WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:08.400 So what I wanted to do just for a few moments this morning is think loosely in general terms 00:00:08.400 --> 00:00:15.040 about the story that we read in Numbers and also the story we read in Acts. 00:00:15.040 --> 00:00:21.839 Two different times in history, two different times with regard to the revelation of God 00:00:21.839 --> 00:00:26.879 and Scripture, but all with a theme, a thread running through it. 00:00:26.879 --> 00:00:33.640 And we can look back at some of the earlier passages in Scripture before Jesus, kind of 00:00:33.640 --> 00:00:37.799 with the light of Jesus and with the knowledge of Jesus and realize the purposes and plans 00:00:37.799 --> 00:00:43.920 that He was working out even in these times. 00:00:43.920 --> 00:00:51.039 Our focus as Christians is very often, I think, maybe particularly in our culture, in our 00:00:51.039 --> 00:00:52.039 context. 00:00:52.039 --> 00:00:55.399 Maybe it's just the weather. 00:00:55.399 --> 00:01:02.479 We often focus on negative things about the Christian life, the battle that the Christian 00:01:02.479 --> 00:01:03.479 life is. 00:01:03.479 --> 00:01:07.959 And that's absolutely fine because it is a battle and it's described as a battle. 00:01:07.959 --> 00:01:12.640 And the Christian life is often in reality for us, a struggle in a battle and we wouldn't 00:01:12.640 --> 00:01:17.200 want to minimize that thought or that reality for us. 00:01:17.200 --> 00:01:23.439 But it's not just a battle for us because we are also guaranteed the victory. 00:01:23.439 --> 00:01:25.379 The victory has already been won. 00:01:25.379 --> 00:01:31.319 That's why we focus so much on the cross of Jesus Christ, the death of Jesus, His resurrection 00:01:31.319 --> 00:01:34.239 on the first day of the week and His ascension. 00:01:34.239 --> 00:01:40.920 And that is transformative, and it ought to be at least transformative for all of us. 00:01:40.920 --> 00:01:48.319 It's not just a kind of theological sort of nicety that we consider now and again. 00:01:48.319 --> 00:01:54.000 It is the life-changing reality for all of us that Jesus defeated the power of death 00:01:54.000 --> 00:02:00.680 and sin, and as we trust in Him, we can know that victory in our own lives. 00:02:00.680 --> 00:02:05.960 And it's important, I think, for us going into a new year to remember that, to remember 00:02:05.960 --> 00:02:14.439 who we are and who we serve as believers and to constantly remind ourselves of the promises 00:02:14.439 --> 00:02:23.960 and the plan of God that goes beyond 2023 and goes even beyond our own lives and has 00:02:23.960 --> 00:02:26.760 a great future. 00:02:26.760 --> 00:02:29.080 And we're called to focus on the promises. 00:02:29.080 --> 00:02:33.080 We'll do a lot of that with the children and the verses that we'll read over, the 52 00:02:33.080 --> 00:02:35.319 verses we'll try to memorize over the years. 00:02:35.319 --> 00:02:37.240 A good thing to do. 00:02:37.240 --> 00:02:38.240 The promises are good. 00:02:38.240 --> 00:02:43.680 They're good to be, to fuse our minds with these promises, to think about them and to 00:02:43.680 --> 00:02:49.480 remember that they're not just glib, they're not just theoretical, but they're there for 00:02:49.479 --> 00:02:54.119 a reason, not only as promises, but as plan. 00:02:54.119 --> 00:02:55.199 His purpose is in plan. 00:02:55.199 --> 00:02:59.919 We see it from the beginning of Genesis to the end of Revelation that there is one clear 00:02:59.919 --> 00:03:04.919 thread that runs through Scripture, and it all revolves around the rescue purposes and 00:03:04.919 --> 00:03:09.439 plans