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Numbers 6:22-27 The LORD said to Moses, “Tell Aaron and his sons, `This is how you are to bless the Israelites. Say to them: “` “The LORD bless you and keep you; the LORD make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you; the LORD turn his face toward you and give you peace.” ‘ “So they will put my name on the Israelites, and I will bless them.”

Another New Year lay before us. Let us first of all thank God for the gift of this coming year, and place it at the feet of our God who created time and entered it in the person of His Son, ask His blessing upon this year, and receive that blessing with rejoicing.

I think the passage above from Numbers, which you may recognize as the Aaronic Benediction, is a perfect blessing to begin 2025. It gives to each of you the promise of His presence with you as you live your day to day lives.

Something that you need to understand is that this Benediction is more than just pious wishful thinking. It is an actual conferral. Through this Benediction, something is actually given and received. The name of God is placed upon you three times, giving you pause to remember grace, mercy, forgiveness and peace. His name is placed upon you just as it was in Holy Baptism. You are God’s! What a wonderful thing to hear each week in worship, but also every other day of your life!

The LORD bless you and keep you! May he bless you with His unfailing love and presence. May His hand rest upon you and supply you with His grace in Jesus Christ to sustain you. May you hear His word of promise, “I am with you as you go.” May He keep you from physical, emotional and material misfortune. May He keep you from the clutches of the evil one who would tempt you and draw you away from God. May He keep you close to Himself until He takes you to your heavenly home.

The LORD make his face shine upon you and be gracious unto you. May His eyes look upon you, His mouth smile upon you, His ears be ever attentive to your cries. May He delight in what you do. May He rejoice that you have believed the message of His salvation in Jesus Christ, and that you let that Gospel light shine in your life. May he look upon you with joy simply because He is gracious to you for the sake of His Son. For His look is a look of mercy and compassion and love.

The LORD LORD turn his face toward you and give you peace. Again the author refers to the face of God. The King James Version has “The Lord lift up His countenance upon you,” which means His face. In the Old Testament, when a king lifts up his face toward one of his subjects, that means he grants his request and is merciful to him. When used of God, it means that He hears our prayers and answers them according to His grace and mercy in Jesus. He looks upon you with favor.

It is that grace and mercy of God that gives us peace. Peace comes when we trust Jesus Christ. Peace comes when we accept God’s will for our lives. Peace comes in knowing that Christ has paid for sin so that we are now forgiven, redeemed, and washed clean by the blood of the Lamb. Peace allows you to live each day that God gives in confidence and joy. You are at peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, and you await the final hope of heaven.

A new year awaits us. Remember that a baby was born, a baby that deserves your attention and admiration. Begin this New Year reflecting and rejoicing over that birth in Bethlehem’s stable. You have no idea what the year will bring. The days might be productive or painful, the nights may be restless or refreshing. But through it all, the blessing of God rests upon you. He has put His name on you. No matter what the year brings, you are His.

The Lord Bless you and Keep you.
The Lord make His face shine upon you and be gracious unto you.
The LORD turn his face toward you and give you peace.

Psalm 98:4 Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth, burst into jubilant song with music;

No more let sins and sorrows grow, Nor thorns infest the ground;
He comes to make His blessings flow Far as the curse is found…

That is something worth singing about. The curse of sin has been defeated for us. Life is different when you know Jesus. It would be nice to think that all problems disappeared, but that doesn’t happen. Instead, Christians are given the ability to cope with the problems of this world. The blessings of God are poured out upon His faithful disciples. Knowing what God has done for you in Jesus enables you to face whatever comes your way in the sure and certain hope that you are forgiven and that you have eternal life. If you would draw on that strength and certainty every day, what could possibly come up that you could not face?

Psalm 98:9 let them sing before the LORD, for he comes to judge the earth. He will judge the world in righteousness and the peoples with equity.

He rules the world with truth and grace And makes the nations prove
The glories of His righteousness, And wonders of His love…

Righteousness has become ours in Christ. We live under the gracious rule of the one who gave himself for us to redeem us from death and the grave. There is certainly nothing wrong with remembering the incarnation of Jesus, His birth as a man, all year long. That is why this hymn is suitable for the entire year as well. Jesus becoming man enables us to relate to Him on our level. And it was the fact that He took on human flesh and became one of us that allowed Him to pay the price for our sins. God’s justice demanded that a man pay the price for man’s sins, and Jesus was truly a man. Yet He was also fully God, so He was able to make payment for the sins of all people, offering His perfect, sinless life as an acceptable offering to pay the penalty.

We have this joy, this certainty, that transcends everything else in life. Tears and sorrow and suffering and sadness and trials and heartaches are all tempered by the surpassing joy of having heard what the angels proclaimed to those shepherds just outside of Bethlehem:

Luke 2:10-11 … “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord.”

