New Beginnings

Introduction

It’s good to see so many of you here this morning. Many of our own number are traveling or sick or no doubt pretending to be sick. There’s probably a fourth category of those who are here who are thinking, why didn’t I think of pretending to be sick? But it’s good to see you, especially those who are visiting. I’m seeing faces that I haven’t seen in a while, and it is certainly good to see you here. In the past 20 or so years, I’ve done various, I would say, levels of preaching, where sometimes I was preaching twice every Sunday, every week of the month for months on end. And at that time, I tried to stay away from the cliches. You know, you get to around July 4th, and you expect to hear a sermon about perhaps freedom in Christ.

And there’s the ever popular Thanksgiving time sermon of being thankful and the importance of being thankful. And I just try to, I tend to stay away or try to stay away from being cliche. But being the I don’t know, third, fourth, twelfth string preacher here, I just couldn’t help myself with it being the last Sunday before the new year. You know, the fact is there are a lot of new beginnings in life, and it is just perfect timing to stand before you and talk about my thoughts behind what it means to have a new beginning and how maybe as Christians we ought to approach new beginnings. It’s easy, and we’ll talk about this in a moment. It’s easy to think about all of the possibilities and the potential and all the good things, and it’s especially easy to think about the time that has passed in context of the negatives and the struggles and the difficulties.

As you perhaps have been or might soon be reflecting on the year 2025, no doubt you’re going to think of some of the difficult things that you’ve dealt with. Some of the good things. Perhaps the good overshadows the bad, perhaps it doesn’t. And if the good does not overshadow the bad, perhaps you anticipate a better 2026. A better opportunity, a turning of the page, a blank slate where you have the ability to create those new adventures, those good things, the positive changes that you wish you may have done this year. And so this morning we’re going to look especially at the children of God in the Old Testament, the Israelites, and consider what we can learn from the idea of new beginnings in 2025 going into 2026.

1. Every New Beginning Comes From Some Other Beginning's End

Maybe you’ve heard the great philosopher Semisonic who once wrote, Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end. But that’s true.

If you’re watching a TV show, you don’t get to a new episode without finishing the old one. If you’re an avid book reader, you don’t get finished with what you don’t start with a new chapter without finishing one or start with a new book without finishing one, unless you’re Star Wars and you start in episode four. But generally speaking, we don’t encounter something new until something old has been done with. The only way to get into something new, a new chapter, a new era of life, a new beginning, is to deal with the end. If you turn over in your Old Testament to Exodus, we’re going to overview a few chapters without looking at any specific verses to start with. But in Exodus chapter 6, God promises deliverance of his people from slavery in Egypt.

God’s people were stuck being the slaves of the Egyptians of Pharaoh and doing their bidding. One of their jobs was to make bricks. And in fact, when you get to the portion of Exodus between chapters 7 and 11, where the plagues begin, Pharaoh gets angry and says, Well, you’re going to keep making bricks, but now we’re not going to give you any supplies, and you’re going to keep having to make the same number of bricks. But God in chapter 6 of Exodus promises deliverance from Egypt. Beginning in chapter 7, going through chapter 11 of Exodus, God sends ten plagues onto Egypt to assert his position as the one true God, to show that Pharaoh is not all that he thinks he is. Pharaoh believes himself to be a God.

Pharaoh believes himself to be above any other entity. Historians would tell us that Egypt at this point in time was one of the world’s superpowers. And God wants to show Pharaoh and show his own people of Israel that he’s in charge, that he’s the boss, that he’s the one who dictates what happens, when it happens, and how it happens. And in Exodus chapter 12, Pharaoh finally has enough. Pharaoh finally gets the message, and he lets God’s people go. Israel was essentially slave labor for the Egyptians. Being forced to make bricks, and it was obviously difficult work. Can you imagine being outside making bricks? That’s hard for me to imagine. I happen to be fortunate enough to sit in an air-conditioned room at a computer all day and not have to work in the heat of the sun.

