New Year, Same God
By: Khalilah Shelton
It's a new year and resolve is high. Motivation is running rampant in the gym and across the nation. Some people are prancing into the new year thanking God for the lessons learned and victories won; new jobs, new baby, weight loss. Others, however, are reluctant to cross the threshold into 2020 without their dearly departed loved ones. The thought that your family is in shambles may make you long for years past. Some are concerned with whether they will have enough provision or if they can stop vaping this year. What do we do with such a plethora of emotions? How do we celebrate the good as we live in the reality of the bad. How do we mourn without ignoring the gift of life graciously granted to us? We turn to Someone who knows.
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”
-John 1:1-5
In the beginning of all creation, God was there; God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. This being true, we can rest assured that Christ knows us. He knows what we feel and what we need. He knows our dreams and our resolutions (even the ones that only lasted until Jan 2nd). Jesus being fully man and fully God, we can also know that he sympathizes with our emotions as well. But how do we manage such contrasting realities when we are mere humans? We trust the One who is both God and Man.
“He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.”
-John 1:11-14
So how do we approach the great days and the sad days. How do we approach days that are filled with joy and laughter and the ones that are confusing and unpromising? With grace and truth. For all who receive him and believe in His name, he gave the right to become children of God, thus giving us access to the “Word became flesh”. We experience the grace of God and we hold our experiences, thoughts and emotions against the word of truth. Anything in us that does not align itself with the word of truth, we either change it to bring it into alignment or we expel it and replace it with Truth. When I feel like I will always be a slave to certain sins in my life, I expel that and replace it with the truth that Christ bore all my sins on the cross (1Peter 2:24) and I no longer have to be a slave to sin if I am in Christ. When I see my family doing well and things are running like a well oiled machine in my home, I praise God and thank Him for giving me the grace to do well. When I think my prayers are too big for God, I must remember that I am praying to the God who “was in the beginning. All things that were made, were made through him.” (John 1:2-3) The Christian's joy is based in the truth that earth is temporary and our real joy and hope is in living with God eternally. All of our pleasures and sorrows on earth will not last. We work to the glory of God on earth as a glimpse of the eternal glory we will have with Him after death, when we live with Him forever and Christ is the Way.
We have a great God that loved us so much that he left heaven and came to live among us. He is the great Lover of our souls. So this year I challenge you to pray the hard prayers, dive head first into the word of God and let God take you exactly where He wants you to be for His glory and for your good. I love the words of the song “Oceans (Where Feet May Fail)” by Hillsong UNITED that says,
“Spirit lead me where my trust is without borders
Let me walk upon the waters
Wherever You would call me
Take me deeper than my feet could ever wander
And my faith will be made stronger
In the presence of my Saviour”
