We all want to change something in life. That’s why so many of us made New Years resolutions three months ago. We wanted to change our weight. Change our eating habits. Change how much time we spend watching TV. How much time we spend on Facebook or Instagram. We wanted to read more. Exercise more. Volunteer more. Give more.

So here’s the question: how many of us are still going strong on the New Years Resolutions we made three months ago? Maybe 10% of us? We want to change, but we can’t!

Christians, more than almost anyone else, know we need to change. That’s kind of what Christianity is all about, right? Step one: You pray a little prayer, and invite Jesus into your heart. Step two: You get a list of bad things you need to stop doing, and good things you need to start doing. Step three: If haven’t messed up too much in following the list, then when you die you go to heaven.

The problem is that different people and different churches all have different lists! At one church I attended in college, I was told I needed to stop listening to worldly music if I wanted to be a real Christian. I didn’t like that, so I went to another church. There I was told that I needed to start defending the poor and oppressed if I wanted to be a real Christian. If I didn’t give up every Saturday to go build houses in the inner city, if I didn’t boycott all the companies that were profiting from child labor, I was never going to fit in.

We all have our own lists of what needs to change. So before we can even talk about what needs to change, we need to talk about why we want to change. Why do you want change in your life?

There are five big reasons why many people seek change in life:

1. So they can be accepted by other people.
2. So they can feel like they’re better than other people.
3. So they can stop beating themselves up for the things they don’t like about themselves.
4. So they can convince God to give them a better life.
5. So they can convince God to give them eternal life.

There are probably one or two of those thoughts behind every desire you have for change. But according to John, there’s a much better reason to change. Something that will keep you going a lot longer than three months:

You may be sure that everyone who practices righteousness has been born of him. (1 John 2:29)

In other words, John says the power to change comes from the fact that you’re reborn. The best reason to change is that you have new life in Christ. Know why? Because in the verses following, John reminds you that there are so many things you have when you have life in Jesus:

1. You have God’s love.

See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are (1 John 3:1)

When you know that someone loves you? That someone is for you? Doesn’t that motivate you to change?

Think about the best teacher you had in school. Mine was Mr. Mosely, my high school history teacher. He was the toughest teacher in the school — he never smiled, never settled for mediocrity, always demanded the best — but we all knew that Mr. Mosely loved us from the day we met him.The first day of class, he gave out the textbooks and said, “Spend the next 30 minutes reading the first chapter. At the end of class, there’s going to be a test.” We all loudly complained, “What? A test? On the first day of school? You can’t do that!” But he wasn’t kidding. So we all started frantically reading … studying … taking notes … memorizing … and then he said, “Close your books!” We all gulped.

“We’re starting the test. But … I never said the test was for you. The test is for me. … I’ve been studying the seating chart, because I wanted to make sure I knew all your names from the very beginning.” He scrambled us up, then went around and said all 30 names — full names! — from memory. And that’s when we knew that Mr Mosely loved us. He was for us. And that’s what motivated us to do well in that class, and in all of life. We all wanted Mr. Mosely to write our college recommendations.

Change comes when you see what kind of love the Father has given to you.

2. You have God’s power.

Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil. (1 John 3:8)

You know what he’s saying? You’re not in this fight alone. It’s a battle to change. God knows that, and he hasn’t sent you out on your own. Jesus is fighting with you. “The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.” He’s on your side. He’s here to help you.

Doesn’t that make such a big difference? When you’ve got someone working alongside you? Someone who can actually do what you’re trying to do? Fifteen years ago, I was trying to rebuild a house in Kailua we had just bought. We had to tear half of it down because termites had destroyed so much of it, but it was the only house we could afford. I started working on it, and I was nervous. I didn’t know what to do. I got discouraged really easily. I would hit a snag, and just want to give up.

But then my friend Aaron came alongside me, and helped me build. He’d built homes all over the Big Island, so he knew exactly what needed to be done. Suddenly I had confidence. I knew I could do it because I had Aaron alongside me, showing me the way.

You have Jesus working and fighting alongside you. Change comes when you take hold of God’s power.

3. You have God’s nature.

No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God’s seed abides in him, and he cannot keep on sinning because he has been born of God. (1 John 3:9)

God’s seed — his nature — his Holy Spirit — is living inside you. You’re going to naturally take on the nature of someone who’s taken up residence in your life, like the way I started talking with a Vietnamese accent when we had a Vietnamese couple living with us for a week.

And the fact that John chose the picture of a seed to describe it tells you a lot. Think about it. How does a seed work? You plant it in the ground, and you put some water on it, and then you wait. And then you wait some more. And then you wait some more. Seeds are slow to grow! You don’t always see what’s happening beneath the surface, but then a little green sprout barely peaks up to the surface. And then it grows a little more. And then a little more. And then a little more. A few months later, you finally have a plant. Maybe a few years later, you finally have a TREE. Change is slow!

And sometimes it seems like it’s going backward, like trees that lose their leaves. We have a bougainvillea tree and every year it loses all of its leaves for a month. The first time it happened, I thought it was dead. I was ready to dig it out of the ground and chop it up and throw it in the green bin, but then suddenly leaves started sprouting again. Flowers started exploding out like I’d never seen before.

That’s the way God’s seed — God’s nature — grows in you. That’s how transformation happens. It’s really slow. Sometimes it seems like it’s going backward. But change is happening.