The New Year’s Revolution

Independent investigation of reality sounds abstract until you realize it’s as practical as deciding what to do with your own body, your own money, your own social media feed, and your own neighborhood.

That was the underlying theme of my New Year’s episode of Created in the Image of God with Morgan Guyton—a former campus minister, writer, and self‑described “weird kid” who grew up both deeply privileged and deeply marginal. Together we explored what it might mean to launch not just another New Year’s resolution, but a New Year’s Revolution: a way of life rooted in mercy, embodied worship, and real community, both local and global.

That “revolution” is now taking form under a new banner:

Facets of One
A collaborative initiative of Created in the Image of God, the Royal Falcon Foundation, and SOOP Media.

I want to share what this means, and why we’re launching it now.

From Resolutions to Revolution

Most New Year’s resolutions are about self‑improvement: eat better, exercise more, break a habit. There’s nothing wrong with that. But the deeper crises of our time—political, economic, spiritual—won’t be solved by new apps and better willpower.

We’re living in what Morgan called a “reciprocal judgment cycle.” Each side of our cultural divide feels misjudged and misrepresented, and that very experience fuels deeper contempt. Social media algorithms reinforce the worst in us: outrage, tribal loyalty, and projection onto strangers we don’t actually know.

Meanwhile, there are people whose lives are genuinely coming apart:

Families here dealing with job loss, addiction, loneliness, medical debt.
Families in places like Pakistan, working in brick kilns under quasi‑slavery conditions, children without shoes in winter, communities without water.

What would it look like to start the year not by promising to become better consumers or even just better versions of ourselves, but by committing to become better kin?

That’s the heart of the New Year’s Revolution, and of Facets of One.

Facets of One starts from a simple conviction:

If we are all created in the image of God, then every person and community is a facet of one larger reality—and we only see that reality clearly when those facets are in relationship.

Practically, that means three things:

Local circles of mercy and testimony
Spaces where people can tell the truth about their lives—especially “the lambs,” those most wounded by economic and social upheaval—and be met with listening, prayer, the Word of God presented as itself, and practical support, not argument.
Embodied worship as “dance,” not performance
Worship not just as reciting “correct” doctrines, but as learning to move in rhythm with Divine, Eternal Law—the “choreography” of reality. Less proving we’re right; more learning to move with grace, in body and soul.
Direct, relational global solidarity
Relationships, not just donations. Local communities here connected directly with local communities elsewhere—like the pastors Morton knows in Pakistan, or organizations I worked with in India—so that mercy flows along real names and faces, not just budgets and institutions.

Created in the Image of God, SOOP Media, and the Royal Falcon Foundation will work together under this banner:

The show and media (including Substack) to tell stories, ask hard questions, and model honest, cross‑boundary conversations.
Royal Falcon’s Soul Seeds program to ground young people in regenerative, hands‑on community building—turning dead dirt into soil, sharing the harvest, then turning outward to help others.
Facets of One as the umbrella that connects these efforts and invites others—churches, small groups, youth projects—to become part of a wider mercy network.

Law, Dance, and the Rhythm of the Universe

One of my favorite parts of the conversation with Morgan was his description of God’s law not as a list of punishments, but as the rhythm of the universe.

Psalm 119’s repeated cry—“Oh, how I love thy law… I meditate on it day and night”—can sound strange if we hear “law” as a cold code. But if law is the deep pattern by which reality holds together, loving it becomes more like loving a piece of music or a well‑choreographed dance.

That connected, for me, with a turning point in my own life.

Years ago I was diagnosed with ankylosing spondylitis, an autoimmune condition that was supposed to put me in a wheelchair by 40. Swimming was part of my attempt to fight back. At first, I used the pool as a battlefield: timing my mile, pushing harder, racing the clock. A few days of “improvement,” then a crash into pain and sleepless nights.

Then something shifted. I stopped looking at the clock. I started “pretending I’m dancing”—focusing on stroke, glide, ease, minimal friction. I began to enjoy how my body moved through the water, instead of measuring my worth by speed.

