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I have never been a big fan of New Year’s Eve! I mean- to me- it’s a big to do about absolutely nothing! And as much as I love New York City- the one time I know you will never catch me there is on December 31st crammed together with thousands upon thousands of others with no other purpose other than to watch a ball drop! I can just hear me out there with my bladder about to explode because there is no restroom for me to find in sight shouting with glee, “Oh boy- Look at the ball drop!” When did a dropped ball become a reason to applaud? A dropped ball is never a good thing in baseball, or even football so why should it be the accepted traditional glorious way to welcome in a new year? Can’t we come up with a better reason to resonate our joy than by clapping over what would otherwise just be recognized as an error?

Now, It would be totally different if when the ball dropped all our debts would be cancelled! Or when the ball dropped- all our relationships would be healed- or all our loved ones would be alive and well again- and all of our world would finally be at peace! But none of those things happen at midnight! All that does occur is that the throngs of people who have had way too much to drink will make way too big a mess and somehow stumble home in the wee small hours of the new day to everything being the same as it was! What’s so happy about that? Actually, I believe that the best our society can muster up is to gives us lots of artificial noise and empty bells and whistles with nothing of genuine substance to truly wrap our hearts around? I still don’t really understand what those who don’t recognize Christmas as being the remembrance of the birth of Jesus are actually getting from celebrating December 25th? There has got to be more than just revisiting Saturnalia!
What’s so great about a Winter Solstice if the days getting longer don’t produce any hope or light or life? And what’s so great about another year if there is not true meaning and purpose waiting for you at 12:01? We all need more than just leftover trash to clean up on January 1st or a nasty hangover to get over!

Without God, what starts out with bells and whistles usually peters out and results in just another overwhelming mess that somebody still needs to clean up! There is no long term paradise for anybody who attempts to take a shortcut to prepare a party that celebrates nothing! On the other hand, with God in the midst of the mess with you- what might begin with a sense of emptiness, loneliness, loss and frustration- will surely end in a divine dance with destiny that will give you a joy that will be true blue no matter what the calendar might say! And what might begin with a singing of the blues- will culminate with a choir chanting a suite of the colors of the rainbow that no eyes has yet seen, nor ear has heard nor mind has conceived what holy hoopla that God has in store for those who trust him through it all! We don’t need a man-made event when we have a God working behind our scenes to create a scenario that won’t end with our feet cemented in defeat!

On a hill far away where that old rugged cross stood- in a garbage dump aptly named Golgotha- in what appeared to be the most humiliating moment for the Lord Jesus- as he hung there on a tree being crucified for you and me- in a situation that nobody thought was worth dropping a ball over- actually led to a mess not to clean up- but to a crowd-pleasing chorus via the heavenly host that rocked and kicked the hell out of death and darkness! The sin that would have condemned us was totally paid for so that we could know what it is like to be eternally free and forever alive! Chains would not be an instrument of eternity because Jesus linked himself to a passionate procession of pain that purposely paraded into a prize that people like you and I would possess permanently! And that is something to shout about!

It may be just another New Year’s Eve- but it doesn’t have to be one more another ordinary day that is part of a wretched week that flows into a mediocre month!!! This could be the year that your blockbuster best selling autobiography begins and breaks out to the big bang of a beautiful brass band because your soul is finally going to be set free from trying to find your future and purpose on empty pages that wander aimlessly looking for a destination on a dead-end street! God wants to take you and make you the masterpiece that he always intended you to be! Look up for something more than a ball dropping! Look up and see you in the hands of the One who made the stars and the sky and the universe and thought up the dazzling colors of a sunrise and sunset! If he can do all that with creation- just think what he can create in you and through you! The same God who put the stars in the sky is committed to keep you on a course to shine for him as his way becomes your high way!

So Happy New Year that calls out of hibernation a new you and me- people who will be all that the Lord intended us to be! And that’s something to sing and jump and shout and knock ourselves out about! But this time we won’t be dropping the ball- but be a personal part of God’s catch of the day- and I can’t sit down over that one!