So here we are, face to face with a new year. Over the past many years, I have expressed
dismay at the traditional New Year’s resolutions ritual in which we inflict a
performance review on ourselves and then decide what we need to do to improve
ourselves. My objection to this annual
exercise is that it promotes a focus on ourselves and greatly minimizes a focus
on God; it also engenders a self-righteousness that moves us away from God and
others rather than toward them.
I would like to suggest an approach that I believe is more
Biblical and more constructive. Please
consider with me the Apostle Paul’s words in his letter to the
Philippians: “Work out your salvation
with fear and trembling; for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and
to work for His good pleasure.” This
passage expresses the mystery of the Christian life: that we are responsible
for our part, but it is God who is the author and perfecter of our faith
(Hebrews 12:2).
But how do we go about following Paul’s command? How do we do our end of the “work” while
remaining focused on our Lord? I think
King David can help us here. King David knows
something about falling short. After initiating
an illicit love affair with a married woman (adultery in David’s time was
punishable by death via stoning), David responds to Bathsheba’s resulting
pregnancy with a cover-up plan designed to deceive Bathsheba’s husband Uriah
and the public. When that plan fails,
the King of Israel resorts to having Uriah killed, again in a deceitful
way.
We don’t have to wait until a New Year and a personal
self-examination by David before the story continues. The Lord sends Nathan the prophet to confront
David, and David responds with an honest confession. David also remains focused on the LORD rather
than plunging into some self-directed self-improvement project. We can read a more in-depth passage about
David’s wrestling with his own sin in Psalm 32:
How blessed
is he whose transgression is forgiven,
Whose sin
is covered!
How blessed is the man to whom the
LORD does not impute iniquity,
And in
whose spirit there is no deceit!
When I
kept silent about my sin, my body wasted away
Through my
groaning all day long.
For day and night Your hand was heavy
upon me;
My vitality
was drained away as with the fever heat of summer. Selah.
I acknowledged my sin to You,
And my
iniquity I did not hide;
I said, “I
will confess my transgressions to the LORD”;
And You
forgave the guilt of my sin.
It is easy to think that since none of us is the King of
Israel with a personal prophet at our disposal that we might need to take the
personal sin issue upon ourselves. But
please consider with me another passage in the Psalms written by David:
Search me,
O God, and know my heart;
Try me and
know my anxious thoughts;
And see if there be any hurtful way
in me,
And lead me
in the everlasting way (Psalm 139:23-24).
David most helpfully models for us an open heart that
invites the LORD to search his heart. By
doing this David not only exhibits humility in resisting the option of
examining himself, he also demonstrates his desire for genuine holiness by
involving the LORD into the examination process, the LORD who is not deceived
by even the most deceitful heart.
I still do not entirely understand how this working out our
salvation as God works in us comes together.
But I believe that King David has given us a good start. It seems to me that cultivating a humble
heart before God is essential. To be
sure, God can search the proudest and most self-focused of hearts, but it is
the humble heart that will be able to hear Him.
Humility is hard to fabricate, but we can follow King David’s model and
study and meditate on God’s Word. As we
do that, we will be better able to recognize who He is and who we are before
Him. And as we add prayer to Bible study
and our daily life routine, we will be putting ourselves in a position to see
and hear Him personally. And finally,
like David, we can be wise about the company we keep. By pursuing relationship with one another and
by remaining open to learning and hearing about the less than pretty parts of
our hearts and lives, God can do His sanctifying work in us.
The wish for a happy new year is nice, but may we not stop
there. May we begin 2017 in full pursuit
of our loving and sanctifying Savior, walking before Him with open and humble
hearts.