Tag: Scripture Memory

10 Bible Verses for Labor Day

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Verses for labor day

colossians3-23

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader.  Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness.  Her book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, is available now!  To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2014 Heather King

14 Bible Verses and a Prayer on Waiting

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  • Psalm 25:4-5 ESV
    Make me to know your ways, O Lord;
    teach me your paths.
    Lead me in your truth and teach me,
    for you are the God of my salvation;verseswaiting
    for you I wait all the day long.
  • Psalm 27:13-14
    I remain confident of this: I will see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living. Wait for the LORD; be strong and take heart and wait for the LORD.
  • Psalm 33:20-22
    We wait in hope for the LORD; he is our help and our shield. In him our hearts rejoice, for we trust in his holy name. May your unfailing love be with us, LORD,   even as we put our hope in you.
  • Psalm 37:7 ESV
    Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him;
    fret not yourself over the one who prospers in his way,
    over the man who carries out evil devices!
  • Psalm 37:9 ESV
    For the evildoers shall be cut off,
    but those who wait for the Lord shall inherit the land.
  • Psalm 40:1-3 ESV
    I waited patiently for the Lord;
    he inclined to me and heard my cry.
    He drew me up from the pit of destruction,
    out of the miry bog,
    and set my feet upon a rock,
    making my steps secure.
    He put a new song in my mouth,
    a song of praise to our God.
    Many will see and fear,
    and put their trust in the Lord.
  • Psalm 62:5 ESV
    For God alone, O my soul, wait in silence,
    for my hope is from him.
  • Psalm 130:5-6 NIV
    I wait for the Lord, my whole being waits,
    and in his word I put my hope.
    I wait for the Lord
    more than watchmen wait for the morning,
    more than watchmen wait for the morning.
  • Isaiah 30:18 ESV
    Therefore the Lord waits to be gracious to you,
    and therefore he exalts himself to show mercy to you.
    For the Lord is a God of justice;
    blessed are all those who wait for him.
  • Isaiah 40:29-31 HCSB
    He gives strength to the weary

    psalm 27

    Photo by Weerayut Kongsombut; 123rf.com

    and strengthens the powerless.
    Youths may faint and grow weary,
    and young men stumble and fall,
    but those who trust in the Lord
    will renew their strength;
    they will soar on wings like eagles;
    they will run and not grow weary;
    they will walk and not faint.

  • Isaiah 64:4 NIV
    Since ancient times no one has heard,
    no ear has perceived,
    no eye has seen any God besides you,
    who acts on behalf of those who wait for him.
  • Lamentations 3:25 ESV
    The Lord is good to those who wait for him,
    to the soul who seeks him.
  • Micah 7:7 NIV
    But as for me, I watch in hope for the Lord,
    I wait for God my Savior;
    my God will hear me.
  • James 5:7-8 HCSB
    Therefore, brothers, be patient until the Lord’s coming. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth and is patient with it until it receives the early and the late rains. You also must be patient. Strengthen your hearts, because the Lord’s coming is near.

prayerwaiting

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader.  Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness.  Her book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, is available now!  To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2014 Heather King

12 Bible Verses for a Spiritual Retreat

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verses-for-spiritual-retreat

  •  Psalm 23:1-6 NASB

    The Lord is my shepherd,
    I shall not want.
    2 He makes me lie down in green pastures;
    He leads me beside quiet waters.
    3 He restores my soul;
    He guides me in the paths of righteousness
    For His name’s sake.
    4 Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
    I fear no evil, for You are with me;
    Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.
    5 You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies;
    You have anointed my head with oil;
    My cup overflows.
    6 Surely goodness and lovingkindness will follow me all the days of my life,
    And I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

  • Psalm 42:1-2 NIV
    As the deer pants for streams of water,
        so my soul pants for you, my God.
     My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.
    When can I go and meet with God?
  • Psalm 62:5 NIV
    Yes, my soul, find rest in God;
        my hope comes from him.
  • Psalm 80:18-19 ESV
    Then we shall not turn back from you;
        give us life, and we will call upon your name!
    Restore us, O Lord God of hosts
    Let your face shine, that we may be saved!
  • Psalm 116:7 NIV
    Return to your rest, my soul,
        for the Lord has been good to you.
  • Proverbs 11:25 NIV
    A generous person will prosper;
        whoever refreshes others will be refreshed.
  • Song of Solomon 2:10 NKJV
    My beloved spoke, and said to me:
    “Rise up, my love, my fair one,psalm23
    And come away.
  • Isaiah 28:12-13 NIV
    to whom he said,
        “This is the resting place, let the weary rest”;
    and, “This is the place of repose”—
        but they would not listen.
    13 So then, the word of the Lord to them will become:
        Do this, do that,
        a rule for this, a rule for that;
        a little here, a little there—
    so that as they go they will fall backward;
        they will be injured and snared and captured.
  • Jeremiah 31:25 NASB
     For I satisfy the weary ones and refresh everyone who languishes.
  • Hosea 2:14-16 ESV
    “Therefore, behold, I will allure her,
        and bring her into the wilderness,
        and speak tenderly to her.
    15 And there I will give her her vineyards
        and make the Valley of Achor a door of hope.
    And there she shall answer as in the days of her youth,
        as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt.
  • Matthew 11:28 NIV
    “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.
  • Mark 6:31 NIV
    Then, because so many people were coming and going that they did not even have a chance to eat, he said to them, “Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest.”