and love of God and Jesus Christ for us. 00:03:09.439 --> 00:03:17.000 Now, we accept, and I accept that there are huge challenges and huge battles that we face, 00:03:17.000 --> 00:03:23.360 and we oughtn't to be blind to that, and we're not naive and we're not foolish and stupid 00:03:23.360 --> 00:03:27.879 when we think about the victory that is ours. 00:03:27.879 --> 00:03:34.000 But I do want to make two points today, because we remember that the challenges and the battles 00:03:34.000 --> 00:03:42.280 we face were no greater, very different, but no greater than the ones Caleb faced as one 00:03:42.280 --> 00:03:48.039 of the spies who saw the promised land along with the other spies. 00:03:48.039 --> 00:03:50.039 He saw things differently from the other ones. 00:03:50.039 --> 00:03:53.240 We'll talk about that for a moment. 00:03:53.240 --> 00:03:57.560 And no different for the apostles in the New Testament. 00:03:57.560 --> 00:04:01.159 They also had many challenges and oppositions and difficulties. 00:04:01.159 --> 00:04:09.960 I don't suppose many of us will be jailed or crucified upside down for our faith in Jesus. 00:04:09.960 --> 00:04:11.520 It's unlikely. 00:04:11.520 --> 00:04:20.120 But that was the kind of battles and struggles that these old and New Testament believers 00:04:20.120 --> 00:04:21.120 faced. 00:04:21.120 --> 00:04:27.680 But I just want to ask two questions on this New Year's morning. 00:04:27.680 --> 00:04:34.519 The first is, what do we see in our Christian journey, in our Christian lives? 00:04:34.519 --> 00:04:37.400 And it's the title of the sermon. 00:04:37.400 --> 00:04:41.040 Do we see grapes or do we see giants? 00:04:41.040 --> 00:04:47.040 Because in this story in the Old Testament, the spies were sent out to spy out the land 00:04:47.040 --> 00:04:51.280 and they were to bring back some of the produce of the land, because God had promised them 00:04:51.280 --> 00:04:54.200 this land and He promised them it was a land flowing with milk and honey. 00:04:54.200 --> 00:04:55.200 It was a beautiful place. 00:04:55.200 --> 00:04:58.240 It was the promised land that they were to have. 00:04:58.240 --> 00:05:03.560 And they were to bring back some of the produce as a... 00:05:03.560 --> 00:05:07.720 Literally as a taster of what lay ahead for them. 00:05:07.720 --> 00:05:14.200 And they brought this...we read it in that verse that they brought a cluster of grapes 00:05:14.200 --> 00:05:21.960 on a pole that they hung it on and they brought it back as a beautiful fruit of the land. 00:05:21.960 --> 00:05:25.520 And that was what God had promised. 00:05:25.520 --> 00:05:33.120 But the 12 spies that went out, Caleb was the only one who could see by faith and understand 00:05:33.120 --> 00:05:36.720 that they could take this land and it could become theirs. 00:05:36.720 --> 00:05:43.480 Because the other 11 could only see the giants, the Nephilim, the big people. 00:05:43.480 --> 00:05:50.040 And as they said at the end of that chapter, we seem to ourselves like grasshoppers. 00:05:50.040 --> 00:05:52.440 So you could re-title it. 00:05:52.440 --> 00:05:56.520 Could it be grapes or grasshoppers or grapes or giants? 00:05:56.520 --> 00:05:58.760 The G's all work either way. 00:05:58.760 --> 00:06:04.400 But the principle there, and I'm not going to go into this story really, and I'm not 00:06:04.399 --> 00:06:09.159 going to focus on the giants today and the oppositions and the difficulties and the impossibilities 00:06:09.159 --> 00:06:12.639 because they're all there in our lives. 00:06:12.639 --> 00:06:20.799 But just very simply, the question is in our lives, do we see the promises of God as believers? 