God Knows No Time

How did you ring in 2020?

I don’t mean how did you celebrate on New Year’s Eve or what are your plans for January 1.

Spiritually and theologically, how are you ringing in the New Year?

What are you preaching to yourself about the year gone by and the year to come?

• What are you facing this year that you wish you could avoid?
• Where would you like to take back choices and redo decisions from last year?
• What about 2020 makes you feel troubled, inadequate, weak, defeated, overwhelmed, alienated, or alone?
• When in 2019 did you look over the fence and wish you had someone else’s life?
• If you could change a couple of things about the year you are facing, what would they be?
• Where did your plans drip like sand through your fingers last year?

Do thoughts of the past tend to flood you with regret, and visions of the future make you a bit afraid?

What are you preaching to yourself about the year gone by and the year to come?

Time.
We think so much of
moments
days
years
times past
things to come.
We deal with so much
regret of the past
fear of the future
confusion in the present.
For us
time passes quickly
we miss a moment
days drag on.
We
anticipate what’s coming
hold on to what’s gone.
Time
holds us
molds us
controls us.
Thankfully
God knows no time
never expects
never regrets
no looking forward
no glancing back
no surprises
no mysteries
nothing unexpected.
God dwells in an
eternal now.
All that he is
he has forever been
and will forever be.
With him there is no
growth
change
becoming.
He is security’s foundation
time’s sovereign.
In a world where
everything is ever
changing.
He is a rock of
secure
unchanging
eternal hope.

To think that yesterday, today, 2019, or 2020 is out of control is to forget that Jesus reigns for your sake and his glory.

Yes, life in a fallen world does confront you with your smallness, weakness, and lack of control, but it doesn’t leave you there. The Bible declares the opposite. It tells us that the difficulties that we face every day, the seeming chaos that regularly greets us, are not the result of the world being out of control, but the result of the reign of One who is in complete control.

The Apostle Paul says in Ephesians 1:22, “And he [God] put all things under his [Christ’s] feet and gave him as head over all things to the church” (the explanations in brackets are mine).

So no matter how chaotic 2019 looked or how bleak 2020 is looking, your world is not out of control; no, it’s under careful rule.

Right now, Jesus rules over all things for the sake of you, his child. This is where peace is to be found.

God bless,

Paul Tripp

Reflection Questions

1. What was the highlight of 2019 for you? What does this reveal about your values?

2. What was the hardest moment in 2019 for you? How has God used hard moments in the past to transform and redeem you?

3. What are you most looking forward to in 2020? How can you enjoy this while using it to draw you closer to your Lord?

4. What are you most dreading about 2020? What does the gospel have to say about this?

5. How can you be more intentional about ministry and evangelistic opportunities in 2020? What comforts might you be required to sacrifice to be more obedient to God’s call?