A Blessed Hope
New Year’s Day is really no different than any other day. The clock keeps ticking through the night, and the sun rises as expected –right on time. We change a page on the calendar, and life goes on. However some face each New Year with fear…fear of the unknown. The list of fears, or phobias, that people have are in the hundreds. They range from ablutophobia: a fear of washing or bathing, toxanthophobia: fear of the word yellow, to peladophobia: fear of bald people. Are you kidding me!? I’m one of the nicest people you will ever meet, and my diminishing locks will never result in a reduction of my congeniality. Ok… I’m guilty. I used that last descriptive line to scare those with a fear of long words. Get ready for this. That phobia is hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliop
People often fear because they feel like that which has given them security to meet their needs will be taken away from them. The year 2014 comes with the enactment of hundreds of new laws across the country. Many of these laws reveal a further overstepping of an increasingly powerful government and a frightening disregard for our freedoms as citizens. Probably at the top is the implementation of Obamacare, the national healthcare plan that was quite plainly forced upon the American people. Literally millions have lost their current health plans as a result and are now wondering how they will be able to afford what was remarkably labeled the “Affordable Care Act.” With the price of gas bouncing between $3-4 per gallon, the mind-boggling increase in the cost of groceries, and a rusty truck with over 200,000 miles on it, I am among those wondering how I’m going to swing a new “bill” with an already tight budget. As you read this, chances are you are wondering the same thing.
To be perfectly honest with you, I don’t know how we will do it, and I don’t know what all else we will face in 2014. But there is one thing we can be sure of… Jesus promised to never leave us nor forsake us. As children of God we have no reason to fear. Are you one of His? Then you have that same promise! Be encouraged. Hope to the end. Our hope must not be in the government, but in the Almighty, and He is still on the throne.
Now that’s a blessed thought!