00:06:20.799 --> 00:06:23.319 Do we think they apply to us? 00:06:23.319 --> 00:06:30.199 Are we like Caleb who says in verse 30, he climbed the people before Moses and said, 00:06:30.199 --> 00:06:36.719 let us go up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it. 00:06:36.719 --> 00:06:38.719 Well able to overcome it. 00:06:38.719 --> 00:06:42.719 And the NIV says, we can certainly do it. 00:06:42.719 --> 00:06:47.120 So he saw with the eye of faith, we can take this land because it's promised to us by 00:06:47.120 --> 00:06:52.399 God and it's got all the promises that He made for us. 00:06:52.399 --> 00:06:54.680 And is that how we live our Christian lives? 00:06:54.680 --> 00:07:02.400 Do we focus on the promises that God has made for us to be in His company, to overcome, 00:07:02.400 --> 00:07:07.560 to have the victory, to know a future with Him, and to look at the end of the story as 00:07:07.560 --> 00:07:09.759 well for us? 00:07:09.759 --> 00:07:14.240 Do we recognize the milk and honey that is promised to us in this life and in the life 00:07:14.240 --> 00:07:15.240 to come? 00:07:15.240 --> 00:07:22.319 The blessings, the strength, the presence of the Spirit, the forgiveness, the hope, the 00:07:22.319 --> 00:07:26.839 beatific vision, seeing Jesus and being in relationship with Him. 00:07:26.839 --> 00:07:29.800 Do we feed on these promises? 00:07:29.800 --> 00:07:37.079 And do we recognize that all that we do in His name has weight, has significance? 00:07:37.079 --> 00:07:44.680 Even the cup of cold water that we will give to somebody is noted and is remembered and 00:07:44.680 --> 00:07:47.759 is significant to the living God. 00:07:47.759 --> 00:07:56.199 Do we trust Him that as Christians we can live in 2023 and say, yes, certainly we can 00:07:56.199 --> 00:07:57.199 do it. 00:07:57.199 --> 00:07:58.719 We can overcome. 00:07:58.719 --> 00:08:02.800 We can live the way He wants us to live in obedience to Him. 00:08:02.800 --> 00:08:10.519 Whatever giants, whatever opposition we face, whether that be circumstantial or whether 00:08:10.519 --> 00:08:13.560 it be personal in our own lives. 00:08:13.560 --> 00:08:21.360 Do we remember that with the living God, camels can go through the eye of needles? 00:08:21.360 --> 00:08:26.800 We are able to overcome what we face in this life. 00:08:26.800 --> 00:08:34.000 We recognize and we see that God raises the dead, the greatest impossibility of all God 00:08:34.000 --> 00:08:35.600 has already done. 00:08:35.600 --> 00:08:41.720 And so we can live this year focusing on grapes rather than giants. 00:08:41.720 --> 00:08:48.240 It's very difficult for us to do unless we focus and channel our lives around the promises 00:08:48.240 --> 00:08:50.840 and the hope and the character of God. 00:08:50.840 --> 00:08:58.360 We can evangelize and share our faith with courage, recognizing that God will sustain 00:08:58.360 --> 00:09:06.080 us and will enable us to see people respond to gospel truth because of what Jesus has 00:09:06.080 --> 00:09:07.080 done. 00:09:07.080 --> 00:09:15.440 We all, we're not really focusing on a moralistic teaching or a do-it-yourself, hey, just keep 00:09:15.440 --> 00:09:18.480 on going and think of promises. 00:09:18.480 --> 00:09:27.120 We recognize that our power source is the living God in Christ and that we are to be 00:09:27.120 --> 00:09:36.879 relying on Him because of what He did on the cross because of the defeat of death and sin 00:09:36.879 --> 00:09:43.519 and His resurrection and His grace to us, that He has gifted us salvation and He has 00:09:43.519 --> 00:09:46.840 gifted us a home and He's gifted us a future. 