That was when things began to turn. The disease went into remission. I am, to this day, a medical puzzle. But more importantly, I learned that healing often starts when we stop treating life as a performance and start treating it as a dance with the Divine.

Facets of One is about helping individuals and communities make that shift:

From “holding fast” to the truth as we’ve perceived it, to looking at the Word of God, broadly, on its own terms.
From proving ourselves right to learning how to move gracefully with others.
From obsessing over ideological “rule‑keeping” to discovering the deeper rhythm of justice, mercy, and humility that underlies all true law.
From obsessive self‑monitoring (am I improving fast enough?) to a posture of worship that delights in God and in the bodies and stories God has given us.

Local Roots, Global Rivers

Mercy cannot be abstract. It has to become concrete: time, attention, money, practical help, presence.

Morgan told stories from his own life that made this vivid:

Supporting a small Christian ministry in Pakistan that serves families trapped in brick‑kiln debt bondage—work, housing, and food all controlled by the same owners, with debts that never seem to shrink.
Paying for a well in a village with no water, and watching on video as it was dug, knowing those faces and names.
Funding annual birthday parties where kids in that community get a slice of cake—children he can see and talk with via video calls.
Helping a young man there pursue his dream of becoming a human‑rights lawyer.

None of these acts made Morgan a hero. They simply made him kin—to people whose lives are unimaginably different from his own childhood of oil‑money security and Good Morning America appearances.

That same pattern is built into the Soul Seeds program of the Royal Falcon Foundation:

Local kids—often in under‑resourced urban neighborhoods—learn to build raised‑bed gardens, turn dead dirt into living soil, plant seeds, and share the harvest.
Along the way they gain agency, practical skills, and a sense of responsibility for each other.
Then they look outward: “How can we, with what we have, help kids somewhere else who are facing even harder realities?”

I’ve often used the image of the Sea of Galilee and the Dead Sea:

The Sea of Galilee receives and gives; water flows in and flows out, and it teems with life.
The Dead Sea only receives; water flows in and never out. That’s why it’s dead.

Facets of One is about helping individuals and communities become living seas, not dead ones:

Receiving spiritual and material gifts with gratitude.
Letting them flow outward in mercy, locally and globally.
Doing so in ways that are relational, not just institutional.

The New Year’s Revolution: How to Join

So what does this “revolution” actually ask of you?

Not to storm any buildings or win any comment‑section wars.

It asks something much harder and much more hopeful:

Commit to at least one local practice of mercy this year.
That might mean:
- Starting a small Facets of One prayer and discussion group in your church or neighborhood where people can take a detached open look at the Message God has shared with His creation, throughout human history.
- Getting involved in a Soul Seeds‑type project—gardening, mentoring, tutoring, visiting the elderly—anything that puts you shoulder‑to‑shoulder with real people.
Commit to at least one global relationship.
Not just a donation, but:
- Learning the name of a community abroad through a trusted contact or partner.
- Following their updates.
- Praying for them, and as you’re able, helping with specific needs (a well, school supplies, shoes, medical bills).
Treat worship as dance, not performance.
Whether in your church, your living room, or your morning walk:
- Ask not, “Did I get it all right?”
- Ask instead, “Am I learning to move with the rhythm of God’s mercy—for myself, my neighbor, and the stranger?”
Stay tuned.
Over the coming weeks and months, Created in the Image of God, SOOP Media, and Royal Falcon Foundation will share concrete ways to plug into Facets of One—from story‑sharing spaces to soul‑seeds projects to international partnerships.

A Closing Question

If this year were less about upgrading your personal life and more about discovering the particular facet of God’s image you’ve been given to share—locally and globally—what might that change?

Where might you need to stop racing the clock and start learning the dance?

Brief plug for next week’s show

Next Sunday on Created in the Image of God, I’ll be joined by Julia Struckley—a practicing Catholic, educator, media scholar, and certified spiritual director. We’ll talk about what spiritual direction really is, how it helps people discern where God is already at work in their lives, and how an ecumenical outlook can deepen—not dilute—our own faith commitments.