Jonathon Edward's Resolutions (Hipster-Doofus Remix)

Recently, I’ve talked about Jonathan Edward’s personal resolutions. They are worth contemplating as a Christian. Since I’ve had numerous requests, here they are. This post features my “hipster-doofus remix” in modern English (only partial as I’m still working my way through them). The last post has the Old English version.

Being smart enough to know that I can’t do anything without help from God, I humbly plead Him to graciously help me keep my own resolutions, so far as they are in harmony with His will for my life lived to Christ. I’ll make it point to read these and remind myself each week.

I resolve…

1- that I will do whatever I can do to give God glory and contribute to my own true good, gain, and happiness, for as long as I live. Moreover, I will do what I think I can do as a servant of God to do the same for my fellow human beings. I commit to doing this regardless of how many or how severe the consequences.

2- to be continually looking for creative new ways to accomplish #1.

3- to renew my commitment to these once I come to my senses if I ever become lazy and uncommitted to these resolutions.

4- to do nothing that is not glory-giving to God, and more to even attempt things that seem to big and too impossible to happen for the same purpose.

5- to never waste time, but to make the most of every moment I get.

6- to live life to the full—giving it everything I’ve got.

7- to live all of life as I were to die in the next moment and I would be proud of what people said about me when gone.

8- to live with the sense that my sins put me on the same level as everyone else so that I don’t have a false sense of being different or better. If anything, I’ll assume that my sins are worse than anyone else’s, or that I’ve committed every sin or have every weakness that anyone else has. At worst, my habit will then be awareness of my own sin and a prompting to confess it to God.

9- to be aware that I will die for death is the common fate of the fallen.

10- to let pain warn me to steer clear of the ultimate painful consequences of sin and challenge me to willingly accept any pain to bear witness to God.

11- to give serious thought to any thought that I have about God, and try to understand Him as much as I’m able to.

12- to get rid of anything in my life that makes me proud or vain.
13- to seek people and opportunities to generously give my resources to.

14- to never seek revenge.

15- to not allow people to provoke me to be angry when it’s just not worth it.

16- to never speak poorly about someone unless for a legitimately appropriate and constructive purpose as a fellow believer treating others as God directs.

17- to live in a manner that would make me proud to hear what people said about me when I’m gone.

18- to live all of life as an expression of devoted worship and in a manner that clearly communicates the good news.

19- [See # 7]

20- to me self-controlled in what and how much I eat and drink and evaluate my behavior each night.

21- to never to something that, if I saw someone else doing it, I would think less of them for doing.

22- [See # 1]

23- [See # 4]

24- to evaluate why I do things that are obviously bad so that I can attack by prayer and preventive actions the things which led or enabled me to act that way.

25- to carefully consider what leads me to doubt God’s love for me and resist it.

26- to flee from things that take away my confidence that I belong to God.

27-

28- to know the Scriptures so well as a matter of lifestyle that those Scriptures know me as a matter of living.

29- to pray with serious conviction, with requests that actually anticipate God’s response and confessions that I know God will accept.

30- to weekly seek a more intense passion for God and more gracious interaction with others.

31- [See # 16]

32- to be a person that others can trust.

33- to be a person who seeks, makes, and preserves principled peace.

34- to be a truthful when I speak.

35- to be sensitive to times when I wonder whether I have really done all that I should as God’s servant, so that I can either let my qualms go or go back and live-up to my responsibility.

36- [See # 16]

37- to nightly, weekly, monthly, and yearly examine my life to see how I have sinned by omission and commission, and when I have denied my own will to serve His.

38- to treat Sabbath days as truly special, even in my speech.

39- to never do anything that I don’t think God would approve of, and to consider whether or not something that I did unthinkingly was or was not to God’s approval.

40- [See # 20]