Dear North Church Family,
My wife Rhonda and I, as well as the leadership here at North Church, wish you and yours a Happy New Year!
We are just coming out of the Thanksgiving and Christmas seasons where we have taken time out to express our thanks to God for His manifold blessings, as well as the unspeakable gift of His Son, Jesus. I think this is always a tremendous time to reflect on His blessings, while looking ahead to the many great things He has in store for His people in the new year.
Perhaps this past year was difficult for you, or one of your family members. Be encouraged – our God is a God of hope! Take a moment to read some powerful scripture from a time when God, through the prophet Isaiah, brought words of hope to His people. These words still apply to us today!
Isaiah 43:18-19 (Message) – Forget about what’s happened; don’t keep going over old history. Be alert, be present. I’m about to do something brand-new. It’s bursting out! Don’t you see it?
This portion of scripture tells us to stop dwelling on the past. That’s not to say there aren’t some valuable lessons to be learned from our history, both individually and as a people. However, the idea the Lord is attempting to convey through Isaiah is that there is no need to dwell on either the bad or the good things that happened in the past, specifically when God is so eager to do brand new things.
Alexander Graham Bell said, “When one door closes another door opens; but we so often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door, that we do not see the ones which open for us.” That’s why I love how Eugene Peterson admonishes us in this paraphrase of the text to “be alert, be present.” It carries the implication that living in the past can engender regret. However, if we trust God with our future, we are sure to experience peace in the present.
I want to encourage you today to look forward to the New Year with hope, but not with groundless hope. I’m talking about the kind of hope God gives when we learn from our past and move forward with Him as our focus.
So let’s do just that – learn from the past, trust God with the future and be alert in the present, anticipating greater from each moment in 2017.
Be Blessed & A Blessing,
Pastor M. D. Johns
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