Happy New Year!!

Happy New Year!  It's a time when lots of people desire a new start and look for opportunities in the year ahead.  There is a line in a song often sung which declares that God has "opened up my future, closed my past."  That's the longing New Year's Day may generate within us – a desire for a new beginning. 

One of the ways many people seek to make the New Year better than the past one is to make New Year's resolutions - commitments to personal goals, projects, or the reforming of a habit.  The only problem with looking to self-determined New Year's resolutions is that statistics tell us that after just 9 days there is a 75% failure rate in keeping the resolutions.

If we think that's bad news, what do we do with the statistic that tells us that 100% of people fail to live according to God's righteous laws?   The result of that failure isn't just a few more pounds or a little more debt – it means death and eternal separation from God. 

It's no wonder we love to celebrate Christmas -- the birth of Jesus Christ.  It is such a wonderful event because the Bible tells us…..But when the right time came, God sent his Son, born of a woman, subject to the law. God sent him to buy freedom for us who were slaves to the law, so that he could adopt us as his very own children. (Galatians 4:3-4 NIV)

Before the beginning of TIME, God planned for each of us to live in a loving, fruitful, creative and enjoyable relationship with Him.  Every day we were to have the opportunity to walk and talk with God and allow His instructions to guide our activities.  We were designed to know peace and blessing in an unbroken relationship with God.  This is how life was meant to be but humans rejected the ways of God for their own ways.

Today is a great day to restore our faith in the one who created us, who alone can "open up our future and close our past."  Let’s start a new life of surrender to our loving Heavenly Father on whom we can cast all our cares, because He cares for us.  We are assured of His infinite love because He gave His only begotten son Jesus to die for our sins on the cross.  This New Year’s Day is a great day to receive the gift of eternal life through Jesus Christ.  May this New Year’s Day 2016 be the beginning of a truly “Happy New Year” for each of us.

©2016 Partners in Hope  

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