A Different Kind of New Year's Resolution

I have mixed feelings about New Year's resolutions. Striving to live a better life is always a good goal, but too often our January resolutions seem to me like another "to do" list.

I think most of us have enough to do lists already.  

Or, New Year’s resolutions are anti-"to do" lists. They're wishlists of all the ways we DON’T want to be: “I wish I was thinner, I wish I spent more time with family, I wish I had a better job.”

Resolutions like that are all based on guilt—on feeling badly about who we are. When we dream about who we want to be based on who we’re not, we’re doomed to fail.

I’m not saying that you shouldn’t resolve to quit smoking or to spend more time with family. But I am saying that I hope you will think about your life and who you want to be by trying to see things the way God sees them.

God looks at you and sees you, warts and all, and says, “This is one of my children.” God looks at you and says, “What matters to me is not how thin you are or how successful you are or whether you have it all together, but whether you are living your life with integrity and love.” 

What if the most powerful resolution you can make in 2012 is to resolve to believe that God loves you?

Then, the smoking, overeating, hating your job, overworking, or whatever it is, will resolve themselves. Because all those other things are the tranquilizers we give ourselves when life hurts too much—and life hurts too much when we don’t really believe God loves us.

May this be a year when you resolve to choose what is life-giving, and not self-denying. May this be a year when you resolve to believe that God loves you.