One Great Thing About The New Year

Happy new year to you friends!

I hope you had a great festive season with family and friends. I also hope you got a time to rest, recharge and reflect. I don’t know about you but I am so excited for 2022. I know God has amazing things in store.

One great thing about the New Year is the prospect of something new. New beginnings, new opportunities, new doors and so on. Everything is new, new, new

But I won’t be talking about that today. I want to focus on something else.

Another great thing about a new year is the second chance we get to either make things right, to do things the right way, finish a project, repair broken bridges in a relationship, to correct some mistakes made in the previous year, and the list goes on. Whatever that thing is a new year brings with it a second chance to try again.

And this is important to know because a lot of people carry shame, guilt, anxiety, fear and so many other negative things from the past year which has a definite impact on the current year. Those people end up believing that the New Year has nothing different to offer them.

If you are one of those people I want to encourage you that the God we serve is the God of second chances. No matter how bad you have messed up He wants to give you a second chance. Take Jonah for example.

God called him to go preach to the people of Nineveh but he ran away from doing what God told him to do. But instead of disowning him or punishing him, God gave him a second chance to do the right thing,

“Then the Lord spoke to Jonah a second time: Get up and go to the great city of Nineveh, and deliver the message I have given you. This time Jonah obeyed the Lord’s command and went to Nineveh, a city so large that it took three days to see it all.”

Jonah 3:1-3

The Lord spoke to Jonah a second time and instead of running away like before Jonah grabbed the opportunity to do it right. And because he did Nineveh was saved from God’s punishment.

I also think of Peter who denied the Lord three times. One would think he blew it for good but Jesus gave him a second chance.

We serve a God of second chances. So as we are now in 2022 don’t let the mistakes and failures of 2021 stop you from having a great year. Take the guilt, shame, fear and anxiety you are carrying to the Lord’s feet. He has a second chance waiting for you.

Bless you friends

When the year is not going the way I want it to go…..

I can’t believe we are already in March. Time is moving at an unbelievable pace.

As I look at the past two months I can say “things” have happened but I can also

see how there have been a lot of things that haven’t happened as well.

I have goals I want to accomplish which I have made throughout the year.

At the end of the year I review them and see how much progress I have made.

But as I look at the past two months I know I haven’t made as much progress as I thought

I would make.

These two months haven’t been smooth sailing as well. The enemy has tried to get me off

my game and his plan worked for a time. I am still recovering from his attacks…..

 

So yes, March is here and it doesn’t seem like much has happened as far as accomplishing

goals goes……So what do I do?

Does change only happen at the start of the year?

Do I have to wait for a new year to make the change?

Or can something be done now? Can a turn around happen today?

 

“For He says: “In an acceptable time I have heard you, 

And in the day of salvation I have helped you.” 

Behold, now is the accepted time, behold, now is the day of 

salvation.”

2 Corinthians 6:2

 

Today is the day according to that word. I don’t have to wait for end of the year to make

the changes that need to be made. I don’t need to wait for end of the year to tweak things

and try again.

We all have today to start anew.

Today is another opportunity given to us. We don’t need to beat ourselves up.

 

You don’t have to wait for end of the year to make the changes you need to

make. You don’t have to wait for the end of a year for YAH to turn your life around.

Today is the day. Today is the accepted time.

Don’t be despaired because things are going all wrong for you. You can cry out to the Lord right

now for mercy, for help!

Today, His mercy is available to you, His grace, His empowerment to do what He has called ‘

you to do. When we fall we can get up and try again.

 

We need His grace to live out this life.

We need His grace to move to the next level.

 

Be encouraged today friends.

There is a new hope today!

Bless you.

 

Rolain

What is change?

I am back and it feels like I have been away forever but I needed

the break and I am really excited about this next season.

I hope the year has started off well for you.

As the year has started the word on everybody’s lips and mind

is “change”. Some people usually take this time to take a stock of

where they are in life and make the required changes.

With all this talk about change and the pressure to change I think

it’s important to understand what change really is.

Change is not an immediate transformation. Change is

incremental but let me not get ahead of myself.

As I talk about change I would like to talk about Zacchaeus

(Luke 19:5)

 

“And when Jesus reached the place, He looked up and said to

him, Zacchaeus, hurry and come down; for I must stay at your

house today.

So he hurried and came down, and he received and welcomed

Him joyfully.”

Luke 19: 5, 6

 

He was the chief tax collector in Jericho. Let me say this, there

is a good chance he was mean, a swindler and so on. Look at the

people’s reaction when Jesus calls him down from the tree.

 

 ^“And when the people saw it, they all muttered among themselves

and indignantly complained, He has gone in to be the guest of and

lodge with a man who is devoted to sin and preeminently a sinner.”

Luke 19:7

 

The people’s reaction tell us a lot about the kind of person

Zacchaeus was. This was more than a bit of jealousy. The bible

doesn’t say “a man complained” but it says “the people complained”.

If one man got upset we could challenge the idea that Zacchaeus

was a mean and unfair man but a group of people responded the

the same. That was not a coincidence.

 

But something happened, Jesus called Zacchaeus and stayed

at HIS house! What a privilege, what an honor! Zacchaeus

was obviously ecstatic. Look at what happens next,

 

 

So then Zacchaeus stood up and solemnly declared to the Lord,

See, Lord, the half of my goods I [now] give [by way of restoration]

to the poor, and if I have cheated anyone out of anything, I [now]

restore four times as much.

Luke 9;8

Something significant happened at that moment.

Zacchaeus declared he would give half of his goods as a way

of restoration to the poor!

What happened was what I call change.

You see, Zacchaeus didn’t declare he would never sin again, no!

That would be real change right? Wrong!

Look at what Jesus says,

^” And Jesus said to him, Today is [Messianic and spiritual]

salvation come to [all the members of] this household, since

Zacchaeus too is a [real spiritual] son of Abraham;

 For the Son of Man came to seek and to save that which was lost.

Luke 9: 9, 10

I have no doubt in my mind Zaccheaus was a changed man but it

would happen a bit at a time. His transformation would not take

a day but a lifetime.

This is what change is about. It’s allowing the Lord to come and

change you little by little. It’s allowing Him to deal with you

in His way. It’s allowing Him to come and open every closed

room in your heart. It’s giving Him access to the hidden

and locked places within you so He can do His work.

Change will take time friends. Transformation is for a lifetime.

You may have looked back at 2016 and seen all the things that

didn’t go according to plan and the things

that didn’t change in your life, like the habits, mindsets and

so on and got discouraged but know God is still working in your life.

He is working in a way you can’t see at times.

God doesn’t only work within the time frame of a year

but for some reason we think like this. We start at the beginning

of the year with a decision, a resolution about a change we want

to see in our lives and when the change doesn’t happened we get so

discouraged and repeat the cycle once again for another year!!

Surely that is not the way we are supposed to live.

There must be a better way.

As I close I would like you to re examine your definition of “change”

The more important question we must ask ourselves is,

How does God see change?

When He thinks of change what does it look like?

It’s great to be back friends.

God bless you.

Rolain

photo credit: google images