This year's resolution? Give up elephant meat!

After years of making, then failing miserably at keeping New Year's resolutions, I've finally discovered the secret of success…make resolutions motivated by more than cowardly self-gratification. Past resolutions such as giving up cigars just so people would like me…or giving up carbohydrates just so people would notice I'd lost weight…were destined to failure because I was being too selfish. That's why I chose saving the elephant. No more inhumane slaughtering of elephants simply to satisfy my merciless appetite! Next year-the giraffe.

Why do so many of us have such a difficult relationship with resolutions? Consider: The reason we find it necessary to make them in the first place is because we lacked self-control in that area of our life during the previous year. That reminder is discouraging enough, but what do you think we will need to be able to keep our new resolutions? You guessed it…more self-control than we had last year…the very thing we discovered we had in short supply. Someone wrote:

I don't understand myself at all, for I really want to do what is right, but I don't do it. Instead, I do the very thing I hate. I know perfectly well that what I am doing is wrong…When I want to do good, I don't. And when I try not to do wrong, I do it anyway. It seems to be a fact of life that when I want to do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong. (Romans 7:15-16, 21, 19 NLT)

Sound familiar? So, what difference does it make that some writer had a similar problem as ours? Because…this was not just any writer. These are the words of Saint Paul, a devout Jew who was one of the major authors of Scripture…not one we would expect to hear admit that he often failed to keep his own promises to himself to be a better person.

We make promises to ourselves, then fail to live up. Paul did the same thing. Should we refrain from making them altogether? Not exactly. Another writer…a legendary Jewish King wrote:

Guard your steps when you go to the house of God. Go near to listen rather than to offer the sacrifice of fools, who do not know that they do wrong. Do not be quick with your mouth, do not be hasty in your heart to utter anything before God. God is in heaven and you are on earth, so let your words be few. (Ecclesiastes 5:1-2 NIV)

Solomon's assessment of resolutions…promises to do better…was that it was the 'sacrifice of fools'. In other words, fools make promises all the time, then break them; that is why promises are as worthless as a check written against insufficient funds. The better option would be to take the effort we exert trying to keep promises and expend it instead on listening to God…getting to know Him. The prophet Jeremiah recorded a direct quote from the Lord on how He felt about our coming to Him to listen, understand and know Him:

This is what the LORD says: "Let not the wise man boast of his wisdom or the strong man boast of his strength or the rich man boast of his riches, but let him who boasts boast about this: that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD, who exercises kindness, justice and righteousness on earth, for in these I delight," declares the LORD. (Jeremiah 9:23-24 NIV)

Bottom line? God is not impressed with our many promises. (It that such a big surprise? Can you imagine how many He has heard, then seen broken?) He is impressed when we draw near to Him to listen and take the effort to understand and know Him. Interestingly, as we do this-seek Him through reading Scripture-we will gain the insights needed to overcome some of the areas of weakness that caused us to need to make resolutions in the first place.

This year, rather than more resolutions consider making a consistent effort to listen to the Lord, understand and know Him. He doesn't even mind if you brag about it!

By the way, I was just kidding about the giraffe.