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With our God, the past is truly passed.
Jonathan P. Bilitz
So how did your first semester go? GPA is exactly where you want it to be, right? You sailed through the semester without a worry in the world—no stress, no anxiety, no late-night study sessions.
If that was your experience, what a blessing from God! Most likely, your semester provided challenges to face on a weekly or even daily basis. What a relief when the semester ends. You made it! The tests are taken, the projects completed, the papers written. Semester break provides a welcome respite from the daily grind a college student faces.
The opportunity for a fresh start ranks among the biggest blessings of a semester break. When the next semester begins, everything starts new—a new opportunity to study harder, manage time better, get more sleep, and pray more frequently for God’s strength. What happened in the past has passed. Picture the panorama of new possibilities on the horizon!
A new calendar year affords similar benefits. Millions of people make New Year’s resolutions—promises made to themselves to do better. Many appreciate turning the page on the calendar to turn the page to a better life. The past has passed. “This time I will get it right!” is the mantra of a new year.
You know how many of those resolutions turn out. Disappointment is a frequent visitor to our lives. We are disappointed by our circumstances, by the people around us, and also by ourselves. The best intentions to change are genuine, but inevitably we struggle to live up to those expectations.
As a new semester and a new year start, making plans and striving for change is admirable. But a dose of reality is also wise. We live in a fallen world and battle a sinful nature in which nothing good lives. The good we want to do we can’t always do. Faithfulness to our promises and resolutions escapes us.
We need someone who changes that, and God provided that change through Jesus. The author of Lamentations describes his confidence in God with these words: “Because of the LORD’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness” (3:22,23). God’s compassion, his deep love, and his mercy always triumph. Our unfaithfulness is covered by the faithfulness of our God.
Were you grabbed by the phrase, “They are new everyone morning”? Talk about a fresh start! God doesn’t wait until a new year or a new semester. His mercies present themselves, every day, every hour, every minute! With our God, the past is truly passed. He forgives our failures and remembers our sins no more. Jesus faithfully lived for us, willingly died for us, and victoriously rose to secure God’s blessings.
Each night, we can confess our failures and sleep well, trusting we are forgiven through Jesus. Each morning, we can awake refreshed, asking for God’s strength to live for him, knowing his mercies cover us. When we don’t measure up, God invites us to come right back to the cross of Jesus to find a fresh start. Enjoy the new semester and the new year. Appreciate the fresh start they promise. Relish the fresh start that the mercy of God gives you in Jesus not just at the start of a semester but each and every day of your life.
Like the writer of Lamentations concludes: “I say to myself, ‘The LORD is my portion; therefore, I will wait for him’ ” (3:24).
Author: Jonathan P. Bilitz
Volume 106, Number 1
Issue: January 2019
