CELEBRATING GOD’S FAITHFULNESS
As we cross over to the New Year, we joyfully celebrate God’s faithfulness, kindness and mercies. It is a new era and things are turning around for better. We may have experienced season of dryness, leanness and famine; suffered severe tribulations, afflictions, pressures and stresses. Many firms and establishments shut down and retrenched some workers to stay afloat or survive the financial crunch and economic crises. This unfortunate situation had great impact on the family. The consequences were not limited to inability to provide for the family, incessant disagreements, squabbles over nothing and living lonely together but also death of relationships. Though times are still hard and things difficult but God’s people are neither hopeless nor helpless. Faith holds to God and His promises. He is forever faithful and compassionate; His anger is only for a short time. As we return to Him repenting, God shows His mercies and amazing grace.
Human beings often forget how they got into the mess. The cry of Prophet Zephaniah about Israel speaks explicitly, “You have rebelled against God and polluted His altar. You have disobeyed His voice and rejected corrections; not trusted in the Lord or drawn near to Him. Your leaders and Governors act like roaring lions, judges behave like evening wolves; prophets and priests have disgraced the place of worship and are more treacherous than regular pew sitters and worshippers. Some of these designated servants of God manipulated and defrauded weak worshippers, needy and the less privileged to enrich themselves. But the Lord is on His throne and ever righteous and faithful. Every morning He brings His justice to light; never failing yet the unjust are grossly in disobedience and shameless” (Zephaniah 3:1-5). Israel’s sins are manifesting in our society today and sadly in multiple dimensions. Notwithstanding, our sense of guilt is arrogantly highly plastic. Fortunately, God still sits at the throne of mercy and the sufficiency of His grace is very elastic. He is ever faithful and tampers His justice with mercies, even when we have failed Him in every way.
God sensed His people were grossly indulgent in sin and He sent the Prophet to call out the people this time with a changed tone, come and celebrate my faithfulness (Zephaniah 3:14-20). “Sing and shout loud people of God. Be glad and rejoice with all your heart because the Lord has taken away your sins, your punishment is over and your enemies are turned back and retreated.” The Lord, the King of Israel and the Ancient of days is with you. You have no reason to fear anything: your enemies, your tomorrow, harms of any kind and cares of life. A time was coming and that time is now and the Lord has shown His favor on us. He celebrates and rejoices because of us. God is mighty to save; His power gives victory after victory. He takes delight in our well being and refreshes our life with His love. In His compassion He gives us a new life, New Year and a new beginning.
The old and the new cannot operate together. The old includes: sins, grudges, murmuring, laziness, greed, cheats, laboring under curse, working hard and earning little, planting and another harvesting, sicknesses, jealousies and dirty habits, etc. The new life starts with salvation, daily encounter with Jesus, victories and good successes; life of fellowship and discipleship as well as experiencing the power of His Spirit. In this season there shall come to an end the threats of doom, reproach and shame; angels rejoice over us with singing like people at festivals. God will punish our oppressors, rescues the disabled and bring back those on exile. In the place of shame, God gives us honor and praise in every land and endeavor; put our enemies and detractors’ to shame and despise them. He will gather and bring back all our scattered people, scattered efforts and synergies; war time, bad economy, insecurity and leadership failures shall end. He will not only make us fruitful in the new life but also restores our fortunes and prospers us before our very eyes.
A hymn writer, Isaac Watts, 1674-1748 wrote: “O God our help in ages past, our hope for years to come.” That hymn acknowledged God as our Help and our Hope. This two four letter words pretty much sum up what we need to move into the New Year, new season and new dimension. The greatest and most awesome thing about God is that you can look back as far as you want into ages past and still find God present (there). Come to think about it, God loves us even before He made the world. He chose us in Christ to be holy and faultless in His eyes (Ephesians 1:4). God is our hope for the year 2014 and even until eternity. The year 2014 is our year of double completion and fulfillment.
At this period of the year, people in desperation are eager to seek knowledge of the future. Some visit fortune tellers and tarot-readers; others buy into the tales of new age prophets. These self acclaimed future tellers live in ghettos and drive smoking aged vehicles with rusted fenders. Fortune tellers offer counterfeit futures and new age prosperity prophets speak wealth that exist in the air. If these folks know the future, why are they still poor and enriching selves by exploiting their blind minded followers. Most people believe that knowing the future would give them joy and peace; instead the reversal is the answer. The scripture says that the only way to finding enduring peace and comfort is through Christ Jesus. Jim Kraus writing in Have A Good Day opines, “If we follow Jesus, we will be well directed, well connected and well protected. That’s true peace.” Believers in Jesus suffer heartaches like everyone else but Jesus promises them rest (Mat. 11:28). “God…is able to keep them from falling away and will bring them with great joy into His glorious presence without a single fault” (Jude 1:24).
We should rejoice that despite our numerous failings and lapses in our eyes and in other people’s eyes, “God has no faults in His eyes.” Think about the passing year and all the numerous good things, call them blessings God did. Let us count our blessings and name them one by one. It will surprise us the things God has done. Little wonder the Psalmist admonishes us, “Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all His benefits” (Psalm 103:2). Is it because you worked harder than other people? Wait a minute, do you count your blessings or think your blessings do not count? Are you sure you don’t have anything to be thankful for? Don’t forget that it was only a foreign leper that returned to give thanks and the power of heaven made him whole (Luke 17:17-19). Even Prophet Jeremiah in all the tribulations he went through, had an amazing testimony recorded in Lamentation 3:18-26. Despite all the bitterness and frustration he encountered in serving God, he didn’t forget God’s great love and faithfulness.
As we celebrate God’s faithfulness, look far back into the past, if the only prayer you can say is, “Thank you Lord, for all your goodness to me,” that’s enough. The New Year is God’s gift to us; it’s God’s way of reminding us that because of the coming of the Savior we can have a new beginning. So celebrate it and be thankful. Let go past and focus on the future. Remember that you are too blessed to be stressed. I wish you all a fruitful New Year.
Reach: Evangelist Ogbonnaya, Godswill at weefreeministries@yahoo.com or P.O.Box 720035, Houston, 77272; Web: www.weefreeministries@org. Ph. 832-881-3929©.