Resolved: To make no New Year’s Resolutions for me to do, but to cling to the One who can make this year exactly what it should be.

I am currently enjoying the masterful biography of Jonathan Edwards by George Marsden.  Fascinating to see the early resolutions of Edwards give way to a delighted in and by Christ kind of spirituality later in his life.

Let’s face it, there are so many good resolutions that we could make as we head into 2013.  Bible reading commitments, wider reading plans, personal prayer schedules, pursuit of ministry training ideas, find a mentor strategies, evaluation and feedback gathering plans, sermonic self-improvement schemes, pastoral ministry visitation goals, personal fitness/diet/exercise/rest regimes, family scheduling tactics, and on the list goes.

All of these would be good ideas.  But making these determined and resolute teeth-clenched-and-muscles-flexed kind of personal commitments may well not be the best way to go.

As we head into 2013, let’s hold all those resolutions with a very loose grip, but squeeze tightly on the hand of Him who holds us, our families, our ministries and our year ahead in the palm of His hand.

Can we even begin to imagine what our Lord might do in us and through us in 2013?  Exceedingly, abundantly beyond all that we ask or even imagine . . . and certainly more than we can achieve by our own self-determined productivity and improvement plans!