A New Year

How quickly our Christmas holiday passes. Are you like me? I can’t believe how fast the Christmas season melts into January busyness. I love Christmas for a lot of reasons: we get to celebrate our Savior’s birth into this world, we get to spend a little extra time with family and friends, we get to show and tell them how we love them in special ways, we get to indulge in lots of Christmas music and holiday activities. All good stuff as far as I’m concerned. So I am always a little sad when I have to take down the decorations and put them away. I drag my feet a little and delay putting things away as long as I can. And ever so gradually, I adjust into the New Year, telling myself, “It’s ok to put Christmas away. Christmas will come again next year. A new year is a good thing…with God we always have a lot to look forward to.” Yet I don’t always welcome picking up the increased work schedule, a schedule I gladly set down the end of December. I forget that God is in my schedule, He is in my life, He has ordained this time for me. And so I need to make an attitude adjustment, and welcome the switch back to my busy ministry life.
It is God’s New Year for us: A year that will be filled with challenges and opportunities. Perhaps your challenge will be economic. Perhaps it will be health, or family issues. Perhaps it is work, like it is for me. Whatever it is, God has ordained the challenge and this year for you. And therefore, He is in it! God has blessed us all with His presence and many rich opportunities to be His ambassador in the New Year. And each new day He gives us new opportunities to be His ambassador no matter where we are and no matter what we are doing. “This is the day that the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad in it!” (Ps. 118:24) Make a decision to embrace this New Year, enjoy it and the many challenges and opportunities it brings us. Happy New Year!