Wishing You a Blessed New Year!

It is a good custom to wish each other a happy new year. Too often, however, what we mean by “Happy New Year” is: I hope that you stay healthy, that everything goes well for you, and that you have lots of prosperity this year in everything that you do. The Reformers and Puritans got it quite a bit better. They often wished each other a blessed new year (“blessed”=internal happiness regardless of circumstances), by which they meant something like this: I hope that everything that comes your way by the hand of Providence this year may be sanctified to you in and through Christ, so that you may be patient in adversity, thankful in prosperity, and have a firm trust in our faithful God and Father for the unknown future (Heidelberg Catechism, Q. 28), believing that all things work together for good to them that love Him (Rom. 8:28). So, I wish you and your family a blessed new year! I wish you in 2020 the experience of Samuel Rutherford who could say, “Every day we may see some new thing in Christ. His love has neither brim nor bottom. In our fluctuations of feeling, it is well to remember that Jesus admits no change in His affections; your heart is not the compass Jesus saileth by.”