In the cartoon Calvin says to his pet tiger, Hobbes:
“I'm getting disillusioned with these new years. They don't seem very new at all! Each new year is just like the old year! Here another year has gone by and everything's still the same! There's still pollution and war and stupidity and greed! Things haven't changed! I say what kind of future IS this?! I thought things were supposed to improve! I thought the future was supposed to be better!”
Hobbes remarks, “The problem with the future is that it keeps turning into the present.”
That is the sad story of many people’s lives – how the rich promise and exciting potential of the future so frequently turns into the monotony and mediocrity of the present. And certainly if we’re honest, we’d have to acknowledge that if our track record is anything to go by, our capacity to make new and lasting changes to our lives is really limited.
If we’re serious about finding newness in our lives this new year, then we have to acknowledge that we need help. Thankfully, that help is at hand in the person of a loving and gracious God, who promises to make all things new.
Which means that the most decisive step that you can take in stepping into the promise that the future holds is to say to this God, ‘I need you! Help me, please!’ And then to trust that this simple prayer is one that God will hear and will graciously answer.
PRAYER
Gracious God, I need you! I cannot effect the kind of lasting change in my life that I need. But you are the God who makes all things new. Help me please, and may the future that you have promised become part of my present. Amen
SCRIPTURE
‘Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?’ (Isaiah 43:18-19)
ONE FURTHER THOUGHT
“If the present is the antithesis of the ills of the past, forgive that past,but if the present endorses that self-same past, move away and move on.”
Kayete
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