 Joy to the World, the Lord is Come.

Psalm 98:7-8 Let the sea resound, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it. Let the rivers clap their hands, let the mountains sing together for joy;

Joy to the earth, the Savior reigns! Let men their songs employ,
While fields and floods, rocks, hills and plains Repeat the sounding joy..

The love and faithfulness of God that led Him to deliver us deserves to be acknowledged. Verses 4-6 of Psalm 98 tell us to burst into jubilant song with singing and instruments, making our joy known. The next verses, 7-8, speak of the sea and the world, everything in the water and everything on the land, all creation joining in the hymn of joy. After all, God is the God of all creation. Paul spoke along these same lines in Romans:

Romans 8:19-22 The creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time.

 When man sinned, not only did they bring destruction on themselves, but they corrupted all of creation. The world is not the place God intended it to be because sin has entered the picture. This was not God’s plan. With sin, all that was in our future was punishment. That is why God stepped in and brought joy to the world by revealing His Son as our Savior. He liberates us, and those who cling to Him in faith are truly free. Creation itself anticipates the renewal, the new heaven and earth, the home of those made righteous by God’s grace through faith in Jesus Christ. The Psalmist encourages all creation to join us in our songs of praise, even as Jesus said they would on Palm Sunday.

Luke 19:37–40 When he came near the place where the road goes down the Mount of Olives, the whole crowd of disciples began joyfully to praise God in loud voices for all the miracles they had seen: “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!” “Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!” Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to Jesus, “Teacher, rebuke your disciples!” “I tell you,” he replied, “if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.”

Hebrews 11:1 Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.

Faith is something we use everyday whether we realize it or not. I’m speaking of faith in general. When you wake up in the morning and tell Alexa to turn on the lights, or if you flip the switch on the wall, you have faith that the light will come on. When you step into the shower and turn on the faucet you have faith that you will not only have water, but that it will be clean and hot. When you compose and email or text and hit “send” you have faith that your message will reach the recipient.

Do you have the same kind of confidence in God? We should have the same kind of trust in God that we have unwittingly given to the electric company, the water utilities and the world wide web. But our faith in God should be a conscious thing. It should not be relegated to the background as a passive thing, but it should be active. Luther wrote about it this way:

Faith is God’s work in us, which transforms us and by which we are reborn from God. By faith the old Adam is crucified. Faith makes us entirely different in heart, in temper, in disposition and in all of our powers, and brings with it the Holy Spirit. This faith is a living, busy, active, powerful thing! It cannot do anything except good. It does not even ask which good works ought to be done; even before the question can be asked it has done them and is constantly at work doing good. (“Preface to Romans,” 1522)

Philippians 4:6 Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.

A faith that is living and active will all God to be living and active in our lives…in everything. Not just when the house is on fire. Not only when a loved one is severely ill, but in even the smallest matters of our lives, in normal day to day situations. Take everything to the Lord and place it in his strong and capable hands. You can bring the things the world considers unimportant to His attention and care. God wants you to be in communion with Him all day every day. When something tries you in any way, take it to the Lord. When you have a joyful experiences, speak to the Lord.

One of the themes of the Reformation was “sola fide,” faith alone. Our faith assures us of everlasting life because it clings to Jesus and all He did for us. This is our greatest blessing. But there is more to it. Faith allows us to cope with whatever comes our way while we are still in this life here on earth.

Live with complete confidence that your Savior will help you in your daily life.

We often live our lives as though we have all the time in the world. Yet we know that our time here is finite. I shared some thoughts yesterday on the phrase, “It’s Not the End of the World.” We say that to remind us to keep things in their proper perspective. And we know that the end of the world will indeed come. God told us that in His Word.

Christians have the certainty of a place prepared for them in heaven when that day comes.  The provisions have been readied. Our Lord promised it would all be in order.

John 14:2-3 In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.

And just a few verses later He tells us what it takes to get in:

John 14:6  I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

All that being said, can we really say that the end of the world is a bad thing? Not for those who have faith in Jesus! All that awaits the faithful is good. That is a comforting thought and should set your mind at ease.

Jesus tells you to Watch. The End is coming, whether it be your death or the end of time when He returns to announce His judgment on all men. But what about the time between now and the end of the world? Peter addressed that in his second letter.

2 Peter 3:10-13 But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare. Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to live holy and godly lives as you look forward to the day of God and speed its coming. That day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire, and the elements will melt in the heat. But in keeping with his promise we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, the home of righteousness.

It’s not the end of the world…Yet! As God graciously gives us more time here on earth, we have more opportunities to live more like Him, holy lives. We have more time to forgive those who have hurt us, to try to correct the wrongs we have done, to love as we have been loved. We put things in proper perspective by saying it is not the end of the world. And as those who know that Jesus has reconciled us to the Father, we can say  “It’s not the end of the world…Yet!” Because it is something we should look forward to … in faith. Come Lord Jesus, Come.