00:09:46.840 --> 00:09:54.080 And we recognize that He has defeated all of these realities in our lives. 00:09:54.080 --> 00:10:03.879 It's so easy to go into this year, I presume, for us all to just see giants, to see opposition, 00:10:03.879 --> 00:10:07.639 to see things that can't be overcome. 00:10:07.639 --> 00:10:14.840 And yet we recognize that death and sin and hell have been defeated, that Christ is victorious. 00:10:14.840 --> 00:10:22.759 And we are encouraged and challenged to look with the eye of faith at everything we face, 00:10:22.759 --> 00:10:30.000 at all our circumstances, at all our personal situations we find ourselves in, to look and 00:10:30.000 --> 00:10:35.480 to focus on the Word of God and the promises of God. 00:10:35.480 --> 00:10:42.679 Now you may be sitting here this morning saying, easy for you to say, minister, you're not 00:10:42.679 --> 00:10:49.799 on the front line, you just slip back into your study with an open Bible and a worn-out 00:10:49.799 --> 00:10:55.639 knees from praying, wish that were the case. 00:10:55.639 --> 00:10:58.240 And it's true, I do have a great privilege. 00:10:58.240 --> 00:11:06.000 I recognize that, I've got a great privilege of not being on the front line at one level. 00:11:06.000 --> 00:11:11.960 And I hope that humbly I always recognize that. 00:11:11.960 --> 00:11:15.919 But we all have different giants that we face. 00:11:15.919 --> 00:11:24.879 We're all ultimately tempted by the same unbelieving heart and we're all opposed by the same enemy. 00:11:24.879 --> 00:11:34.039 These tactics are different for you as they may be for me, but nonetheless they're there. 00:11:34.039 --> 00:11:36.960 But we all have the same call. 00:11:36.960 --> 00:11:42.679 We all have the same call in 1 Timothy 4, 7, which is that we're to train ourselves to 00:11:42.679 --> 00:11:47.480 be godly and to look with the eyes of faith. 00:11:47.480 --> 00:11:54.759 Don't depend on just your quick fix on a Sunday morning and the preaching of the Word, significant 00:11:54.759 --> 00:12:00.759 and important though that is, remember that we have this responsibility to be our trained 00:12:00.759 --> 00:12:12.000 ourselves, looking to God, focusing on God, being self-controlled, praying and seeking 00:12:12.000 --> 00:12:18.960 godliness and living with the eye of faith ourselves, pleading His promises and taking 00:12:18.960 --> 00:12:21.200 up discipleship. 00:12:21.200 --> 00:12:27.320 Our ongoing challenge of discipleship from the picture of Jeremiah 17, the tree, the 00:12:27.320 --> 00:12:35.800 great tree that speaks of the Christian walk and says that tree will always bear fruit, 00:12:35.800 --> 00:12:42.560 even in a drought, even in a desert place, because its roots go down and along to the 00:12:42.560 --> 00:12:44.560 living water, to the stream always. 00:12:44.559 --> 00:12:54.519 And it said that tree doesn't need to be afraid of the heat because its strength and its nourishment 00:12:54.519 --> 00:12:57.039 and its energy come from the living water under the ground. 00:12:57.039 --> 00:13:02.759 And what is unseen is so important in your Christian life, what nobody else sees, where 00:13:02.759 --> 00:13:09.839 your roots are, where you find your energy and strength and courage from, it is not visible. 00:13:09.840 --> 00:13:16.560 The fruit is, the fruit is that when you're faced with impossibilities and you're faced 00:13:16.560 --> 00:13:24.360 with giants, you don't feel like a grasshopper, but you can say, yes, we can do this. 00:13:24.360 --> 00:13:26.080 We can certainly do it. 00:13:26.080 --> 00:13:31.560 We can overcome because of God's promises, because of the risen Savior and because of 00:13:31.560 --> 00:13:39.400 the hope and the commitment He has to us that He will never leave us nor forsake us. 00:13:39.399 --> 00:13:48.240 So we can… the challenge for us in terms of grapes or giants is that we ourselves can 00:13:48.240 --> 00:13:49.240 be the fruit. 