TWENTY-FOUR THINGS CHRISTIANS SHOULD DO IN 2024

(Post by: Lilly Hobbs)

It’s hard to believe that we have begun yet another new year, and it’s even harder to believe that it’s time for our annual list of Christians goals that we publish for each new year!

This is our third year publishing a post like this, and it has become one of my very favorites to brainstorm about and then write out! I love reading through a good list or “idea” type post myself, and have found them to be very helpful when trying to be creatively intentional about living a deep and meaningful Christian life. I am sure you have a running list of things you would like to get better at or do more of going into 2024. Those things are great, but what about the things that actually matter? What about Jesus? Is He something you just fit into your schedule when it permits, or does everything else flow from your personal relationship with Him?

We get asked quite often how to practically get serious about living for Jesus, and I pray this list is one you can refer to time and time again to help you do exactly that. 

Here are 24 things I believe Christians should do in 2024!

• Read the whole Bible in a year. I am reading through the whole Bible for the third time in 2024, and I can confidently say it has been the most rewarding things I have ever, ever done. Some days are challenging, and I have learned to put an end to the excuses I had been making for why I couldn’t spend time in the Word. However, I have now become disciplined and am passionate about being in the Lord’s presence daily. It’s the best part of my day! Here’s the plan I did: https://www.proclaimstreetwear.com/

• Make it a habit to listen to ONLY Christian music this year. One of my goals for 2024 is to start each morning by listening to at least one worship song and allowing that to be what sets the tone for my day! You can start by listening to our worship playlist (click here) while you’re in the car, at work, or studying for that next quiz. We add new songs that we’re loving all the time, and truly believe that this can impact your life in so many positive ways!

• Get back to the Biblical model for Church. Unfortunately, the model the American Church currently has for Church is simply not Biblical. We have made it convenient, comfortable, and easy for people to simply show up, sit in a chair for an hour, and leave unchanged week after week. That’s not the radical Christian lifestyle we’re called to live. I would encourage you to study the model Jesus presents regarding Church in Scripture, and make a serious effort to live that out in a local church/small group each week!

• Commit yourself to a small group that meets weekly. If you don’t know of a group you’re interested in investing in, start one yourself and invite a few friends to join you each week! This doesn’t have to be anything fancy. Our small group met in our living room for a few years, and we made some of the best memories as we all grew closer to Jesus. We were never, ever meant to do life alone. We must ditch the idea that living life online is going to get us somewhere. Just take a look around. We’re not happy, and we’re certainly not thriving. We desperately need to start embracing how God intended life to be lived: together.

• Spend at least 24 minutes in prayer each day. Practice listening to what God wants to speak to you. Maybe this time needs to happen in the morning after you study Scripture, or perhaps it’s on your lunch break, or right before you get ready to go to bed. Make it happen. Many of us spend much more than 24 minutes on our phones each day, just go look at your screen time report.

• Draw a line. What in the world do I mean by this? Well, I believe some of us may be entering 2024 a bit marred, brokenhearted, and world weary due to spiritual warfare and present circumstances. My challenge for all of us, myself included, is to draw lines before ourselves that motivate us to persevere. Have daily goals that you push yourself to accomplish for the sake of the Kingdom. They may be simple and small, but that’s okay because those “lines” that you draw will keep you moving and guard you against discouragement and complacency. I mentioned this concept in one of our most recent podcast episode which you can listen to HERE.

• Be a modern- day prophet. In our little corners of the world, God is calling us to be the modern-day prophets who remind our community what it is for, what it is committed to, and what it ought to be. That’s how repentance and revival break out, which are the two things our communities urgently need. I see a stone wall that needs to be rebuilt. It’s time we begin building with one hand and battling with the other. A true prophet will say, with the prophet Micaiah just before his fateful confrontation with Ahab, “As surely as the Lord lives, I can tell him only what my God says” (2 Chronicles 18:13).

• Don’t go a day without thinking of Heaven. I believe this entails cultivating a lifestyle that constantly reminds you of eternity and the world to come. C. S. Lewis once said, “If you read history, you will find that the Christians who did most for the present world were precisely those who thought most of the next. It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this.” Need I say more?

• Pursue holiness. I read a quote the other day that made me pause and reflect on the goodness of Jesus. It said, “He that sees the beauty of holiness sees the greatest and most important thing in the world. The old has passed away; all things have become new. We are to pursue godliness with unbridled zeal.” The beauty of holiness is indeed the greatest and most important thing in the world. Why, you ask? Because Jesus wasn’t willing to let us stay in our ugliness. He paid the price on that old rugged cross so that you and I could be made beautiful like Himself.

• Understand that self-sufficiency is a deficiency. There’s no doubt that you can attempt to live out every day of 2024 in your own power, and the terrible truth is that this is our human tendency. However, there’s a much better way to live, and that is in the fullness of the Holy Spirit! He is the one who can provide us with the peace, strength, as well as power that we need to live for Jesus.