About twenty years ago I built a walkway to front of our house in Sherman. We had lived in that home for 15 years without a sidewalk to our front door. People would enter our house through the garage or the back door. Our house sat on a corner, and the driveway was on the side, so it was a long way to the front door. We wanted to put a paved, circular drive in out front, complete with a sidewalk to the door, but things kept getting in the way. Things like three sets of braces and college tuition and weddings and other obligations you have with three daughters. After years of putting things off and coming up with different ideas, I finally decided to build a walkway from the driveway on the side of the house over to the front porch: A “do-it-yourself” project. I sketched it all out and used a combination of an above ground deck or “board walk” and a path made out of landscape timbers, mulch and stepping stones. It turned out pretty well. To install the landscape timbers, I was using  rebar – metal rods that were about 18 inches long. I drilled holes in the timbers and drove the rebar through the timbers and into the ground to hold them in place. As I put the very last landscape timber into place, and drove the last piece of rebar into the ground, I stood up to survey the project. I was feeling pretty satisfied with myself. Then I turned around and saw my water meter box. For a brief instant I thought, “It’s a good thing I didn’t hit the water supply line with one of those pieces of rebar. I turned back around just in time to see up through the ground come-a-bubbling water – my water. Somehow I had managed to drive the very last piece of 3/8-inch rebar through a ¾-inch plastic pipe 14’’ under the ground. It went right through the center. I could not have made that shot if I was trying. I had to shut off the water and spend a day digging a trench along the water main so I could repair the break. Of course, a big portion of my walkway had to be torn up to repair the water line. Things had not worked out according to my plan.

I think that little home improvement project gives a description of our lives. We make plans for things, we try to carry them out, and we encounter unexpected problems along the way. Life is unexpected problems and situations that you encounter.

I don’t know what you think of John Lennon. I don’t think too much of him. But that member of the Beetles was credited with the following quote:  “Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.”

Things seldom go according to all the plans that we so carefully make. And how often do we make our plans and think they will be for the best, only to discover that God has something even better planned for us? The problem with many of the plans you and I make for our future is that we often neglect to ask God to show us His plans. Too often we make our plans and then ask God to bless them rather than asking His blessing first and that He would to lead us to His plan.

God wants you to  live in the confidence that you are safe in His keeping through faith in Jesus. He wants you to live as His child, in keeping with His will. That is why He sent Jesus to pay for your sins. Knowing that you have forgiveness changes you and how you live your life. I learned that a long time ago, and many of you did as well, when you memorized those words from Luther’s Small Catechism:  …that I may be His own and live under Him in His kingdom and serve Him in everlasting righteousness, innocence and blessedness…

God’s plan is that you believe in Jesus and live with the confidence that He is with you and that He wants only the best for you. He said as much to the crowds who followed Him:

John 6:28-29  Then they asked him, “What must we do to do the works God requires?” Jesus answered, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.”

God’s plan is that you believe in Jesus Christ so that you can have life, abundant life, here and in eternity.

1 Timothy 2:3b-4, and 7–”…God our Savior…wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. … And for this purpose I was appointed a herald and an apostle—I am telling the truth, I am not lying—and a teacher of the true faith to the Gentiles.”

With all of the conflicting coverage on the Presidential candidates, including their running mates, I was reminded of the old saying: “How can you know if a politician is lying?  His (or her) lips are moving!”

In our world today, we find people still struggling with the question Pilate asked the one on trial before him: “What is Truth?”  There are those who deny absolute truth by saying “you have your truth and I have mine.”

In this context it is somewhat ironic that the expression “If the truth be told” is still fairly common in our culture. We use it to fill people in on a situation so that they have the whole story. Sometimes it is difficult to distinguish truth from fiction, truth from half-truths, truth from “white lies.” Sometimes people don’t want the truth to be told. But people long for and need the truth in their lives. And as followers of Jesus, we have it, the truth that needs to be told.

Jesus said about Himself, “I am the way and the truth and the life.” (John 14:6). This is the truth everyone needs to know.

John 8:31–32 To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”

Jesus was and remained the truth, even in the midst of all the lies that were told about Him. And the truth took Him to the cross, where He died to establish the truth once and for all that God is our Savior, and that He does want “all men to be saved.” His death with your sins on Him and in Him saves you from the death you truthfully deserve.

God does not want you to keep this truth to yourself. If the truth is going to be told, you and I are the ones who have to do it! And if the truth be told, what God wants for all people will happen. “God our Savior … wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.” That sets the vision for your mission and purpose in life. If the truth of the Gospel be told, people will come to believe in the truth, because the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Truth, will bring them to faith.