I may be behind the ball by posting this on New Years Day. Probably most of your thinking about resolutions will already have happened. Oh well.
I don't intend for this blog post to tell you what resolutions to make. I don't mean for it to provide wisdom on how to keep them, or how to maintain your resolve. My intention is modest: to remind you that change is possible.
Should we resolve?
At church the other day Pastor Adam showed us a video of John Piper explaining that, yes indeed, God does intend for us to resolve things. The video is based on 2 Thessalonians 1:11-12: "To this end we always pray for you, that our God may make you worthy of his calling and may fulfill every resolve for good and every work of faith by his power, so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ." (Click on the video to see Piper go a little crazy with his electronic pen.)
In other words, Paul prays that God will help people to achieve their good resolutions, so long as they rely on God's power, and for the ultimate purpose that Jesus be glorified. With God the impossible becomes possible. With God, change is possible.
Living in Light of Resurrection
We should allow the logic of Jesus' resurrection to work its way into our worldview, to remind us again that drastic change is possible.
Some people, even Christians, functionally adopt a worldview with no room for hope: people just are the way they are. They are fixed entities. They have let you down before, and so they will again. In your own life, you struggle with the same sins. In your own life, you see many failed resolutions. The apple never falls far from the tree. You can tell a bad apple early on and predict they are headed for no good. Etcetera, etcetera.
The logic of the resurrection turns this hope-less worldview on its head. Jesus was the firstborn of the dead. He was literally dead and was brought back to life by God (and he then appeared to many who went on to live and die for him, and the apologetic argument here may be appropriate for another post). We serve a God who sees death yet breathes into it life - deep and abiding and abundant life. Spiritually this happens when a person is saved and comes to faith: we are not simply sick and made well, we are dead in our trespasses and sins, then brought back to life. What a turnaround! People are not fixed entities. Look at Paul. Look at the other apostles. Our God is in the business of turning people around.
This brings him glory. Because God is really there, because he raised Jesus from the dead, because he is glorified by changing us to be like Christ, we have hope. It is so good to live with hope, instead of living without hope. Indeed, we live in a world in which change is possible.
Paul tells us in Romans 12 that we are to be transformed by the renewing of our minds. Transformation, then, must be possible.
Habits Upon Habits and More Habits
Now, if you think about your day, you will see within it lots of habits. Most of your decisions are now made on autopilot. Whether you workout. Whether you turn on the TV. What you choose to eat. Your routine. How you handle your emails. Whether and how much you pray. When and what you choose to snack on during your break at work. What you look at on your phone or computer. Where you sit in church. Who you talk to. Most of what we do is dictated by habit. Most of the doors we open and walk through are chosen subconsciously based on what we have repeatedly done before. You didn't always have the habits you do now, and so those habits had to get created at some point.
Because change is possible, you and I have the power to create new habits. You and I have the power to break old habits. I don't argue that either of those things will be easy. They won't be. They will be hard. But most of the things most worth doing are going to be hard. I want to be the sort of person who has a godly character and a wisdom about how to live in all areas of life, and I want my habits to flow from that character and feed into that character. And I never want the reason that I fail to be that sort of person to be that it was just too hard and I gave up. Join me in thinking this way.
Life is Not a Sprint, but a Marathon
Pastor Adam also quoted in his sermon Darrin Patrick (I think): "Discipline is learning to do the things you are able to do now to ensure in the future you are able to do the things you currently cannot do now." Amen. That is beautiful and challenging. Meditate, if you will, on the long-term nature of this concept.
When God works in a person, he often takes a long time. We live in an impatient, on-demand, immediate gratification culture in which we can roll over in bed in the morning and be instantly connected to everyone in our social network. Sanctification, on the other hand, is a decades sort of thing. God's plan for his church is a project spanning thousands of years. The Kingdom of God starts out small like a mustard seed; it works through like leaven; but in the end it is worth selling everything for it. If you think out the changes you want to make in your life, it is probably worth it to make those changes, but you ought to make peace with, and even appreciate, that worthy changes are those that may take a long time.
Some Miscellaneous Thoughts On Trying Again
An encouragement: changes worth making don't have to start on January 1. If you have had a bad day, tomorrow is a new day. I am currently enjoying some changes I made back in late November. Late November resolutions, I guess.
If there is a change in your life work making and you have tried and failed already, consider that you might simply have to fail a certain number of times before you succeed. And you don't necessarily know how many times that is. Because change is possible, because God is real, dust yourself off and get up and try again if you have fallen.
Thank you, friends, for reading, and I pray that God may fulfill your every resolve for good!
