New Year’s Resolutions
Luke 22:31-34
“Simon Simon, behold, Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat, but I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail, and you, when once you have turned again, strengthen your brothers. But he said to him,” Lord with you, I am ready to go both to prison and to death!” And he (Jesus)said,” I say to you, Peter, the rooster will not crow today until you have denied three times that you know me.”
So what in the world does this familiar passage of scripture have to do with New Year’s resolutions? Well it’s about the difference between good intentions and self empowerment, versus faith and dependence on God.
Peter is one of my favorite people in the Bible. He’s pretty easy to relate to. He was “resolute” and zealous, but didn’t always “finish the deal “.. Look at some of the other stories about him. He starts out by walking on the water and then almost drowns. His out of control desire to protect Jesus from being arrested results in lopping off a Roman soldier‘s ear. And then of course the most memorable story is his 3 time denial of Jesus. God wanted to make sure we remember this story by putting it in all four gospels. And if we back up to an earlier part of the story, we will find in Matthew 16 that Jesus prophetically changed his name from Simon to Peter to indicate that he would be the foundational rock (Petros) of the new church.
So what happened between Peter‘s pledge of allegiance to Jesus and his denial? What was it that failed? Why would God use a story of failure to promote the gospel narrative?
Remember that Jesus prayed that Peter‘s faith would not fail. Nothing is mentioned about Peter himself. Yes indeed, Peter failed in his own self-reliance, but let’s see what happened with his faith. The faith that Jesus gave him was a gift and it would soon become faith in the risen Christ. Look at what happens to Peter in the rest of the Bible. He encounters the post resurrected Jesus in John chapter 21 for a job interview as the head of the new church. Ironically, it again involves three questions to examine Peter’s love and dedication to Jesus. But this time he passes the test, now relying on his faith in the resurrected Christ, instead of himself. He is depicted in the book of Acts as a completely changed man and then goes on to write two amazing epistles,1st and 2nd Peter.. Another example of God using broken people to repair the brokenness of this world.
So now as we head into a new calendar year for Faith In Practice, let us make New Year’s resolutions for more patients to be served and more life-changing surgeries performed. Nothing wrong with that . Maybe you have a personal resolution to dive deeper in your service to God and those around you. But I urge all of us to prayerfully lean into the faith that God has given us to provide these services and not on our self reliance and self will, but in God‘s will. People fail but faith in God never fails. As mother Teresa famously said “God has not called me to be successful, he has called me to be faithful.” Let us leave the results to our good and sovereign God.
As always, we look forward to meeting many patients and families this coming year who will exhibit a genuine, humble faith in God for meeting their needs. In no way do they buckle up and rely on self reliance, but they lean into Jesus to answer their prayers. May we learn and be inspired by them and partner with these people on both sides of the mission to take our Faith and put it in Practice in 2026!
God bless and Happy New Year!
Dr. Mark Woolf
