January first, the day millions – perhaps billions – of people make life-changing resolutions. New Year’s Resolutions is tradition that goes back thousands of years, all the way to the Babylonian Empire. The Babylonians vowed to repay their debts, but it is from the Roman’s that we inherit the modern practice. The Romans made promises to Janus, a god from whom many wrongly believe the month of January is named after (January is actually named after the god Juno). According to the Romans, Janus is the god of beginnings and transitions and has two faces, one on each side of his head, which permits him to look forward into the future and back into the past.

As Janus is the god of a long-dead religion the modern tradition is secular in its practice, and is something many Christ-followers participate in. There is a connection in making resolutions and Christianity in that both teach that one’s yesterdays do not determine one’s tomorrow. Real change can be made in one’s life, and it’s much easier to make those changes with the aid of the indwelling Spirit of God. Of all the resolutions one can make, what resolution do you need the most? Is it losing weight? Becoming more physically fit? Is it getting up earlier? Spending more time with your significant other and/or kids? All good things, to be sure. How do you decide?

Making a resolution for the believer is a bit like it is for the Roman, it is making a promise to God to make a change in your life. Before making that promise, why not see if it’s a promise God wants you to make?

As a follower of Jesus we are involved in a process of lifelong change. That change is called “sanctification”. The word literally means “the state of proper functioning”. For the believer it is a process by which we become more like who Jesus wants us to be and less like who the world tells us we should be. Perhaps an illustration would help. Take a pair of eyeglasses as an example. Their state of proper functioning is to help one see better. The world, however, would rather you use them with sunlight to fry ants. What would God rather the glasses be used for? That’s right.

To review, when making a New Year’s Resolution it is important for the believer to make a resolution that is in accordance with God’s desire for us, that will make us more like the person God wants us to be and one that we can keep (one doesn’t want to break their promise to God). But there is one more aspect we need to consider.

We don’t keep our resolutions on our own. This is where the believer has an advantage over the unbeliever. If we have chosen a resolution that meets the criteria above then we know that God’s Spirit, who indwells us, will help us keep that resolution and make it a permanent part of our being.