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Have faith in New Year's resolutions

By Lorenzo Botello
Special to MÁS

“OK students, put away your books and take out a blank piece of paper and a pencil, we are having a pop quiz.”
     Those words still send chills up my spine. I was never the sharpest pencil in the box, so I feared taking tests.
What I didn’t understand was that doing poorly on the pop quiz didn’t make me a failure. Its purpose was to show me where I needed to give more attention, so that when it came time for the finals, I wouldn’t be a failure.
With January upon us, many will be making various types of New Year’s resolutions.
Maybe you are Catholic and want to get to confession more often, or Pentecostal and want to do more evangelism, or a chocoholic and ... well, you know.
No matter what your resolution is, many will stumble at some point. In fact, most resolutions are broken within two weeks to two months.
But that is where the concept of the pop quiz comes in.
God cares about the decisions we make, especially resolutions, because for the most part, they help make us a better person.
So God says, “I want to help you with your resolution. I want to help you by getting you to see your weak areas so you know where to focus your attention.”
Just like the teacher, guess how God gets us to see our weak areas? A pop quiz or a little test.
The problem is most people hit those little tests, stumble and then quit completely. Rather than see those tests as the help they are meant to be, they think that their stumbling makes them a failure.
You have to get back up and ask yourself, “Why did I stumble?” Learn from it and move on.
The best time for this reflection is during your prayer time. After all, who can teach you more about yourself than the one person who knows you better than yourself?
Stumbling is a part of life, and no one can avoid making those little mistakes, but please do not label yourself a failure just because you stumbled.
OK, pop quiz: What is your New Year’s resolution?