Dear Cornerstone Family,
Sometime after Christmas, but before New Year’s Day, I pull out the album Recovering the Satellites (1996) by the American alternative band, The Counting Crows, and listen to their smash hit, “A Long December.” Given the year we’ve had, I found myself resonating with the opening line of the song more than ever:
“A long December and there’s reason to believe
Maybe this year will be better than the last.”
In looking to the year ahead, the lyrics express both hope and reticence at the same time. The writer recognizes that there’s reason to believe things could be headed in an upward trajectory, but there’s enough uncertainty and question that he’s not yet ready to bank on it. “Maybe this year will be better.” Maybe not. Who can say for sure?
As Christians, our hope for the future is more certain than, “Maybe this year will be better.” As we looked at last week from Psalm 11, we know the end of the story. All who are upright in heart will behold the face of God (1 John 3:2). Our destiny is face-to-face, never ending fellowship with God in perfect love and holiness. Now, ponder this: no matter what happens in 2021 that future is ours in Christ Jesus right now.
Read that sentence again. Did you catch that? That future is ours now! Yes, I know we’re still waiting for that future, and we don’t know how long it will be until Christ returns and the fullness of the kingdom comes. But I’m telling you that by faith, you can lay hold of that future today. And when you do, that future becomes to you a present reality.
As I write that sentence, I’m experiencing that very reality. My heart wants to jump out of my chest with hope! I’m sensing the solid joys and lasting pleasures of my eternal future in Christ even now as I write this. It’s as if I’m standing in that eternal future now, experiencing the joy and peace that Christ has won for me.
Friends, this is what the life of faith looks like. Notice, I said the life of faith. Faith is not mere knowledge or feeling or action, though it incorporates all those things. Faith is a principle of life at work inside the true believer. It is, as Jesus told Nicodemus in John 3, a new birth that produces a new life empowered by the Holy Spirit (Galatians 5:25).
As we gather for worship on the first Sunday of 2021, let’s reject reluctancy born of worldly hopes– “Maybe this year will be better.” Instead, let’s set our hopes higher—to the certain future of a new heavens and a new earth, where every tear is wiped away, and every joy and lasting pleasure are secured, and each day is better than the one before. Yes! Let’s let that future lead the way in 2021... and always.
Grace & Peace,