00:13:49.240 --> 00:13:54.919 We ourselves can reflect the reality of Christ in our lives. 00:13:54.919 --> 00:14:01.720 And we pray, I hope we can pray, as I certainly seek to pray, that my eyes might be opened 00:14:01.720 --> 00:14:06.679 in the same way that Elisha's servant's eyes were opened in the story that we did with 00:14:06.679 --> 00:14:12.120 the kids, which is kind of similar in one way to the story we did. 00:14:12.120 --> 00:14:18.439 We're looking at what is unseen is always greater than what is seen. 00:14:18.439 --> 00:14:26.679 And however bleak and difficult the challenges and opposition is, in Christ we can know victory 00:14:26.679 --> 00:14:30.039 and we can know that He who is with us is greater than He who is against us. 00:14:30.039 --> 00:14:32.199 So that is an encouragement. 00:14:32.200 --> 00:14:37.800 And it's great to do and great to recognize that Christ invites us to Himself and He says, 00:14:37.800 --> 00:14:40.360 you know, my yoke is easy and my burden is like. 00:14:40.360 --> 00:14:42.640 Come to me, says in Matthew 11. 00:14:42.640 --> 00:14:48.680 It's easy at that level because of whom we trust and whom we serve. 00:14:48.680 --> 00:14:54.800 Thirty-five years ago I was in the free church book room, as it used to be called, it's 00:14:54.800 --> 00:14:59.080 now a book shop, used to be a book room. 00:14:59.080 --> 00:15:09.879 And I was a raw, thirty-five years, a raw 24-year-old starting my first year of training to become 00:15:09.879 --> 00:15:10.879 a minister. 00:15:10.879 --> 00:15:18.639 And I was probably buying one of the books that I had to get for learning Hebrew or Greek 00:15:18.639 --> 00:15:20.400 or something like that. 00:15:20.400 --> 00:15:25.200 And an old professor came in, he was retired by this time called Professor Macintosh, he 00:15:25.200 --> 00:15:27.600 was a lovely old man. 00:15:27.600 --> 00:15:31.200 And he knew my father and he knew family and things like that. 00:15:31.200 --> 00:15:36.560 And he hadn't met me since I'd kind of been a child. 00:15:36.560 --> 00:15:40.000 And he was asking what I was doing, I was saying I was going in for the ministry. 00:15:40.000 --> 00:15:47.279 And he just said to me, an old man, he just said, you'll never serve a better master. 00:15:47.279 --> 00:15:52.399 And it's very simple, I kind of throw away comment in many ways, but I've never forgotten 00:15:52.399 --> 00:15:54.399 that because he's right. 00:15:54.399 --> 00:16:00.959 Just now in thirty-five years, he's absolutely right that there is no greater Lord and master 00:16:00.959 --> 00:16:04.279 to serve than the Lord Jesus Christ. 00:16:04.279 --> 00:16:07.439 And we should never forget that at the start of a year. 00:16:07.439 --> 00:16:13.319 We have a Savior with a triune commitment, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, whose currency 00:16:13.319 --> 00:16:16.919 is forgiveness and shared strength. 00:16:16.919 --> 00:16:21.559 He doesn't keep things to himself, he shares us with himself. 00:16:21.559 --> 00:16:27.759 We have not just a Savior, we have His Word, Scripture, which is our great hope. 00:16:27.759 --> 00:16:33.239 And you can go to someone today and ask them what they're going to do with a dead man who 00:16:33.239 --> 00:16:36.959 claimed to be God who walked out of the grave on the third day. 00:16:36.959 --> 00:16:38.719 You've got that? 00:16:38.719 --> 00:16:43.159 You've got that truth that we can challenge people with from Scripture? 