7 results for tag: New Years

An Unshakeable Hope

Maybe for you the start of a new year has opened fresh wounds concerning the loss of your dear child. It seems unimaginable to live through another year without your baby in your arms. How can everyone around you be dreaming of new beginnings and fresh starts, when all you can see are the endings? The ceasing of a tiny heartbeat. The abrupt end of a pregnancy. The death of your dreams for the future. The ground beneath your feet feels unstable. Will you ever stand on solid ground again? Last week we began a journey through the book of Hebrews to discover how Jesus is the better encouragement. Today, we continue on that path to find out how we can ...

A Better Encouragement

Here we are at the start of a new year. Most of us have made lists of ways we want to grow, things we want to change, and goals we would like to set. Maybe you chose a word for the year, and have been brainstorming all the ways you can allow this word to influence and direct your choices in the months ahead. Perhaps you've joined the "This Is In + This Is Out" trend as a way of categorizing what you hope will be the priorities that define 2024 for you. While many of the resolutions we make at the start of each year are admirable goals, they cannot achieve for us lasting encouragement and satisfaction. In fact, most of the resolutions we make are ...

Motherhood and My Years of New Year Reflections

For the past couple of years, I have decided not to focus on trying to accomplish resolutions for the year but rather reflect on my year and find a focus word or phrase as a theme or point of focus to bring before the Lord during the upcoming year. I was first encouraged, through a friend, to ask the Lord for wisdom in reflecting on my year and insight into what I should focus on bringing before the Lord during the next year. She told me about her experience with trusting the Lord with a phrase or thought throughout the year and how she wanted me to join her. I don’t always approach new ideas with the best attitude so I walked away unsure how to ...

6 Questions for the New Year

There's just something about this time of year that has everyone thinking about all the improvements they want to make in their lives. We set goals for our health and finances. We determine to be more creative, more adventurous, or more engaging. We ponder what new habits we would like to form and what old habits we would like to overcome. We make lists and promises, and determine to become a better version of ourselves over the course of the year. Self-reflection and goal setting are admirable, necessary, and biblical practices. When God's people had grown careless in their relationship with God, He rebuked them through the prophet Haggai and ...

New Year, Renewed Hope

There is no circumstance in life in which placing your hope in Christ is not relevant. There is no valley so low that His light cannot penetrate. Even in the dark night of grief we can choose to make much of the Lord. We can be resolved to lift Him high. Tomorrow we will wake to the start of a brand new year, and this reality is often accompanied by the idea of a fresh start. We make lists of the ways we’d like to grow or change and make plans to implement new habits, learn new skills, or embrace new experiences. Often, these resolutions are driven by a desire for self-improvement. But what if this year we allowed our resolutions to be rooted in a ...

Renewing Your Focus

New Year’s resolutions have a bad reputation. Often, our goal is to make this life as easy as possible, not regarding the Lord’s greater plan and trustworthiness, and elevating our own desires above His authority. We often find ourselves living with this temporary, humanistic view of time—we are impatient, frustrated in trials, lacking in perseverance, not living with eternity in mind, worrying, not trusting God for provision, or living in fear. Grief has tempted me to live this way. In missing my baby, I ache so fiercely that, sometimes, I simply just want it to end. Grief brings on fear, worry, and a difficulty in ...

A Renewed Focus for the New Year

New Year’s resolutions have a bad reputation. So much so that my husband decided to start working out on December 31 last year to avoid quitting during 2019. I will say he was successful in his reasoning, but one day didn’t actually make the difference. His commitment to one day at a time with focus on his future goals did.  As believers, we often find ourselves living with this temporary, humanistic view of time—we are impatient, frustrated in trials, lacking in perseverance, not living with eternity in mind, worrying, not trusting God for provision, or living in fear. Often, our goal is to make this life as easy as possible, not ...