2021 Come Quickly!!

And when it does, what will be different?

Will the passing of the dreadful year of 2020 make your life instantly better?

Does the ball dropping in Times Square automatically change everything into a world of peace and happiness?

What does 2021 promise you?

So, let’s stop for a moment and look to the past. What do you see? The same scenario year-after-year . . . joys and sorrows, fulfilled and unmet expectations, life and death, wins and losses, ups and downs, financial gains and losses, strength and weakness, calm and storms, success and failures, and my list could continue.

You see, it’s been this way since the Garden of Eden. We live in a sin-cursed world with deceitful, desperately wicked hearts (Jeremiah 17:9) that longs to be satisficed with the “husks of this world” (Luke 15:11-16) and the selfish desires within each of us. It is totally impossible to find lasting satisfaction and joy in this world or within ourselves. Everything around us and within us is temporal, fleeting, decaying and dying.

So, what does 2021 promise you? Nothing. It’s just another year of the same.

What hope then do we have? How will we survive? What do we have to look forward to?

The answer is wrapped up completely in a name, in the Person, the very Son of God . . . the Lord Jesus Christ.

We are still in the midst of celebrating a special holiday called Christmas which is all about the name at the beginning of the word Christmas…Christ.

He is the Good News for today, for 2021, for the past and for eternity future!

And she will bring forth a Son, and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins.(Matthew 1:21)

Then the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people. For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be the sign to you: You will find a Babe wrapped in swaddling cloths, lying in a manger.” And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill toward men!” (Luke 2:10-14)

For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. . . . He who believes in the Son has everlasting life; and he who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him. (John 3:16-17, 36)

My friends, John 14:6 spells it out so simply when Jesus said, I AM the Way, the Truth, and the Life. The way, the truth, the life are not things, a better year, a pay increase, being married, having children, or any other ingredient you think you can add to your life to make you happy and/or satisfied. All three of these are now and will forever be a person . . . the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ!

The Way to Heaven and the way of everyday life is found only in the Person of Christ. He desires to have a personal relationship with you for all eternity. The Truth is now and will forever be in the Person of Christ. He is the unchangeable, living Standard. He is the Truth Who will personally guide you into all truth, in the paths of righteousness (John 16:13; Psalm 23:3). And, Life is now and will forever be the Person of Christ. There is no life outside of Christ. You will strive and exist in this life, but true living is only found through the Creator, Giver, and Sustainer of life.

Jesus, come quickly today as I walk with you and you with me (Psalm 1, 23; John 15:1-11; 1 John 1).

Jesus, come quickly and take us home to Heaven where we will truly, finally be home! Then it will all be different; it will all be right; it will be one eternal day of basking in your glorious presence, serving You without sin, sorrow, disappointment, pain. . . the stuff of this life that binds us.

I’m not looking for the ball to drop in Times Square. I’m looking for the Savior to return (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18).