00:16:43.159 --> 00:16:50.919 And we've got a gospel society, like-minded believers, a church family that we can embrace 00:16:50.919 --> 00:16:53.120 and know. 00:16:53.120 --> 00:17:00.519 Not many people have that, that triumphant of amazing realities of Savior, Scripture and 00:17:00.519 --> 00:17:01.519 society. 00:17:01.519 --> 00:17:04.240 So in 2023, what is it we see? 00:17:04.240 --> 00:17:08.759 What is it you see by faith? 00:17:08.759 --> 00:17:16.159 To use a non-biblical illustration, we should be glass half full people, not by a humbug 00:17:16.160 --> 00:17:24.040 glass half empty people, because of who we serve and because of what He's done for us. 00:17:24.040 --> 00:17:27.320 So very briefly, what do we see? 00:17:27.320 --> 00:17:28.600 Do we see grapes or giants? 00:17:28.600 --> 00:17:33.400 And that's a challenge that only you can answer and only I can answer for myself. 00:17:33.400 --> 00:17:36.480 Very often it's giants, isn't it? 00:17:36.480 --> 00:17:39.960 Very briefly, the second question is, what do we do? 00:17:39.960 --> 00:17:43.800 Do we praise or do we protest? 00:17:43.799 --> 00:17:49.079 And that just takes us to the New Testament story of Paul and Silas who were in prison. 00:17:49.079 --> 00:17:52.720 See, it wasn't easy for them. 00:17:52.720 --> 00:17:58.759 It might be easy for some other Christians in life, but it wasn't easy for Paul and Silas. 00:17:58.759 --> 00:18:00.919 They were imprisoned for sharing their faith. 00:18:00.919 --> 00:18:07.399 It was midnight, it was probably blooming cold, and they had been flogged. 00:18:07.399 --> 00:18:12.119 And they might have well have been there saying, well, why on earth am I here in prison? 00:18:12.119 --> 00:18:13.119 Why are we in prison? 00:18:13.119 --> 00:18:15.439 We're doing a lot of such amazing work. 00:18:15.439 --> 00:18:24.279 The other apostles seemed to have it easy, really sore in pain and cold and in chains, 00:18:24.279 --> 00:18:25.279 and they were praising. 00:18:25.279 --> 00:18:27.119 They were praising at that moment. 00:18:27.119 --> 00:18:30.079 Why were they praising at that moment? 00:18:30.079 --> 00:18:34.879 Because they could see grapes. 00:18:34.879 --> 00:18:37.519 They could see the promises. 00:18:37.519 --> 00:18:40.879 They were entrusting themselves to the living God. 00:18:40.879 --> 00:18:42.879 They didn't feel like grasshoppers there. 00:18:42.880 --> 00:18:48.240 They didn't feel like the opposition was so gigantic, and it was the Roman Empire after 00:18:48.240 --> 00:18:49.240 all. 00:18:49.240 --> 00:18:52.160 But they had the spirit of Caleb. 00:18:52.160 --> 00:18:55.120 We can certainly do this. 00:18:55.120 --> 00:18:56.120 God is with us. 00:18:56.120 --> 00:18:57.720 We're doing His will. 00:18:57.720 --> 00:19:05.240 And very shortly, it became evident why God had them imprisoned, because He had a prison 00:19:05.240 --> 00:19:12.160 officer that He wanted them to share faith with, and He and all His households became 00:19:12.160 --> 00:19:18.440 Christians, and who knows the power and significance of that in their lives? 00:19:18.440 --> 00:19:24.920 The temptation for us always, isn't it, is to protest rather than praise. 00:19:24.920 --> 00:19:26.080 It's so hard. 00:19:26.080 --> 00:19:27.880 This is so difficult, Lord. 00:19:27.880 --> 00:19:33.080 Let's just, we just want to hunker down until judgment day in a kind of survival mode. 00:19:33.080 --> 00:19:37.160 Just go underground until it's all ended. 