Out with the Old, In with the New

You have been handed a new book.

Its pages are blank.

Its spine is stiff and the paper smells fresh.

You crack open the ledger and thumb through the crisp pages.

All empty.

Not a single line of prose.

Not a single jotting of a memory.

Not a single letter, sign or symbol.

Every space available.

Every room a vacancy.

Every chapter void.

What will you do with this diary?
Is your memoir a mystery, comedy, or tragedy?

What would the title read?

The chapters?

Will you do with this diary the same as you did with last year's?

Will you write within its pages the same verses, the same resolves, the same worries?

What if, instead of being bound within the binding of yesterday,
you could scribble new dreams?
What if your journal, instead of failure, recorded fruition?
Instead of regret, rejoicing?
Instead of fear, faith?


But, despite your own determination,

your quest for perfection is unattainable.

Your hunt for holiness, useless.

However, the hero in our story defends our honor.
The villain who would hinder and sabotage our deliverance is bested and crushed!
Our worthless virtue becomes exquisite beauty.

Since God reconciled us through Jesus,

we all get a fresh start with new mercies and new grace.

Every single day.

Every single page.

Every single line.

As you pick up your pen to write in your new year's book, 
within the narrative will you record the truth, when confronted with lies?
Will you testify to hope when driven to despair?
Will you submit to His authority as the Author and Publisher of your faith?


 If you belong to Christ, you are a new creation. 
The old things have gone; everything is made new!


What a note-worthy novel yours will be!