[Happy New Year!]
Change. Transition.
“The more things change, the more they stay the same.”
“God is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow.”
“It’s all the same, only the names are changed.”
“When you go through the storms I am with you…you are mine.”
“Not everyone likes the new things.”
At Christmas we remembered a young, Jewish, peasant girl whose faith enabled her to accept one of the most enormous changes anyone can experience – the announcement she would be mother to God’s Son.
“I am the Lord’s servant; may it be as you have said.”
At this time of year we remembered a young, Jewish man whose faith enabled him to accept his betrothed’s changes – which, therefore, also changed his life – and to raise a child that was not his own.
“So Joseph married Mary….”
At this time of year we remembered families who have lost loved ones during the past year – families for whom Christmas was very unfamiliar. We remembered families for whom job losses and economic distress made this a challenging Christmas.
“This Christmas was so different…”
This weekend we see an “old year” quickly tumble into a “new year,” as if we’ve been promised that the new is better, or as if the days are somehow fresher in the new year. Still, we breathe a sigh of relief when a hard year is ended, looking forward to a new year with hope for its future.
“I’ll be so glad when this year is over. There is a time for everything, a season for everything…”
At the end of C.S. Lewis’s The Last Battle, the main characters are passing from the Old Narnia into a New Narnia. This new land is like the old, except the colors are brighter, the scents are sweeter, the air purer — it’s just better by far. In their first moments in the New Narnia, the main characters go “further up and further in,” running with abandon and joy in this new place to which Aslan (the Christ character) has brought them.
Not every change or transition we undergo in this life on earth is immediately seen as a “good one.” But, if Christ is calling us to a new place, we can trust that as we go further up and further in, as we follow where we are led, we will be accompanied by our Savior.
“Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You’re not in the driver’s seat; I am. Don’t run from suffering; embrace it. Follow me and I’ll show you how.” – Jesus (from Matthew 16:24-26 MSG)
“Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.” (Proverbs 3:5,6 NIV)
God IS the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow.
God IS faithful, especially to his chosen children.
God CAN be trusted to walk us through the changes and transitions we encounter.
So, Lord, help us turn over to you our anxieties and fears, our hopes for the future, our pain from the past, and our sin that hinders us from running with endurance the race set before us. Grant us your peace so that we may run further up and further in to the “better by far” where you call us to go. May we run with joy and abandon because we are confident in who YOU are. Lead us, Lord, in paths of righteousness for the sake of your Name and your Glory. Bless us with your Spirit, your Favor, and your Hope as we enter into 2024, we ask in Jesus’s name, AMEN.
“Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith” (Hebrews 12:1-2 NIV).
“If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labor for me. Yet what shall I choose? I do not know! I am torn between the two: I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far;but it is more necessary for you that I remain in the body.” (Philippians 1:22-24 NIV)