15 Bible Verses about Courage

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  •  Deuteronomy 31:6 NIV
    Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the Lord your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.”versescourage
  • Joshua 1:9 NIV
     Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.”
  • 1 Chronicles 28:20 NIV
     David also said to Solomon his son, “Be strong and courageous, and do the work. Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord God, my God, is with you. He will not fail you or forsake you until all the work for the service of the temple of the Lord is finished.
  • 2 Chronicles 32:7 NASB
    “Be strong and courageous, do not fear or be dismayed because of the king of Assyria nor because of all the horde that is with him; for the one with us is greater than the one with him.
  • Psalm 16:8 NASB
    I have set the Lord continually before me;
    Because He is at my right hand, I will not be shaken.
  • Psalm 27:1 NIV
    The Lord is my light and my salvation—
        whom shall I fear?
    The Lord is the stronghold of my life—
        of whom shall I be afraid?
  • Psalm 27:14 NASB
    Wait for the Lord;
    Be strong and let your heart take courage;
    Yes, wait for the Lord.
  • Psalm 31:24 NASB
    Be strong and let your heart take courage,
    All you who hope in the Lord.
  • Psalm 56:3-4 NIV
    When I am afraid, I put my trust in you.
         In God, whose word I praise—
    in God I trust and am not afraid.
        What can mere mortals do to me?
  • Isaiah 41:10 NIV
    So do not fear, for I am with you;
        do not be dismayed, for I am your God.
    I will strengthen you and help you;
        I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.
  • Isaiah 41:13 NIV; psalm31-24For I am the Lord your God
        who takes hold of your right hand
    and says to you, Do not fear;
        I will help you.
  • 1 Corinthians 16:13 NIV
     Be on your guard; stand firm in the faith; be courageous; be strong.
  • 2 Timothy 1:7 NIV
     For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-discipline.
  • Hebrews 13:5-6 NIV
     Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said,
    “Never will I leave you;
        never will I forsake you.”
    6 So we say with confidence,
    “The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid
       What can mere mortals do to me?”
  • 1 Peter 3:13-14
    Who is going to harm you if you are eager to do good? But even if you should suffer for what is right, you are blessed. “Do not fear their threats; do not be frightened.”

Weekend Walk: Shifting Shadows

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I can’t quite explain it or rationalize it, but I love Groundhog Day.  I love the fun of it and the silliness and the groundhog himself and the mock seriousness of the traditions.  Maybe I love it even more than my kids do.

So today my family gathered on the outskirts of the crowd and pressed in closer until we 011could see the podium and the table holding a small pet carrier.  The speakers introduced the groundhog while we shivered and rubbed our hands together, hoping for news of an early spring.

This adorable creature gnawed away on his corn cob, caring not a bit for the flashing cameras and rolling video.  And those officials who eyed the groundhog watchfully finally announced that, unlike the more famous groundhog Phil, our particular prognosticating creature predicted six more weeks of winter.

Instead of booing over the news that we’re stuck with the cold longer than we’d like, we accepted it with good-natured whimsy.  It is, perhaps, the cutest way to deliver bad news.  Send in the groundhog to tell it.

Then we toured the museum and colored groundhog pages and played games with shadows.  It struck me that this is what we watch the groundhog for, to see his response to the shifting of shadows.

Shadows shift.  They change.  The direction of the light, the time of the day, the traveling of the clouds across the face of the sun all make the shadows dance or lengthen or shorten or perhaps even disappear.

Life shifts, too.  It changes.  Groundhogs are right and sometimes they are wrong.  Experts are right and sometimes they are wrong.  Circumstances alter unexpectedly.  You make a plan and then God interrupts you with the unexpected.

But here’s what we know: God is our constant, our reliable, ever-faithful, un-shifting Light in a world of uncertain shadows.