00:19:37.160 --> 00:19:42.560 Within a spiritual drought, helpless, hopeless conditions for blessing, I'm such a rubbish 00:19:42.560 --> 00:19:46.680 Christian compared to others and what I see around me. 00:19:46.680 --> 00:19:50.640 There's just giants all over the place in my life. 00:19:50.640 --> 00:19:51.880 Where are you, God? 00:19:51.880 --> 00:19:54.320 I feel like I'm in prison. 00:19:54.320 --> 00:19:59.320 I feel I'm in a hopeless situation spiritually. 00:19:59.320 --> 00:20:02.279 Look how easy other Christians have it. 00:20:02.279 --> 00:20:06.680 Envious, jealous, mistrusting of them. 00:20:06.680 --> 00:20:11.480 So we protest, we stamp our feet at God. 00:20:11.480 --> 00:20:15.160 We're Protestants after all. 00:20:15.160 --> 00:20:18.519 Maybe that's why we protest so much. 00:20:18.519 --> 00:20:26.120 But praise is impossible, but that's what makes praise so significant. 00:20:26.120 --> 00:20:29.519 It's kind of easy to praise when everything is going smoothly. 00:20:29.519 --> 00:20:32.720 Well, it's just run of the mill, isn't it? 00:20:32.720 --> 00:20:42.240 But when we can praise God in the darkness, in what seems like a prison cell, that's what 00:20:42.240 --> 00:20:46.759 makes it so radically life-transforming. 00:20:46.759 --> 00:20:52.600 When we know that He takes even the hardest circumstances in our lives and will turn them 00:20:52.600 --> 00:20:59.440 on their head for our good, nothing and nobody else can do that. 00:20:59.440 --> 00:21:04.799 And even when the circumstances keep hitting us, keep batting us, He can take us through 00:21:04.799 --> 00:21:05.960 them. 00:21:05.960 --> 00:21:12.840 He can enable us to not just survive, but to praise Him. 00:21:12.840 --> 00:21:16.600 Nothing and nobody can enable you to do that. 00:21:16.600 --> 00:21:24.120 I empower you to do that unless it's the living God who has shown you His victory and has shown 00:21:24.119 --> 00:21:30.399 you His love and has shown you His purposes and plan for your future, which is the promised 00:21:30.399 --> 00:21:31.559 land. 00:21:31.559 --> 00:21:42.119 So in a world of impossibilities, and I kind of slow to use the word resolutions because 00:21:42.119 --> 00:21:48.079 I know they generally don't go much past the end of January, but are we going to see grapes 00:21:48.079 --> 00:21:56.399 or giants, and in whom are we going to trust as we go into this beautiful new year that 00:21:56.399 --> 00:21:58.079 He is ordained for us? 00:21:58.079 --> 00:22:00.399 I mean, let's pray. 00:22:00.399 --> 00:22:07.000 Father God, we ask and pray for Your grace, for Your help, for faith to see. 00:22:07.000 --> 00:22:09.679 We know we can't do these things on our own. 00:22:09.679 --> 00:22:16.079 We know You've already gifted us freely salvation and forgiveness and hope and a future. 00:22:16.079 --> 00:22:24.119 These are Your gifts, and will You not then withhold from us every single thing we need 00:22:24.119 --> 00:22:29.199 to enable us to continue and to grow and to develop as Christians? 00:22:29.199 --> 00:22:34.759 Whatever our circumstances, whatever we face, Lord God, we pray and ask that we would have 00:22:34.759 --> 00:22:38.919 the spirit of Caleb, we can certainly do it. 00:22:38.920 --> 00:22:50.880 Not in some kind of just motivational talk, motivational chat, but with the eye of faith, 00:22:50.880 --> 00:22:58.080 recognizing Your purposes and plans, and Your promises never to leave us nor forsake us, 00:22:58.080 --> 00:23:05.640 and to transform us and to take us home, and to give us an inheritance that is eternal, 00:23:05.640 --> 00:23:12.680 that death will be defeated, and that the future is unbelievably great. 00:23:12.680 --> 00:23:15.920 Reminders of these things, in Jesus' name we pray. 00:23:15.920 --> 00:23:37.920 Amen.