Let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love, for I have put my trust in you. Show me the way I should go, for to you I lift up my soul. (Psalm 143:8, NIV)
I have stood on the first tee box of my home golf course many times with a sense of hopefulness for what is to come. My hope is for the best round I have ever played, but my memory of prior rounds clouds that hope when I think about the future.
I stand today not on a golf tee box, but in my house looking at the dawn of a new year. A better one than the last is my hope, but my uncomfortable anxiety about what will happen next is rooted in what has happened this past year. Is there room to hope for better times?
As a believer in Jesus, my hope is built on something other than my past experience. I can remember the bad things that have happened in the past, but my hope for the future lies entirely in God’s hands. I have trusted God in the past, and when I look back at how he has worked things out, I know I can trust him in the future. God did not change last year—he remains unchanged this year.
Our verse for today directs us in the way we should approach the future. God uses the morning to remind us of his unfailing love for us. A new day, a new year, another chance to receive his unchanging love for us. There is the work of the day, the rest of the night, and the hope of the dawn of a new day. We stand right now with the hope of a new year in front of us. We have been through a long day and a sleepless night, but God has not changed. He is still in control and knows exactly what needs to happen next to fulfill his purposes for us and for the world we live in.
Jesus went to his Father and received new hope every morning, along with the strength to get through what lay before him.We can ask God to show us more of his unfailing love every morning. He will do just that, if we truly trust in him. If we really think about it, the fact that he has revealed himself to us at all is probably the greatest testament of his love for us. He did that through Jesus who came to earth as Immanuel, God with us. He experienced life as we do, with all its ups and downs, hopes and fears, victories and defeats. He can love us for who we really are because he has walked the same road we have traveled. It’s OK to be battered and bruised—he was, too.
How did Jesus deal with the mess that comes with being human? He went to his Father and received new hope every morning, along with the strength to get through what lay before him, though he knew full well the pain that his earthly future held.
My prayer for this new year is our Scripture verse for today. I am going to ask God every morning to remind me of his unfailing and unstoppable love for me, as I put my trust in his mercy and power to sustain me. I will ask him what I should do this day and this year that will please him. I will lift up my heart and soul to him as my rightful response to his love for me. I know he loves me, and I’m going to love him back.
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Linda Ballard
January 7, 2021
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The Links Daily Devotional appears Monday-Friday at www.linksplayers.com.
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