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| Volume 25 Number 1 January 2023 |
Page 5 |
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| Volume 25 Number 1 January 2023 |
Page 5 |
Sunny David
Thanks be to God for keeping us and allowing us to have another year. In the last few days, many have greeted us with a Happy New Year, and likewise we have said the same to so many people. Certainly, we all are looking forward to having a happy and blessed New Year, but to make a happy new year, there must be a proper use of time. Someone has pointed out, “Dost thou love life? Then waste not time, for that is the stuff that life is made of.” The apostle Paul wrote, “Redeeming the time, because the days are evil” (Ephesians 5:16 NKJV). Someone else has rightly said, “Nothing is more precious than time, and those who misspend it are the greatest prodigals.” Character may break to pieces and be built up again. Health may be lost and regained. Silver and gold might be lost but time can regain them. However, time itself cannot be recalled. The brevity and uncertainty of time emphasizes our responsibility in the way we should use it. True, nothing is more precious than time. To redeem the time means taking advantage of the available time or to buy back the neglected opportunities.
When the children of Israel were heading to the Promised Land – when they came near it, just before entering – Joshua who was leading them cautioned them by saying, “That you may know the way by which you must go, for you have not passed this way before” (Joshua 3:4). They were going to enter into a new territory, and God, through His servant Joshua, was directing their travel. He would lead them right if they would follow His directions. Friends, we haven’t yet lived over this New Year. We have just touched the hem of it. Are we going to allow God through His Living Word to direct our steps as we live each day of this New Year?
We should realize that we are living on borrowed time. We are not here forever. Who knows if this may well be the year of our summon to meet our Creator God! None of us know how long we are going to be here on this earth. The Psalmist very correctly pointed out when he wrote, “The days of our lives are seventy years; And if by reason of strength they are eighty years, Yet their boast is only labor and sorrow; For it is soon cut off and we fly away” (Psalm 90:10). The exhortation of the wise preacher is equally worthy of note, “Remember your Creator before the silver cord is loosed… Then the dust will return to the earth as it was, And the spirit will return to God who gave it” (Ecclesiastes 12:6-7). Are you prepared to meet God, even if this may well be the year of your summon to meet Him?
A Look in the Mirror
Derek Broome
Do you ever look at yourself in the mirror? When I was younger, I looked at myself in the mirror all the time. In fact, I used to look in the mirror so much that people who knew me best would pick on me about always staring at myself. I’ll admit it, sometimes I was looking in the mirror because I was vain. I was younger, thinner and for a brief period of time, I actually had hair. Pride and vanity have definitely impacted my life, but not always in the obnoxious, arrogant kind of way. I’ve also had times in my life when I was looking in the mirror because my confidence was low, and I wanted to see if I fit or measured up to the worldly standard of how a young man is supposed to look. Pride and vanity impact you even if you are not acting arrogant or obnoxious. People with low self-esteem can often think everything is about them but just in a negative way. People with low self-esteem often put the focus on this life and find themselves looking for satisfaction and fulfillment in all the wrong places.
Does this mean that looking in the mirror is always a bad thing? Of course not. It’s good to put your best foot forward. It shows self-worth as well as care and can help one have and show a healthy level of confidence from day to day. However, we need to be sure that we are not valuing things in this life over the spiritual things of God. When we look into Scripture, we can see numerous accounts of people who were caught up in the things of this life. That pattern of living has continued to this very day. Scripture even warns us of perilous times in the last days as people will be “lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy” (2 Timothy 3:2 NKJV). We are living in the last days, and we see on a daily basis that people continue to be “lovers of themselves.” Yet, that is not the way we as people of God are supposed to live. We read in Colossians 3:2, “Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth.” If we look into a worldly mirror, all we are going to see are worldly things. We are not to be focused on earthly things because they lead to destruction (Philippians 3:19). Instead of having minds conformed to this world, we are to have minds transformed in Him (Romans 12:2). We must look into a different kind of mirror than this world has to offer.
We see in 2 Timothy 3:10-17 that if we want to be pleasing before God, we must continue to follow His Word. We see similar instructions given in James 1:21-25 where we see we need to receive the “implanted Word.” However, we do not receive it by just hearing. We must be people that both hear and do. A person who just hears is said to be “like a man observing his natural face in a mirror; for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was.” We are to be people that look into the “perfect law of liberty” and continue in it by being people who hear the Word and continue to obey. Let each of us look daily into the mirror that is the Word of God and be sure that we are living lives that look and are pleasing before the Lord.