January, 2007

Dear Friends,

Revelation 21:5 And the one who was seated on the throne said, "Behold, I am making all things new."

Happy New Year! Isn’t it a wonderful feeling to get a fresh start each year? We gather at parties to celebrate the coming new year, hoping against hope that this year will be better than the last. Sometimes we celebrate the passing of the old, the death of the miserable experiences that we had in the past twelve months. After all, when God says, “And it came to pass,” God didn’t mean it came to stay; no, it came to pass! Isaiah 42:9 says, “See, the former things have come to pass, and new things I now declare.” Such is our hopeful faith in God’s continual providence, for we know God wishes us to be happy and fulfilled.

Still, I’m haunted by a conversation I overheard late in December, 2005: A couple of folks I knew casually were talking about their upcoming plans, and one said, “Thank God this year’s over! It’s been awful. Surely 2006 has to be an improvement.” But you know what? It wasn’t. I watched him over the next twelve months have just as unhappy a time as he always did. Why? Because his hopeful expectation was that the new year would bring him new experiences. And he waited for them, doing nothing to change the same old unhappy person he was inside. Sure, sometimes good fortune befalls us by accident or design outside of ourselves. But by and large, God doesn’t work that way. God works through US, and if we want a new year, we’d better make sure we are new people doing new things. “Cast away from you all the transgressions that you have committed against me, and get yourselves a new heart and a new spirit!” (Ezekiel 18:31). Don’t hope for God or the fates to send a lottery ticket floating from heaven into your lap. Look inside yourself for whatever is holding you back from happiness and fulfillment – those are the sins and transgressions of which we must repent – and start working to get rid of them. Change your circumstances! Become a person of faith, and you will see God opening doors of change for you, but first you have to be an agent of change.

I dearly hope 2007 is a new and better year for all of us. Please join me in prayer and action to see to it that it is. Let us find ourselves shouting from 2 Corinthians 5:17, through the coming winter, spring, summer, and fall, “Because we are in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!”

Love and light,

Martin

To read Martin's letters from past months, please click here.