A New Year to Behold

I came across a ‘view’ in the flood account of Genesis 6-8 that seems relevant as we all look out on this new year.  With the prevalence of New Year’s resolutions and aspirations, it’s interesting to note how self-focused they typically are.  It’s good to grow in knowledge, career, strength and health, no doubt, but it’s all relatively meaningless if first things are not indeed first.    

Genesis 6:13 says, “Then God said to Noah, ‘The end of humanity has come before Me; for the earth is filled with violence because of people; and behold, I am about to destroy them with the earth”.  Here, we see the reality of the severity of sin, and God’s perfect justice.  He is a just judge, and sin must be judged.  Later, in Genesis 8, we see the culmination of the flood account as the waters recede and Noah looks out from the ark.  Genesis 8:13 says, “Now it came about in the six hundred and first year, in the first month, on the first of the month, the water was dried up from the earth.  Then Noah removed the covering of the ark, and looked, and behold, the surface of the ground was dried up”.  Here, we see God’s perfect mercy, and the reality of the good provision of the ark for the salvation of Noah and his family.   

We just recently experienced another first day of the first month, and many were ‘looking’ and ‘beholding’ of the temporal hopes of the new year.  Maybe before we embark on the pursuit of New Year’s resolutions, let us make sure our foundation is in ‘beholding’ the reality of life that is everlasting, of eternal significance, and to the glory of God.  As we begin this new year, let us:

·      Behold the reality of the severity of sin, and be beholding to a holy and just God who cannot let sin go unpunished. 

·      Behold the reality of Jesus, our Ark, who took upon Himself the sin of the world on that torturous Cross in the most tragic story known to man, and behold that when the world seemed most hopeless and out of control, God was most in control, reconciling the world to Himself. 

·      Behold His resurrection, the new life He gives us in Him, the reality of the Holy Spirit’s indwelling and that “He will never leave us or forsake us”, and the miraculous and undeserved dry ground before us. 

 God could have dried up the flood waters and allowed Noah to ‘behold’ the dry ground any day of the year, but the Scripture tells us it was the first day of the first month, and maybe that’s important for us too. 

 As a concluding thought, it’s interesting to think through all the things that are culturally relevant and universally embraced, and consider where they originated from and what their logical conclusion is.  In thinking about all the self-focused New Year’s resolutions, if we’re not pursuing them for the glory of God, for whose glory are they?  Consider the words of 2 Corinthians 4:3-5, “And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they will not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.  For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake”. 

 There is a god of this world (Satan) who continually runs counterfeit to the things of God, and the counterfeit usually is masked in something seemingly innocent.  If it’s not for the glory of God, it’s a worship of something else, and a veil has been set.  Noah’s view unveiled the Light of the gospel; may this be our view too.  As the apostle Paul says, let us not proclaim ourselves, except ourselves as servants for Jesus’ sake, and Christ as Lord.