BitterSweetLife

I've been looking at my life (and rolling my eyes) as I mull over some resolutions for the new year. Reflection can have a slightly corrosive effect, which should be expected when you are a person dealing by necessity with a sin nature. How does a Christian approach the prospect of a "clean slate?" (And if the slate is a "merely" hypothetical one, I see no reason to discount it - hypothetical fresh starts being the stuff of sanctification.) We need a nuanced perspective. Gung-ho conviviality is to be applauded, but it must be tempered with grit and resiliency.

I haven't settled on my bold declarations just yet, but here are some guiding lights to condition your expectations and guide your resolutions as 2007 threatens, New Year's help from some very wise people (with my amateur commentary).

It was rather splendid to be wearing a blade made in Gondolin for the goblin-wars of which so many songs had sung; and also he had noticed that such weapons made a great impression on goblins that came upon them suddenly.

“Go back?” he thought. “No good at all! Go sideways? Impossible! Go forward? Only thing to do! On we go!” So up he got, and trotted along with his little sword held in front of him and one hand feeling the wall, and his heart all of a patter and a pitter. - J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit

Action
Daring to do what is right, not what fancy may tell you,
Valiantly grasping occasions and not cravenly doubting—
Freedom comes only through deeds,
not through thoughts taking wing.
Faint not nor fear, but go out to the storm and the action,
trusting in God whose commandment you faithfully follow;
freedom, exultant, will welcome your spirit with joy.
- Dietrich Bonhoeffer, “Stages on the Road to Freedom”

and wait for things to calm down. (They won't.) Faith coalesces in action.

Man must have just enough faith in himself to have adventures, and just enough doubt of himself to enjoy them. - G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy

The unforeseen and unpredictable can be exciting if we have learned to take God more seriously than we take ourselves. When this happens, we have learned the secret of strong humility, of God-blessed swagger.

We are not necessarily doubting that God will do the best for us; we are wondering how painful the best will turn out to be. - C.S. Lewis, Letters of C.S. Lewis

The limited alignment of our eyesight and God's sovereign goodness is the source of much bittersweet pain in life. Therefore, we brace ourselves, knowing that the cost of heavenly joy will be earthly sorrow, but that in the end, we will have no lingering regrets. Death, pain and loss have already been defeated, and while "on earth you will have tribulations," things are not always what they seem:

Blessing is at the end of the road. And that which is at the end of the road influences everything that takes place along the road. The end shapes the means. As Catherine of Siena said, “All the way to heaven is heaven.” - Eugene Peterson, A Long Obedience In the Same Direction

Only a fool would forget the direction and nature of his travel, but we are all fools at one time or another. What a relief it is to remember again what it is we're doing here, and why we keep on moving: "Be of good cheer, for I have overcome the world."

May your new year and mine be infused with gutsy humility, trust despite our pain, and action in the face of dragons.

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