And it’s nice to know that we aren’t in the hands of whimsy or relying on the predictions of unreliable sources.  He knows us.  He knows what we need.  He knows where we’ve been, where we are, where we’re going.  He knows what tomorrow holds.  He knows how to take us through.

He knows.

This week, I’ll be meditating on a verse that reminds me of God’s constant character and His trustworthy love, and I’ll be using this as my third memory verse for the year with Beth Moore’s SSMT plan.

Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. James 1:17 NIV

What’s your verse for the week?

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader.  Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness.  Her upcoming book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, will be released in the Fall of 2013!  To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2013 Heather King

Weekend Walk, 1/26/2013: Snow

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Last year, I don’t remember seeing a single flake of snow.  No snow days off of school for my kids.  No bundling them up in two layers of pants and shirts and socks, then piling on coats, hats, gloves, scarves, and boots to send them outside.  No scraping off the frozen clothes when they pile back in and then making hot chocolate and snuggling them under fleece blankets.

This year, it hasn’t been much snowier (so far), but yesterday the tiny flakes finally piled 005up onto earth cold enough to hold them.

Snow!!!

My kids ran outside as soon as they finished breakfast this morning to play in it.  When they were done, my oldest brought in “clean snow” for snow cream—a recipe we’d never tried before.

Me, I like snow outside while I stay inside.  I like to watch it fall, so peaceful and hushed.  I like the brightness of it, especially when it covers over the drab muddy browns and muted gray-green of a snowless winter landscape. I like the untracked snow, the kind before boot prints and tire tracks and melted slush.

I like the reminder of what Christ has done for us.

Such a simple beauty this Saturday morning: A reminder as clear to me as a rainbow in the sky showing God’s faithfulness to His promises.

Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;
Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow
(Psalm 51:7).

They used this hyssop (really the ezov plant) for ritual cleansing in Israel–for purification and the ceremony to pronounce a leper healed and made clean again.

We’re self-condemners so often—listening as Satan reminds us of past sins, beating ourselves up in our minds, calling ourselves all manner of cruel names: stupid, a mess, flaky, foolish, failure, idiot…

God is so much more gracious than that, willing to cover over our sins, able to wash us and redeem us, able to purify our hearts and heal us from the diseases that plague our souls.

This snow–mostly still outside, some melting in spots on my kitchen floor from where my children have trekked in from outside– reminds me of His powerful, cleansing grace, a “grace that is greater than all my sins.”

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader.  Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness.  Her upcoming book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, will be released in November 2013!  To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2013 Heather King

Weekend Walk, 01/19/2013: A Prayer for Children

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Sure, sometimes I get frustrated by towels heaped on the floor and shoes strewn across the kitchen and living room.  I sigh over coats stripped off and dropped on the linoleum.  I whine over piles of paper and toys dragged from one room to another and then abandoned.  I make speeches about obedience, right away, the first time I say it.

But there are days when your mom heart is shocked into tears and all the petty annoyances fade and the selfish bits of your heart are tamed back into unselfishness.

It’s when you hear of a school shooting and so many little ones dead.  It’s waking up on a normal, totally average morning and slowly going about your normal, totally average routine, and then reading the news: three young children—babies really—and their grandmother dying in a house fire just 5 minutes from my home.

Suddenly average doesn’t seem so average anymore.  Every moment seems specially blessed.

I was thinking and praying all week about the verse to share this morning.  In my scripture memory project through Beth Moore’s SSMT, I needed to choose verse #2 of my 24 verses for the year.

I read through all of the beautiful verses other women had chosen.  I went through my prayer journal for the week and thought first this one and then that one.

And I prayed.  Of course, I prayed.

But when it came down to what was on my heart and mind, the verse that Beth Moore herself chose reflected what I was praying.  How could I not?  So soon after national tragedy and so soon after a tragedy in my very own community, my heart is heavy for my children.

We aren’t promised their safety or their salvation or their health.  Yet, we are given this 002great joy, this weighty responsibility, this amazing calling to love them, train them, guide them, and more than all that, to pray for them.

