David Grousnick

As we start a New Year together, allow me to share a few adult viewpoints about New Years Eve:

“Youth is when you’re allowed to stay up late on New Year’s Eve. Middle age is when you’re forced to.” Bill Vaughan

“Every man regards his own life as the New Year’s Eve of time.” Jean Paul

“I had a terrible fight with my wife on New Year’s Eve. She called me a procrastinator. So, I finished addressing the Christmas cards and left.” Robert Orben

One week a Sunday school teacher had just finished telling her class the Christmas story, how Mary and Joseph went to Bethlehem and how Jesus was born in a stable and laid in a manger.

After telling the story the teacher asked, “Who do you think the most important woman in the Bible is?”

Of course, the teacher was expecting one of the kids to say, “Mary.”

But instead, a little boy raised his hand and said, “Eve.”

So, the teacher asked him why he thought Eve was the most important woman in the Bible.

And the little boy replied, “Well, they named two days of the year after Eve. You know, Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve.”

Any way you look at it, a New Year is upon us!

In his covenant prayer, which he offered every year at midnight on New Year’s Eve, John Wesley prayed, “I am no longer my own but Thine, put me to what thou wilt, rank me with whom thou wilt, put me to doing, put me to suffering, let me be employed for thee or laid aside for thee, exalted for thee or brought low for thee; let me be full, let me be empty; let me have all things, let me have nothing; I freely and heartily yield all things to thy pleasure and disposal.”

As disciples of Jesus Christ, we’d do well to pray with Wesley and be reminded that we’re not free to follow the dictates of our own sinful nature. We’re free to surrender our wills to the will of God and to submit ourselves to the authority of Jesus Christ.

We prepare for Christmas during the Advent season by repenting. Repenting in the Biblical sense is more than having a change of heart or a feeling of regret. It is more than a New Year’s Eve resolution. Repentance is a turning away and a turning back. A turning away from sin and a turning back to God.

Bishop Joe Pennel of the Virginia Conference of the United Methodist Church once attended a Christmas worship service in Bethlehem at a place called Shepherd’s Field.

As he heard the songs of the season, he thought to himself and later wrote: “I did not look to God and say: See how virtuous I am. I did not utter: God, pat me on the back for all of the good things I have done. I did not pretend by saying: God, look at all my accomplishments, aren’t you proud of me? Indeed, I found myself asking God to forgive me of my sins.

“That is how it works. The more we turn away from Christ the more enslaved we become to the power of sin. The more we turn to Christ, the more free we become from the bondage of sin. Turning toward Christ enables us to repent.”

Someone once said half-jokingly: If we are not careful, John the Baptist’s message in Matthew 3:1-12 can take all of the fun out of Christmas. I disagree. I think that it is John’s message that puts joy into Christmas and great potential in to a New Year. For it is his message that calls us not to the way that Christmas and New Years are, but that the way Christmas and New Years ought to be. Christmas and New Years ought to be free from guilt and self-absorption. For that to occur there must be repentance.

Experience the joy and potential of the New Year with us this Sunday. Worship is at 10:30 and we are located at 11th and Bullock, across the street from Zia Elementary School.