KICK OFF NEW YEAR WITH HOPE.

For many, a new year is a time for hope.

Some people believe they will be able to lose the weight, organize their houses, finish that book or carry out whatever change they believe is needed in their lives. Maybe they hope to find true love, move into their dream home, or finally get that promotion.

None of those things are bad, but there is a higher place to put our ultimate hope of what we are believing for in 2023.

As I learned in Visionwriters International, what is hope for, if not for God?

Psalm 42:11 (KJV) says, “Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted within me? hope thou in God: for I shall yet praise him, who is the health of my countenance, and my God.”

And in The Passion Translation: “So I say to my soul, ‘Don't be discouraged. Don't be disturbed. For I know my God will break through for me. Then I'll have plenty of reasons to praise him all over again. Yes, He is my saving grace!’”

We ought to place our hope in God — for Him to move in our lives and our families and our cities, to speak to us what we need to hear, to redeem anything that was lost, to answer prayers, and to work miracles.

Even in situations where we play a role as cooperators and co-builders with God, we ought to trust not only in our own efforts but to believe that He will help us, lead us, and strengthen us to carry out those resolutions.

“He does the heavy lifting,” as my friend Noel Condon told me years ago, and it just came to mind again as I wrote this. God doesn’t intend for us to face our resolutions, possibilities, and “to do” lists on our own!

Psalm 27:13 confesses, “I had fainted unless I had believed to see the goodness of the LORD…” (KJV). The Passion Translation declares, “Yet I believe with all my heart that I will see again your goodness, Yahweh…!”

Can we trust and believe that we will see God’s goodness in this New Year?

We see in Hebrews that hope can anchor our souls. “…it was impossible for God to lie, we … have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us: Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast…” (6:18-19, KJV).

And in The Passion Translation: “… it is impossible for God to lie for we know that His promise and His vow will never change! And now we have run into His heart to hide ourselves in His faithfulness. This is where we find strength and comfort, for He empowers us to seize what has already been established ahead of time — an unshakable hope! We have this certain hope like a strong, unbreakable anchor holding our souls to God Himself. Our anchor of hope is fastened to the mercy seat in the heavenly realm…”