Hebrews 11:1 “Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”

I sat in a circle of friends on New Years Eve, struggling to come up with a resolution for the New Year. I tend to be lousy at that kind of thing. It is not as if I did not have plenty of time to think about it; hard to miss the arrival of the New Year what with all the hubbub people put on it. What I was not prepared for was the naming of it; not to mention the naming of it in a group of my close friends. Doing so implies one of the worst things one can ask for when making a new year’s resolution. Accountability.

By a show of hands, how many of us make New Year’s resolutions?

New year, new me, new you! How many of you, like me, are going to exercise more? How many of you, like me, are going to shed a few pounds? How many of you, like me are going to drink a little less, be it alcohol or sugary drinks? And how many of you, like me, are going to fall back into old habits around February 14th? While the word “resolution” certainly implies finality and closure, the unfortunate truth for me tends to be that around this time every year I simply try to re-solve the same issues that have been plaguing me for years.

John Oliver, formerly of the Daily Show, now the host of his own show on HBO had this to say about our New Year’s Resolutions. “The key to a successful resolution is not hard work and dedication; it’s managing disappointment and that’s it.”

One pastor recently lamented the self-serving nature of the resolutions most people seem to make. He cites a recent Nielsen poll that says the top resolutions made this year were: Stay fit, lose weight, budget better, spend more time with family, don’t overschedule, get organized, travel more, read more, and the beautifully vague, “enjoy life to the fullest.”

All of these are worthwhile goals for us to achieve. None of them requires much from us beyond our own self-sacrifice or emotional disposition. This pastor who singlehandedly undermined many of my resolutions offers a sensible alternative to our traditional approach to the New Year. Turn the “me” into “we” and take a little responsibility for something beyond my own sense of self. He challenges us to take our intentions to a broader audience, with the belief that in doing so we will cultivate a deeper and more rewarding life; which, I believe, is what most of our self-serving goals hope for (but often fall short of providing).

Fortunately, for me, every fall I am asked by the Congregation Ministry Review Board to draft a set of goals, both personal and professional, that I hope to achieve in the coming year. These goals must be realistic (yet optimistic), and measurable. For example, it is one thing to say, “I will go to the gym more,” yet it is quite another thing to say, “I will go to the gym at least three times a week.”

A number of years ago I recognized that I was not practicing what I preached as much as I would have liked, so I put into my goals, “I will do at least one hour of community service every week.” For me, this was a game changer.

I became a dishwasher at the Catholic Worker House. Once a week, when they would open their doors to the hungry and the homeless and invite them in to enjoy some delicious soup and home made bread, I would slip out of the office, enjoy a delicious and nutritious free lunch, then spend the rest of my lunch hour doing dishes. One would think something so simple would not be as profound as I am setting it up to be.

But it was.

First, there is the feel-good component of doing service. I literally got to roll-up my sleeves once a week and get lost in the bubbles, doing a job that most folks would rather not do, contributing just a little bit of my time and energy to making someone else’s life easier. Secondly, I got a free lunch out of it. But that free lunch did more than just satisfy my hungry belly-, it satisfied my hungry soul. Lunch at The Catholic Worker was a feast of love. Unlike any soup kitchen I have ever been to, the tables were set with cloth napkins and candles. There was soft music playing from the corner. And after we had been shown to an empty seat at a shared table, we were waited on by the most thoughtful of servers. The bread is brought. The soup is served. And together, sitting around that table, we dine. We broke the bread, passed it, hand to hand, and lived into the beloved community that I believe Jesus was modeling for us at that last supper so long ago.; this is the grace of Communion, literally the joining of the community around a table of love.

I love it when we do communion here in worship. It is powerful watching the procession of our family of faith come forward to share the bread and cup. It is beautiful watching you pass the baskets and hold the goblets for one another. I believe that simple act of passing the bread and wine strengthens us; incorporates us into a strong community of love and support. Blessed be the ties that bind our hearts in sacred love, as the old hymn says.

Where I feel the strength of love and power of our community of faith HERE, at the Catholic Worker the beauty came from the opposite side of the spectrum. Where here there is strong love and trust with my sisters and brothers, there, in the company of strangers there was fragility and cautious hope.