Parents of adult children can pray this, too.  Grandmothers and grandfathers, aunts and uncles, spiritual mentors, teachers and counselors can all lift up the little ones in our sphere of influence and in our hearts with this prayer of blessing:

All your children shall be taught by the Lord,
    and great shall be the peace of your children.
Isaiah 54:13 ESV

Yes, teach these children Your own wisdom and the joy of Your presence, Lord.  Help them to know You personally and be real, present and active in their lives.  In the very moments of their need, reveal Yourself to them and be their ever-present help in times of trouble.  Bring peace into their lives, into their hearts and minds, into their relationships.  We place them in Your hands and trust them to Your care.  Please help us to know when to speak and when to listen, what to say and how to love.  We are imperfect and weak; forgive us when we mess all this up, give us grace for a new day, and guide our steps, actions and words.  In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader.  Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness.  Her upcoming book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, will be released in the Fall of 2013!  To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2013 Heather King

Weekend Walk, 1/12/2013: Take My Picture

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“Take my picture, Mommy!  Take my picture!”

In the middle of Sunday morning chaos, pulling on stockings, buttoning dresses, clipping 006on bows and tying on ribbons, my three-year-old twirled in her dress and posed for a Kodak moment.

And I clicked the camera.

I don’t ever remember being this way, so eager to say, “Cheese.”  I’ve always been the one declining photos, offering to hold the camera, tossing into the trash any pictures of me I don’t like.

But when I’m out and about with my daughters (or even just running around the house frantically trying to get four females ready for Sunday morning church service)… they want to stop and take pictures.  Lots and lots of pictures.  Not of the scenery.  Of them.

It takes us three times as long to walk down the Main Street of our town and probably twice as much time on location on our family “field trips.”  But I don’t mind.

I love that they feel beautiful enough to want to pose.

There was a day I stepped into the bathroom to put away a stray toothbrush, and I caught one of my girls watching herself in the mirror.  She smoothed her hair and glanced up at her reflection, pleased with what she saw.

How beautiful is the girl who feels beautiful in her own skin.

This rare gift, how do you teach it?  How do you help them keep it for life?

Somehow, most of us grow out of it.  We glance in the mirror and critique the image or sigh in frustration.  We step on the scale and slander ourselves with our thoughts.  We pose for that picture and know we won’t be happy with it later, not with the smile or the hair or the wrinkles or the chin or ….

Even my husband, in the early days of falling in love, would sit across me from the table and I could feel him watching.  I didn’t know where to look.  I was uncomfortable in his gaze.  What imperfections would he see in me if he looked too closely or watched too long?

Later today, I’ll take my seat at a piano and offer up the music for a wedding ceremony.  There will be a moment at that wedding when the soloist will sing, “How Beautiful the radiant bride who waits for her Groom with His light in her eyes” (How Beautiful, Twila Paris).

The beauty of the bride isn’t so much the hairdresser and the hair spray, the makeup, the gown.

It’s that she walks down that aisle feeling loved.  In a moment, she knows she is wanted, precious, and she radiates the joy.

And it’s beautiful how she loves him.  So we, thinking of another, run out of time to be so self-analyzing, so self-criticizing, so self-condemning—so “self.”

It’s a verse for meditating on all week, with a reminder of how beauty is looking to God–our Groom–thinking of Him and less of me.  Beauty is caring for others.  Beauty isn’t feeling shame, but feeling redeemed, feeling precious, feeling loved.

“Those who look to him are radiant;
    their faces are never covered with shame” (Psalm 34:5).

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader.  Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness.  Her upcoming book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, will be released in the Fall of 2013!  To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2013 Heather King

Weekend Walk: Choices, Choices

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Playdates at our house are often the same.  My daughters give their guest a grand tour of the playroom and their bedroom…

Three girls’ worth of Barbies, baby dolls, princesses, Polly Pockets, ponies, Strawberry Shortcake, puzzles, games, art supplies, doll house furniture, Play Doh, and dress up….

And pretty soon we’re spinning from one activity to the next.  By the time my girls set up 039the Barbie house, their guest is ready to play with puzzles.  Halfway through the first puzzle, their guest is ready to play a game.  A few turns into the game, their guest is ready to play princess.  After a few minutes of assigning princess names and creating back story, their guest is pulling out the Play Doh.

Is it any wonder?  With so many choices and so little time, we happily jump from activity to activity and, after all, who can complain about how well everyone sleeps that night?  We all have fun and it’s all a joy.

But it can be a little like me, especially at the start  of a new year when I’m spinning from good thing to good thing and I really just want to do it all.

We do it with fitness programs, spiritual disciplines, diets and savings plans. Given a million wonderful choices, we can try to do a million amazing things…and end up failing at all of them.

This year, I’ve been given or discovered four prayer books, three Bible reading programs, four Scripture memory plans, five devotionals, and three Bible studies to begin the year.

The thing about me is that I’d press through every day and finish all of them, maybe exhausted, stressed, hyperventilating and skimming through pages just so I can mark it off on my to-do list, but I’d do it.

