ONWARDS AND UPWARDS INTO THE NEW YEAR

A quick glance behind…
If you feel that you have made mistakes, taken wrong turns, even failed miserably at this or that, you’re in good company. Many of God’s heroes in the Bible did those same things, but they learned from their mistakes. And God came to them, sitting in the midst of failed dreams or disappointed hopes, and gave them a new reason to live.

That’s what He can do when we give up on our own plans and projects and decide to try His. He gives us goals to help us grow and move in the right direction, and then He helps us attain them. Give Him your heart and life, and let Him give you all the good things He has planned for you.
—Nana Williams

Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow.
—Albert Einstein (1879–1955)

The world is a book and every step turns a new page.
—Alphonse de Lamartine (1790–1869)

A story is told of an elderly woman who slipped and fell on a busy street. Several people quickly went to assist her, but she was already hoisting herself back up.
“I’m all right,” she assured them. “I always fall forwards, never backwards.”
When we’ve “taken a fall,” instead of dwelling on the mistake or hurt, let’s make it a fall forward by learning from it and looking to the future.
—Abi May

A steady look upward…
We are given a fresh start not only at the beginning of the year, but every morning when we wake up. We have the chance to start anew and make things right.
—Mottos for Success

To improve the golden moment of opportunity and catch the good that is within our reach is the great art of life.
—Samuel Johnson (1709–1784)

Look upon every day as the whole of life, not merely as a section; and enjoy and improve the present without wishing, through haste, to rush on to another.
—Jean Paul (1763–1826)

Let us labor to be like unto angels, “strengthened with all might,” walking about the world as conquerors, able to do all things through Christ which strengthens us.
—John Trapp (1602–1669)

All of us carry the future in us, the hopes, the dreams, the good and the evil, the potential to create a better world, if we can only make the right choices, if we are only willing to pay the price, to search for the goal and reach out for it.

We all search for love at some time or other, and so love will come to us. But how will we treat it when it arrives? For love might come to you as a princess, or as a beggar, or a slave; majestic and glorious, or uncomely and in rags, and void of respect. Though we cannot choose who we are when we are born, and what kind of life we get born into, still we can choose how to live our lives and what kind of person we will be when our earthly path ends.
—Colin C. Bell

I am willing to go anywhere, anywhere, anywhere—so long as it’s forward.
—David Livingstone (1813–1873)

A teacher took her primary school students to the assembly hall for a lesson with a difference. Standing at the foot of the steps leading up to the stage, she asked, “Is anybody good at jumping?”
Quite a few young hands shot up.
“Well,” she continued, “could any of you jump from the floor here up onto the stage?”
No hands went up this time.
“I can,” said the teacher, “and I’ll show you how.” Beginning at the foot of the steps leading up to the stage, she hopped onto the first step. From there she hopped onto the second, and so on until she reached the top.
Many things can only be accomplished little by little, step by step. When a task looks daunting or the way ahead too steep, just take it one step at a time.
—Abi May

Lord, when you call us to live and work for you,
Give us the wisdom to remember
That it is not the beginning
But the faithful continuing of the task
That is most important in your eyes,
Until we have completed it to the best of our ability;
Through Jesus Christ, our Lord,
Who laid down his life for us
In order to finish your work.
—Sir Francis Drake (c. 1540–1596)

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Acts 2:38 ESV / And Peter said to them, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.

Matthew 24:22 ESV / And if those days had not been cut short, no human being would be saved. But for the sake of the elect those days will be cut short.

2 Peter 3:3-4 ESV / Knowing this first of all, that scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires. They will say, “Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation.”