Passing the bread at The Catholic Worker was an unsanctioned communion, with no priest or pastor to pronounce a formal blessing over the basket; it was sacred, perhaps, only to me. Ahh, but in that bread I felt my brokenness. In the eyes of the people gathered around that table, I sensed the woe of our world. And I recognized the importance of this sacred meal, and the grace that led me to that table.

I didn’t know it at the time, but now I recognize that what those simple meals did for me was to give me names and stories to go with the issues that I knew I was supposed to be fighting for. The skeletons of despair and injustice, poverty and inequality that many would prefer to keep hidden in the closet were given flesh and blood, stories, and names for me to hear and know, and to be forever changed for the knowing.

It was the exposure, plain and simple, that unveiled my eyes and changed my heart. Simply being a witness to the human side of the issues that I had heard and read so much about, but paid so little mind to because I was somehow insulated from it, that changed my heart.

In a recent interview, Brian Stevenson, author of the book, “Just Mercy” was asked why he wrote a book about his experiences working for the incarcerated, particularly those sentenced to die. He said “I wrote the book because I am persuaded that if most people in America saw what I see on a regular basis they would not be able to reconcile themselves with these realities,” “But our instinct is to deny.” Whether he recognizes it or not, Brian Stevenson is taking on the role of contemporary prophet in a world and at a time when we could probably use a few more prophets.

The prophets from the first testament were those individuals who railed against the injustices they saw taking place in their communities; injustices that were being performed with common knowledge and consent from the society and, consequentially, having adverse effects on the community of a people who considered themselves people of God. “Look at the nations and see!” shouts one prophet, “Look and see and be astounded…Destruction and violence are before me, strife and contention arise. Look on them, and be astounded!”

The hope of the prophet is that by witnessing the injustices that are taking place, one will be moved to action to make amends. “To open the eyes of our hearts, that we will be forever changed and know the hope that we have been called to,” as Paul said; That we might allow our hearts to be exposed to the needs of our world, in order that we might be strengthened in our resolve to work towards a better world for all people.

That is something to be resolute about.

In her blog on our church website two weeks ago, Shelly shared how this year she is deepening her new years resolutions beyond personal health and well-being, and incorporating the ideas of Kwanzaa; to hold a sacred place in her heart and spirit for the needs of the community; through vision, cooperation, financial support, creativity and faith. And as I considered this, I was reminded of one of my favorite passages about faith. “Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, and the conviction of things not seen.”

Perhaps, as we make our resolutions for the New Year, we do so because we sense that there is something deeper within our selves and in our world that is broken, and needs attention. Perhaps we make resolutions of and for change from a deep seeded deficit that we feel inside of us, that we know needs repairing. Maybe we’re holding out hope for a better world, but having a hard time comprehending all that sorrow and all that sickness and all that pain. Maybe we simplify, personify and personalize the things we hope to see in the big world into our own little worlds, believing we are somehow enabled to maintain control and comfort– when perhaps what we really need is a stronger nudge towards our convictions, and a wider view of what needs must be met this year.(or maybe it really is all about just wanting a set of six pack abs…)

I believe that each of us, deep in our hearts, longs for a more beloved kindom. I believe that if the path were made clear for us, if the way were somehow marked and measurable we could and would conquer all the ills that life might throw at us. I know that when the arrows show the path then the goal can be reached, no matter how far we must walk, no matter what obstacles might stand in our way.

There is so much trouble, so much injustice, so much sorrow and so much pain that clamors for our attention. It can be difficult to see a path forward because there are so many ways to go. It can be so overwhelming that we may not want to move forward at all.

And that’s when God spoke to the prophet Ezra, and said, “Rise up. The matter is in your hands.”

If we judge the success of our resolution by inches around our waistlines or dollars in our bank accounts, we are, as John Oliver pointed out, merely setting ourselves up for disappointment. But if we measure our resolution by the hope we help to inspire, by the lives we improve, by the communities we support, and by the connections we make, then I believe we on track to make the broken world whole again. Even one dirty dish or affirming word or evening walk through your neighborhood becomes one little piece of the puzzle of life that has the potential to open our eyes to a completely new way of seeing. My prayer is that we will be forever changed in the knowing, and that we will take comfort and be resolved knowing that the matter is in our hands.

Rise up, my sisters and brothers; the matter is in your hands.