Your New Week’s Resolution

So you are one month into 2017, but has your New Year’s resolution made it this far? The fact that many resolutions have gone through the wood chipper by now is the very reason people snicker when they talk about these apparent exercises in futility.

But for those who know that changes really need to happen, you are in the critical moment. I am told that commanders in the military must be masters of adjustment. The battle strategy is finely tuned in the war room, but once the fighting actually begins, new plans have to be made.
Why must new plans be made for war as well as resolutions? Because you see weakness that weren’t first visible, and new circumstances that have changed the situation. Perhaps much of that is due to sloppy planning fueled by eggnog and motivational memes. But now you are a month in and you have sobered up. You are still plodding down this habit-laden rat hole and it stinks. The advantage is now you see the putrid habit entangled about your feet. It wasn’t as clear when your eyes were fixed forward and you were attempting to make the best of it. But now you see where the hooks are. Now you see where the work has to be done. This is good. Go to work.

New Year’s resolutions are fine…if they are one of many. But any real fight will need a new month’s resolution, or a new week’s resolution. This is what the gospel moves us to do. Where sin increases, grace abounds all the more. We keep fighting because the Spirit is unrelenting in His pursuit of Christ’s glory in us. He is always supplying us with new morning mercies. So we make another resolution. We get up from our failure and bring another round-house and uppercut to the body of our sinful flesh as it struts around us mockingly.

So gird up your loins and go to work with a clearer, more precise resolution. Faithfulness will bring forth fruits and victories you may not even expect.