• Do the next right thing, especially when fearful and afraid. For many of us, it’s quite easy to start a new year feeling overwhelmed by what is to come and the change we know we will experience. All Jesus asks of us is to follow His lead by doing whatever the next right thing is that He shows us. It’s not our job to worry about all that may/may not come. Make it your mindset to do the next right thing, to continue doing so, and you will have done your duty.

• Refuse to settle for things that are man-made, and do not participate in them. Our desire should never fail to be completely Spirit-sourced. No decision should be made, no activity committed to, no action done without the Holy Spirit’s leading. We are to fear God, not man, in all things.

• Show up in the simple and obey in the ordinary. The size of the task before us doesn’t matter, the size of our God does. Do not neglect a task simply because there doesn’t seem to be much of a reward in it for you. Isn’t there a saying that states that we should enjoy the small things because one day we will look back and realize they were the big things? Nothing has been more true in my own life. How much could change this year if we truly believed that the seemingly insignificant tasks and moments of obedience are the ones that have the possibility to change us completely?

• Be healed of hurry sickness. You know what genuinely astonishes me about us today? It’s the fact that we pray and ask God to bless our disorder and dysfunction. We ask God to bless the life that we desperately want a vacation from, yet we come back to it time and time again and don’t change a thing. Elisabeth Elliot once said, “One reason we are so harried and hurried is that we make yesterday and tomorrow our business. When all that legitimately concerns us is today. If we really have too much to do, there are some items on the agenda which God did not put there. Let us submit the list to Him and ask Him to indicate which items we must delete. There is always time to do the will of God. If we are too busy to do that, we are too busy.”

• Learn how to share your faith in your everyday life! The people God has placed in your little corner of the world matter more than anything else, and there is a reason God has placed you where He has. Do the people at your school/workplace know that you’re a Christian? Have you ever offered to pray for them? If not, this is the year to do so! You will be amazed at what the Lord can do with a simple step of obedience in this area of your life.

• Steal back your joy. Far too many Christians allow the enemy to steal the joy that comes from the Lord daily. We allow the enemy to use our circumstances, trials, and hardships to steal a gift the Lord Himself has given us in order to bless us. What if you decided each morning that no matter what the day holds, the one thing you will NOT do is let the enemy have your joy? I think life would look a lot different, don’t you?

• Do a 24-hour prayer time/fast. This is something our small group does together every year and we all walk away powerfully impacted! It’s truly amazing how taking time to be with Jesus, without any distractions or a to-do list can change your life. 24 hours may seem like a long time, but trust me, it goes by so much faster than you will want it to!

• Defy the enemy by celebrating every chance you get! I wrote a blogmas post about this just a couple weeks ago, and this is a goal I personally have for 2024. I truly believe we don’t take the time to celebrate like we used to, and our excuses usually include that we simply don’t have time or don’t feel like it. This is how the enemy wants us to operate. However, by taking the time to celebrate, we remind ourselves of the things that really matter and of the Lord’s goodness and faithfulness.

• Read through the Narnia and Lord of the Rings series. If you have been around us for almost any amount of time, but especially a good bit of time, it should not shock you that these series made the list! Lewis and Tolkien are both extraordinary writers with the gift of explaining divine things from very interesting perspectives! Both are well worth your time!

• Listen to our Podcast, “A Few Minutes With The Few” every Monday! We don’t shy away from the super difficult topics when it comes to Christianity, the American Church, and all the different things we face in life. Click that play button to let us help you get serious about living for Jesus and make some radical choices! LISTEN HERE.

• Boldly and proudly stand for life. You can do so by following pro-life organizations such as Live Action and Students for Life on social media, help your local pregnancy center by donating items/your time, vote for pro-life politicians, and do your research about why life matters and should be protected at all costs!

• Download our free, Christian Resources page HERE. This page was created for the Christian who wants to build upon a firm foundation. It covers some of the basic areas of life that should be impacted by the Lord if you want to intentionally live for Him. We have included things like books, accountability, podcasts, and movies, just to name a few. It’s also a great practical tool for brand new Believers and for those discipling others!

• Memorize a passage of Scripture that speaks to a personal struggle you have or certain circumstance you are walking through! Being able to contemplate Scripture and remind ourselves of it daily is one of the most powerful things we can do. Take Scripture to heart, know what it says, live it out minute-by-minute and day-by-day this year.

• Tackle each immediate evil that arises as well as you can. Sometimes it’s easy to push the evil that makes its presence known in our daily lives to the back burner, thinking we will address it later. We often do this because we know addressing the evil will require effort and firmness on our part. This is what we are made for, dear Christian! If we don’t tackle evil the moment it arises, we will not be victorious, and the evil will not be overcome.

There! Twenty-Four things you should do in 2024. We are here cheering you on and look forward to growing together and spending every day doing what will ultimately impact eternity!

Comment below one of your personal goals or aspirations for 2024, and be sure to send this post to that person you thought of while reading it! Until next Thursday!