spent his life bringing people back together. Back toward community. Back toward the holy truth that our lives are intertwined, and that our neighbour’s well-being is not separate from our own.

What might our goals be if we dared to follow in those footsteps?

We will keep the building lively and full because a space that shelters good things, music, recovery, children’s laughter, support groups, prayer, protest, and play, is already a ministry. Every gathering here quietly reminds us that the church is not a museum; it is a living community with lights on and doors open.

And deeper still, our goals could be these:
-to be a place where no one has to pretend they are fine
-to feed hungry people, body, mind, and spirit
-to practice radical hospitality until it feels natural
-to stand with the marginalized as neighbours, not heroes
-to listen more than we lecture
-to be willing to be changed by the stories we hear
-to remember that God’s love is not a reward, but the starting point

Attendance may rise or fall. Choirs grow and shrink. Programs evolve. What matters is this: if people walk through our doors, for jazz, toys, meetings, or worship, and discover welcome without conditions, and justice and compassion lived out in real ways, then we are already leaning into the heart of the Gospel.

So perhaps this year our resolution is simply this:

To be a church that loves like Jesus, quietly, courageously, without keeping score

A church that hungers for more than numbers.

A church that trusts that the Kingdom of God looks less like a full parking lot and more like lives stitched back together with kindness, dignity, and holy mischief.

Here’s to a new year. To a building that breathes. To questions that nudge us deeper. To the sacred work of showing up for one another and for the world God so loves.

And to the grace-filled possibility that we might already be part of someone’s answered prayer, without even knowing it.