There wouldn’t be any joy, though.  I wouldn’t really breathe in and out the beauty of God’s Word. I’d set my love relationship with my Savior firmly on business-only terms, focusing on tasks and accomplishing and not relaxing and being.

The truth is that doing a million things doesn’t always get us very far, but paring it all down and asking God to focus our hearts on one thing (or at least less than a million) can bring us joy and growth in the new year.

I started last night with Scripture memory, choosing from all the plans and programs and suggestions.  Sitting at my computer, I read through four Scripture memory plans and prayed.  Then I chose just one way of meditating on God’s Word, soaking in it, breathing it in, chewing on the thoughts and making this Holy Scripture part of the core of me.

This year I’ll be using my verses for the week on the blog to participate in Beth Moore’s Siesta Scripture Memory Team (SSMT).  Her plan is simple.  You choose the verse you want to memorize, whatever God has placed on your heart, and you leruthgrahamscripturesarn one verse about every two weeks.  By the end of 2013, we’ll have committed 24 verses to memory.

A dear friend brought me back Ruth Graham’s Scripture Treasures from her visit to Billy Graham’s library.  I was reading them through last night, pulling out beautiful verse after beautiful verse and many of my Scriptures for the year will come from these cards.

To begin, I’m reminding myself to keep it simple, keep the joy, give myself room to breathe and not suffocate myself with systems and plans that suck the air and the pleasure right out of this walk with God.

One thing I ask from the Lord,
    this only do I seek:
that I may dwell in the house of the Lord
    all the days of my life,
to gaze on the beauty of the Lord
    and to seek him in his temple (Psalm 27:4 NIV).

What about you?
How are you keeping it simple in the new year?  Did you choose one word to help focus your spiritual walk?  Did you find one Scripture memory plan or one Bible reading program to focus on?

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader.  Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness.  Her upcoming book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, will be released in the Fall of 2013!  To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2013 Heather King

Fear of Blank Calendars and A New Year’s Verse

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Afraid.

That’s how I feel.  Maybe it’s pessimism or a sort of realistic pragmatism, but pulling out that blank calendar for the new year, all those empty spaces soon to be filled to overflowing with notes, events, appointments, due dates, and reminders, makes me nervous in an awkward and embarrassed kind of way.  It’s the kind of fear that you want to hide and cover over with nervous giggles and by abruptly changing the subject.

I’m no believer in superstition, and yet I battle this one mysterious fear-mongering belief that if the first few weeks of the new year begin poorly, I’m in for doom and dismay for the next twelve months.

Like the year I threw up on New Year’s Eve as a teenager.  Even I knew that seemed like a bad omen.

Truth be told, I don’t look at that empty dayplanner with excitement and anticipation about all the unknowns in the coming year.  I don’t like surprises and the unexpected makes me nervous.  I’d rather see the pages filled out in advance so I can brace myself for the ride with all its twists, turns, high rises and low points.

I guess I’d be a failure as a mountain climber or an adventurer of any kind.  I’d never really look forward to what’s over the next peak or around the next bend in the road.  Instead, I’d likely be trekking backwards, always back.  Even if the ground were difficult, at least it’d be familiar.

It’s a foolish thing really, this fear of mine coming so soon after Christmas.  The consistent message of the Christmas story, heard in the prophecies of Isaiah, the announcements of the angels, the pronouncements of Almighty God, is “Do not be afraid.”

All year I flip open my Bible to these words, returning again and again to take comfort in the promise of an angel to a virgin and the host of heaven to shepherds keeping a night-watch in the fields.  God with us.  Fear Not.  Do not be afraid.  Emmanuel has come.

And then I sit just days after Christmas staring at this white-paged calendar, worrying and fretting anxiously, preparing for the worst instead of expecting the best.

How quickly I forget the promise and stumble into this now-familiar pit.

And I need to stop.

I don’t want to be a backwards-traveler, confined by foolish superstitions and held captive by the sin—yes, sin—of fear and worry, refusing to trust my Almighty God who carries the the whole world in His palms and who loves me so passionately and lavishly that He’d sacrifice His Son to spend eternity with me.

It’s uncomfortable at first, awkward like a baby stumbling through those first few steps.  Maybe it’s even unnatural, me learning slow to walk by faith, letting go of the comforts of the known within my white-knuckled grasp.

So I’m choosing this week to meditate on a verse that reminds me to be excited about the new work of God in my life, the blessings and beauty He has in store for the year ahead.  I’m reminded to take joy in the promise of a new year in His presence and in His care.

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?
I am making a way in the wilderness
    and streams in the wasteland
(Isaiah 43:18-19).