3rd Letter from Dave

Resolutions

Tomorrow is New Year’s Day. Typically this is a time of evaluating the previous year, of looking ahead to the coming year, and of making resolutions so that we don’t repeat the mistakes of the past. As many of us engage in that process I want to issue a word of caution as well as a suggested direction. These thoughts are not original to me. They have grown out of recent readings of two books that have been a mainstay of study and reflection for me over the years. I would highly recommend both of them to you. They are “The Return of the Prodigal Son" by Henri Nouwen and “Celebration of Discipline" by Richard Foster. I hope you, too, have developed intimacy with books and mentors who are seldom far from reach or thought.

My caution has to do with the nature of resolutions. They are often constructed around our own ability to willfully implement the intended course of action. They come dangerously close (as we have practiced them in the past) to making an idol of our will. We give it the ability to do what we have been told over and over again in Scripture that only One can do. To quote Foster, “The moment we think we can succeed and attain victory over sin by the strength of our will alone is the moment we are worshipping the will." Such idolatry is both deadening and enslaving. We simply cannot renovate and purify our heart by the exertion of our will. That is because “the will has the same deficiency as the law – it can deal only with externals. It is incapable of bringing about the necessary transformation of the inner spirit." If we approach transformation with a set of will-empowered duties we will end with deadening legalism, a discouraging moral defeat, and an enslaving feeling of hopelessness and helplessness.

Now, though I am expressing caution about our typical approach to resolutions, I am not promoting doing nothing. I am still strongly convinced of the truth of the concept so excellently developed in another highly recommended book (Dallas Willard’s “Divine Conspiracy") that to not plan to do something is dangerously close to planning not to do it. Let’s plug that in so it makes more sense. To not plan to follow Jesus is in effect the same thing as planning not to follow Him. To not plan to pursue godliness is frightfully close to planning not to pursue it. To not plan to pursue intimacy with God comes down to the same thing in practice as planning not to pursue intimacy with Him. So though I do not promote will-driven resolutions as a means of achieving the transformation of the inner person for which we all ache to attain, I certainly do not promote doing nothing, which will most certainly achieve its goal!

Let me suggest a choice (I prefer that word to “resolution") for this coming year which grew out of one of my readings this morning in “The Return of the Prodigal Son." It is actually a quite simple thought and a quite simple approach. To quote Nouwen, “I have to kneel before the Father, put my ear against his chest and listen, without interruption, to the heartbeat of God. Then, and only then, can I say carefully and very gently what I hear." What a picture! My ear leaned against my Father’s chest, listening undistractedly and without interruption to His heartbeat. As I leave the intimacy of His presence with that heartbeat still gently pounding in my ear, then I can choose how to live and what to say. Then my life and words will be lived and spoken in time with that beat…the beat of my Father’s heart.

So, my suggestion is to simply choose this year to listen to the beat of our Father’s heart. It is not a difficult endeavor. The means to accomplishing it are spelled out in Foster’s book, “Celebration of Discipline." For further insight you might want to read my previous Note titled “Intimacy." As His heartbeat continues ringing rhythmically in our ear, it makes the need for every resolution obsolete. Our actions and our words will simply and naturally keep in step with that beat. We will be walking in the Spirit.

Join me as I choose this year to make listening to the heartbeat of my Father my first passion and my highest goal! May His Spirit guide us in the process.