New Years Resolutions

I dislike the term New Year’s Resolution. Probably some others do as well, including many of those that make them. It seems to me that when we make them, we often do it with that “wink-wink” look as in “I’ve bit off more than I really want to chew, but it sounds good”. Or, it’s like goal setting—the loftier the better in which we place ourselves into a box in which we know there is no way out without breaking them at best or diminishing them at least.

I don’t make them for the primary reason that I know my brokenness and my weaknesses better than anyone, and I know how those two things can drive all that I say, think, or do at any given moment. I also know how easily I can yield to that which I don’t want to yield at any given moment, and how difficult it is for me to purposefully and intentionally focus and act on that which is entirely pleasing to God, not just at any given moment, but most every waking moment. I accept that that is part of my fallen humanness.

Thus, trying to live in a holy and humble manner before God, something that will have only positive effects on myself, my relationships, and my quality of living is not a year to year effort. Indeed, it’s a minute by minute work in progress. It’s an effort that will have fallbacks, twists and turns, surprises, stumbling blocks, tears and pain, failures, and yes, some successes. It’s a lifelong process, one I will never complete to perfection, yet one which, by faith, has a reward my imagination can only begin to grasp.

Because of that faith led pending reward, the only thing I can consider and rely on is His strength in helping me to figuratively put the right foot forward at any given moment in any given situation. His plan for me is His resolution, and I don’t know what that plan is, so how can I make any resolutions knowing that whatever they are they may be contrary to His? If any resolution comes close to His, it would be to simply follow Him, and I have proven over and over that I fail at that time after time. Even those failures, however, have their upsides because they are actually gifting from Him. They are the gifts that teach me more about me.

So, some might say that my resolution should simply be to follow Him. I can’t accept that as a resolution. It’s my job. He made that clear in His word.