A New You in the New Year!

As you prepare to usher in your New Year, I believe GOD desires to carry out a new thing in your life in 2016. He wants to create a new you that is equipped and prepared to carried out great and mighty works for the cause of His Kingdom. He is waiting for you to take the initiative to step up to the plate and say: “YES, Lord, here I am, use me!”

The children of Israel found themselves in Babylonian captivity due to their ongoing wickedness and sinfulness. In the midst of their despair, GOD spoke words of encouragment and hope to them through His prophet, Isaiah. He declared: “Forget the things that have happened in the past. Do not keep on thinking about them. I am about to do something new. It is beginning to happen even now. Don’t you see it coming? I am going to make a way for you to go through the desert. I will make streams of water in the dry and empty land” (Isaiah 43:18-19).

Today, we are living in a nation that has turned its back on GOD. Our government is doing everything in its power to silence Christianity. It is time for you and I to rise up and speak out while we still can. Doing so will require a new way of thinking, a new perception of ourselves, our abilities and our world. We must prepare ourselves for the battle GOD is calling us into. It is going to take a new you to carry out the new thing GOD is desiring to do.

This new you will begin to develop as you do two things: (1) Change Your Focus and (2) Clarify Your Focus. Isaiah declared you must forget your past and the weight it carries and advance forward into your new future. Then, you must begin to see more clearly what GOD truly desires to do in you and through you. God sees the capabilities in you that you never knew existed.

The possibilities of what GOD can do through you are endless. He wants to change the dry, arid desert into streams of living water. But, it all comes back to your willingness to allow GOD to be GOD in and through you. It requires total, absolute surrender of yourself unto GOD so He may work in you and then work through you. God has plans for America, if America will turn back to GOD. America will only return to GOD when the church returns to GOD and its true mission. That begins with a personal commitment of people just like you and I. What will you do?

(Exerpt from sermon preached by Pastor Danny Anderson at First Christian Church – Weslaco, on Sunday, December 27, 2015. The full sermon is available in print form by emailing me at preacher.dannyanderson@yahoo.com.)