One Word

Choose one word. 

Connect. Imagine. Simplify. Transform. Thrive.

Is it just me, or does it seem a little stressful to choose for yourself the one word that will define you—the one word that you can “focus on every day, all year long… One word that sums up who you want to be or how you want to live.”¹ Yikes! How am I supposed to pick just one? I can’t even settle on one task for the next ten minutes, much less one passion for the next 366 days. (Apparently it’s leap year, in case you forgot to muster up one more day’s worth of inspiration.) 

No pressure. 

Can’t Choose, Won’t Choose

Now, I’m sure a lot of people have chosen very good words and will change and grow accordingly. I’m a little jealous of that, actually, but I don’t think I’ll be able to pull it off. For one thing, I can rarely make a decision and stick with it come what may. As new factors come into play, I usually change my decision accordingly. 

For example, I may plan for Monday to be  grocery day. There, that’s my word: grocery. I’ll get groceries and do my meal prep. But when Monday turns out to be rainy, I’ll change my word in an instant. Who gets groceries in the rain? That’s miserable. Suddenly, Monday is deep-clean-the-basement day. (A compound word is still a word, right?) But it’s possible that I’ll remember another task in the middle of that, and my word will change again.

One day, my husband will be the patron saint of longsuffering. And facial twitches.

A Nearly-Impossible Standard

Granted, this is not as much a problem with the one-word resolution as it is with my brain. I’m too squirrely. But the idea also feels ever-so-slightly degrading as well. I mean, it’s been only three centuries since Jonathan Edwards wrote his resolutions. He didn’t write just one word, mind you; he wrote 70 complete resolutions. And, lest he forget them, he re-read them every week. He even made a resolution for the occasion of breaking his resolutions: “Resolved, if ever I shall fall and grow dull, so as to neglect to keep any part of these Resolutions, to repent of all I can remember, when I come to myself again.”² This guy thought of everything! 

In light of that kind of diligence, it’s kind of a bummer to imagine a slouching millennial sipping locally-roasted coffee and scrolling his iPhone 783 for “one-word resolution ideas” by which to direct the course of his year. But I digress. 

The Flaw in the System

Regardless of where you fall on the resolution spectrum, I’m sure you’ve made enough resolutions to discover their unsatisfying nature. I don’t even mean our tendency to break or forget them; I mean, if you examine it deeply enough, there is even a kind of emptiness in keeping them. Why is that?

Maybe the trouble with making up our own resolutions is that they can never give us everything we want them to. Sure, if I resolved to stop eating so much sugar and to start working out every day, I would probably start getting fit. That’s just science. And if I resolved to read a book a week, I would probably start getting smarter. That’s just logic. But even though these surface results would inevitably come, I’d still be lacking the fulfillment of their deeper motivations. Let me explain.

The Goal Behind the Goals

Often our desire to be fit is not only a determination to be the healthiest version of ourselves so we can live long and prosper; we also want people to think we look good. Our desire to read books isn’t always about enriching our minds as good stewards; we also want people to think we’re well-read, well-rounded, and well worth conversing with. We want to recycle so we can do our part for the planet but also so others will approve of our responsibility. We want to simplify our belongings so we can be organized but also applauded. We want to be more generous because it’s a good thing to do but also a good thing for others to know that we do. 

It’s not a flattering description, to be sure. If you object to my exposing the baser aspects of our motives, know that I feel the same way! I would deny it if I could, but the scrap of honesty inside me forces me to admit how much I want to improve so I can win approval—glory, if you will—from others. 

An Age-Old Desire

The truth is, this isn’t a new problem. In fact, Jesus addresses something very similar in John 5. He is talking with the Jewish religious leaders about one of their most sacred resolutions: to search the Scriptures diligently. That sounds like a worthy resolution if I’ve ever heard one. But Jesus exposes their motives and warns them about the emptiness of their pursuit. 

“You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life” (John 5:39-40). Jesus sheds light on their action and their motive. Their action is a diligent search of the writings of Moses. They think they will find eternal life, but they’re rejecting the Source of life that the Scriptures are pointing to, namely Jesus.

Full, Yet Empty

So what is their motive? They don’t want Jesus; they want glory—approval—from each other because of their diligence. Sadly, that rotten motive prevented them from benefitting at all because it prevented them from believing. “How can you believe, when you receive glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes from the only God?” (v 44) They didn’t sense their need for God’s approval because they were full of each other’s. 

But the tragic truth is that their quest for approval betrayed them in the end. “Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father. There is one who accuses you: Moses, on whom you have set your hope. For if you believed Moses, you would believe me; for he wrote of me” (v 45-46). The object of their pursuit would destroy them in the end because they mistook the penultimate thing for the ultimate. The writings of Moses were there to point to Jesus. To miss that is to miss everything, no matter who else is applauding you. 

Too Close to Home

“Well, too bad for those Jews 2,000 years ago,” I’m tempted to think. “How unfortunate for them. Good thing it doesn’t have anything to do with me.” But that’s where I’d be wrong. Consider that Jesus’ warning to them would read just about the same if I swapped out their resolution for some of mine.

“You work out, read books, recycle, simplify, and give because you think you’ll get admiration, but these good things are meant to point to me, the Source of all good things. You keep yourself from gaining my approval because you’re so focused on the approval of others. The resolution on which you set your hope will accuse and betray you in the end.” God forbid that I spend all my efforts in penultimate pursuits when the Giver of glory is calling to me! I want to set my hope on the only One whose applause matters.  

A Better Word

So this year, while I may not be able to keep 70 resolutions or even choose one perfect word for myself, I think I’m all right with that. Instead, I’ll try to use every pursuit as a means of seeking Jesus, the only Source of approval that can satisfy me in the end. 

I guess that’s one word after all.

Jesus.

¹ https://oneword365.com
²https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/the-resolutions-of-jonathan-edwards, Resolution 3.