LET US TAKE TIME TO REFLECT AND PRAY AS WE ENTER INTO NEW YEAR
1. General Evaluation about the joys and challenges of the year 2020,
·
Family
·
Health = Corona Pandemic and others
·
Economy
·
Education
·
Formation
·
Friendship
·
Social life
·
The world in general
·
Etc
There have been a lot of challenges and joys which have
in these areas
2. Self-Evaluation in the past year:
What went well and what did not go on well, what can I do:·
In my spiritual life = prayer and spiritual
exercises --- Sins????
·
Social life = relationship with family,
community members, best friends, my fellows and every one
·
Psychological life and Emotional life =
any guilt holding you and me back to, unforgiveness, envy, resentment, anger,
despair, desolation, anxiety, fear, self-denial, unworthiness, addictions, loss,
joys and sorrows experienced this year, and many others
·
Physical life: do you like your size, how
do you see yourself In front of others, do you like your body and all your body
parts
·
Health Wise – how has been your health,
any serious illness, what threatened your health, did you take care of yourself
well, and others
·
Daily Activities: what were the successful
activities, what dint work, what went wrong, what might have caused you not to
achieve your set goals, how was the cooperation with others, procrastination, ignoring
activities, taking for granted, laziness, and all those associated with daily
activities etc
·
Authority. How did your respond to
authority, the decisions made by those in authority, any obedience you showed,
reactions to those in authority?
·
Charity and justice. How did people help
you in one way or the other, how many people did you help and how did you, how
did you respond to those in need, marginalized, abandoned, were you just in
business, market, area of responsibility, family, work, and how did you respond
to the injustices in your family, community, church, and the world in general?
Did you become indifferent? Etc
·
Set Goals and Vision. Did you achieve goal
of this year, or not? What might have gone wrong for you not to achieve your
goal, have you achieved the vision and intentions you had for this year, or not
and Why? Who came to your help?
·
Generally, which kind of person were you
to yourself, to your family, to your community, to your society, congregation,
and the world in general?
In all these do you see
the hand of God. Though some things may have seemed tough or unworthy to
behold, we have got more reasons to thank God for having enabled us reach this
day
3. New
Year intentions and Resolutions
With all these above how do you want 2021 to be for you?
· What
do you pray for? = intentions
· What
are your resolutions from the experience of the year 2020 and other years?
· What
are your targets and goals of this year?
· What
is the vison of the year?
· What
do you want to retain?
· What
do you want to let go?
· Where
do you want to develop = talents, and whole person growth?
· And
others
Write them on the paper…which will help you to evaluate
yourself at the end of the year.
4. SPIRITUAL
TIPS TO ENTER NEW YEAR: Scriptural
·
Look Back on His Blessings (Look to the Lord
and his strength; seek his face always. Remember the wonders he has done,
his miracles, and the judgments he pronounced, Psalms 105: 5; 1
Chronicles 16:11-12)
·
Focus on The
Future, And God’s Plans for You (e.g.,
For
I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and
not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Jeremiah
29:11)
·
Don’t Worry About
What Is to Come (Be anxious for nothing, but in everything
by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to
God. Philippians 4:6)
·
Plan Ahead for
The Coming Year (e.g., For which of you, intending to build a
tower, does not sit down first and count the cost, whether he has enough to
finish it—lest, after he has laid the foundation, and is not able to finish,
all who see it begin to mock him, saying ‘This man began to build and was not
able to finish’?” Luke 14:28-30)
·
Find Contentment in
God This Year, And Give Thanks (e.g.
Not
that I speak from want, for I have learned to be content in whatever
circumstances I am. I know how to get along with humble means, and I also know
how to live in prosperity; in any and every circumstance I have learned the
secret of being filled and going hungry, both of having abundance and suffering
need. I can do all things through Him who strengthens me. Philippians
4:11-13)
5. GUINDING
AND CONSOLING SCRIPTURES
1.
Exodus 14… Don’t be afraid, move forward…for
all will know that I am the Lord
· A
pillar of cloud – so that all your problems won’t see you again
· Pillar
of fire – to show God’s presence in your life, the Lord is with you and cannot
leave you alone
· Pharaoh’s
army drowned and so all our worries and problems
As the Lord
enabled Israelites pass through Red Sea, and so he will enable us pass through
this year with safety, new blessing and renewed hearts
2.
Look back on your blessing and how God is promising
more blessings on your way….
Look to the Lord and his strength; seek his face always. Remember the
wonders he has done, his miracles, and the judgments he pronounced…1
Chronicles 16:11-12. The Lord again says "I will make you into a
great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will
be a blessing Genesis 12: 2. This year you will be a blessing and all yours will be
blessed. Claim these blessings now.
Even if you have endured such a year as Job had, you have so much for which to be thankful. No suffering or tragedy should overshadow the “love upon love, grace upon grace” (John 1:16) that God pours out over you. “Of His fullness we have all had a share” (John 1:16). The Lord has again “crowned the year” with His bounty (Ps 65:12). “Let us give thanks to the Lord our God. It is right and just”
“Give thanks to God the Father always and for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Ephesians 5:20). “Dedicate yourselves to thankfulness” (Col 3:15). “Let the last word be, He is all in all! Let us praise Him the more, since we cannot fathom Him, for greater is He than all His works” (Sir 43:28-29). Thank You, Jesus, for 2020. I love You with all my heart.
Start New Year by Looking at God’s Grace
NEW YEAR PRAYER
Lord Jesus, I thank you
for all the blessings, protection, and all everything you have done for me in
the year 2020, which were not by merit but from your gratuitous abundant grace.
Thank You Lord. I come before at the beginning of the year 2021, to ask you for
forgiveness for what may have gone wrong, for the promises to you which I broke
and did not fulfil, for the sins I have committed against you and my neighbor, for
being a bad witness to your Holy Name, for hurting my fellows, for the things I
have done wrongly, for the things I did do and I ought to have done, for the
good I did wrongly, for the chances I have missed and have taken for granted,
for failing to live up to my vocation, for all the addictions, for failing to be faithful to you all the
time, and for all things I know and all those I have forgotten which are against
your will, and the common good.
Forgive me Lord and Renew
me, make me a new person and give me a new heart as I enter into this new year.
By your grace and love I place everything and my life into your hands, take it
and use it for your glory during this year 2021 and may I be a blessing and a
source of blessing to those who will see, heart, talk, relate and be with me.
Make me a sign of your presence to everyone this year and may my life make
others give you glory in heaven.
I pray for your Holy
Spirit during this year, to lead, guide and rule my life. Shower me with all
the blessings I need this year to do your will and to live a life of peace,
happiness and harmony with myself and others. I pray for all the gifts, talents
and virtues to come and fill me. Develop the good that is me, give me more
goods in my life, and dispel all traces of darkness and evil acts in me so that
I will live for you and only you Lord. May I, at the end of this year, find all
my dreams, goals and visions of this year, and may next year also find me
praising and glorifying your name always. Be with me always until the end of my
life. Amen
New Year Blessing
The LORD bless us
and keep us! The LORD shine his face upon us, and be gracious to us! The LORD look upon us kindly and give us peace! HAPPY NEW YEAR 2021
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