"Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice!" Phi 4:4
"Happy New Year" is on the lips of most everyone these days and will most likely continue to be for the next four to six weeks. Why is it that we exchange this greeting so readily as one year passes into the next? Perhaps it is about optimism. We measure many things by the year and we hopes that a new one will bring improvement in life, new opportunities, realization of goals and resolve to do and be better. Not only do we wish these things for ourselves but for everyone we know and meet. It is a time of great joy and celebration for many. We are all in this life together...right?
Paul, writing to the church at Philipi, encourages them and by extension us, to have this great joy. As Christians, we should be a people of joy because we know how blessed we are. It should come across in the way that we conduct ourselves and the ways we interact with fellow Christians and others. This joy is to be rooted in the Lord from whom those blessings flow. He is the source of all that is good, clean, holy and righteous and it is he that sustains us and saves our very souls. We are therefore encouraged to rejoice always in that we are blessed always. Otherwise put, God is good all the time and all the time, God is good!
Beloved, as we advance into every new moment, hour, day, week and month of this new year, let us remember who ordered it for us, who brought us to it and who, if it be in his divine will, will bring us through it. And in our remembering, let us rejoice in all of the goodness, grace and mercy he provides. Paul found it worth repeating, "...and again I say rejoice!"
Rejoicing in the Lord,
Lee
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