Verse of the Week

My New Years Day run is a tradition I love. It sets the tone for the year and gets the ball rolling in the right direction. I track my miles each year, so making the first entry into a fresh run log satisfies the spreadsheet nerd within me. Benefits on top of benefits! I’ve run it on mild days and frigid days. I’ve run it feeling 100% and run it with flu-like symptoms. But I can’t say I’ve ever run it with a broken foot before! In true 2020 fashion, I suffered a Jones fracture in my right foot while playing tennis on the night before Thanksgiving. I had resigned myself to pedaling on my stationary bike on NewYears, but that wasn’t going to cut it. We’re moving forward in 2021. It’s a fresh year, and today is the day the Lord has made! I crutched/hobbled/hopped my way to mark that first mile in my run log. As I struggled along, Hebrews 12:1 was on my mind. No one ever said that the Christian life would be easy. It’s not like our problems just go away when we give our lives to Christ. Some might even get worse. But we’re instructed to run the race set before us with endurance! We’ve got the joy of the Lord within us whether things are going our way or not.  As we head into the new year, I want to encourage you to run your race with endurance. Talk to Jesus about your problems and allow the Holy Spirit to come into your life and help you out!

I had a nice little New Year’s Day message written for this inaugural newsletter, but it no longer feels appropriate. As we all know, yesterday, the US Capitol was stormed by an angry mob protesting the presidential election results.

It was hard to believe the near- anarchy I was seeing. This is the kind of thing that happens in other countries, not here in the US. I held my breath as I watched a news

reporter being followed around, intimidated, and mocked by a group of protesters.

If anyone was feeling anxious about our country’s political climate, yesterday surely cranked up the intensity. We pummel ourselves with hypotheticals:

What if this candidate gets elected? What if that policy gets changed? What if, what if, what if?

This stuff runs through my mind, too, but I try to remind myself, and I want to remind you here:

God is still on the throne.

The president may be changing, but the King of kings reigns forever. Our country may be divided, but “as surely as I live, says the Lord, every knee will bend and every tongue will confess the name of Jesus.” (Romans 14:11)

The bottom line is that God is still in control. As my friend Joe Labieniec says, nothing gets by God’s desk without Him noticing. So, if He allows it, there’s a purpose.

Human nature causes us to be ruled by our emotions and get bent out of shape because we want to control everything. I encourage you to take comfort in the fact that if God allows it, there’s a purpose. Like our verse of the week says, the purpose of the Lord WILL stand.

Take courage, friends! We’re not alone.