But I can imagine, when I go out to mow the yard, I can imagine what it might be like to have to work in the heat all day. And no doubt there are some here who do that. And that is strenuous labor. It was obviously difficult, especially when Pharaoh mandated that now they had to get their own supplies while requiring the same output. And yet, I have to imagine that God’s people yearned for freedom. Brick by brick, minute by minute, hour by hour, when is God going to get us out of this place? When is God going to be God and set his people free? When is God going to do something? After hardening Pharaoh’s heart through the plagues, and ultimately causing him to relent, God grants his people the freedom that in my head I imagined they have been begging for.

Take long for God’s people to look back fondly on those days of Egypt. And as I was studying this and reading through various parts of Exodus, it was it was a little shocking to be reminded of how quickly they were set free from Egypt, and they turned right around and said, Boy, I wish we could go back there. Life was good when we were slaves and we had to make bricks in the heat of the sun. In Exodus chapter 16, beginning in verse 1, the account says that they set out from Elam, and all the congregation of the people of Israel came to the wilderness of sin, which is between Elam and Sinai on the 15th day of the second month after they had departed from the land of Egypt.

And the whole congregation of the people of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness. And the people of Israel said to them, Would that we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt when we sat by the meat pots and ate bread to the full. For you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger. In verse 1, in I’m sorry, in verse 2, it says that it was just about six weeks after they left Egypt. Six weeks when they had been enslaved for years and years and years, and all it took was six weeks for them to look back and encounter a little bit of hunger to say, Boy, I wish we could go back to Egypt.

I wish we could go back to slavery. You ever heard the phrase rose colored glasses? This is perhaps the epitome of that idea that you could be a slave to a world superpower and finally be set free and in some sort of absurdity want to go back. And yet that’s what God’s people wanted. They wanted to go back. Because they were only thinking from one specific perspective. They were only thinking about how hungry they were. I don’t know about you, I’ve been pretty hungry. I’ve never wanted to go be a slave in order to eat food. But that’s what God’s people wanted. They said, when we sat by the meat pots and ate bread to the full.

And you finally got that thing that you wanted so badly. And then in a very short time, it was like no big deal. We just celebrated the Christmas holiday, and perhaps those of you who are parents, especially if you have little kids, you got your kids the thing that they wanted. They’ve been wanting it for weeks or for months, and later that day on the 25th, they just kind of cast it aside because it’s old news.

Oh, we’re so hungry. And indeed, they very well may have been incredibly hungry. But to go from I am so hungry to, do you remember how awesome it was when we were in Egypt? To me, that’s that’s such a gap, such a divide that you have to cross to say, I’m so hungry, I wish I was back there. How could they possibly have had it better as slaves in Egypt than as free people who belong to God? And yet they weren’t seeing it. They were only feeling what they felt and thinking through that limited perspective. Sometimes the new chapter in life is difficult to accept. It seems pretty apparent to me that God’s people, to some extent, maybe not all of them, but to some extent, they were regretting their desire to leave slavery.

Sometimes going to a new chapter is not easy. Especially if you’ve had a chapter that is ending that was good. Those times in your life where everything feels like it’s been working out well, things have gone your way, God has answered your prayers in the way that you’ve wanted, in the time frame that you’ve wanted, and it’s just like everything comes together, and life couldn’t be better. And then one day something happens, something changes. You lose your job. A family member, a spouse passes away. You’re diagnosed with some sort of terminal illness, and all of a sudden, all of that perfection, all of the good, all of the things that you held so dear, are in the past. They’re not important anymore because of the new challenge that you have to face.

Where today could be the best day of your earthly life, but today could be the worst day of your earthly life. Maybe for those of you who are expecting Brent, this is one of those worst days.

I like things to be consistent and predictable. I prefer the known over the unknown. I can think about different times in my life where I was looking forward to something, and then things changed, and I had a hard time dealing with that change. Whether it was moving away to college or getting married or having a kid, those things can be curveballs. Those things can be different than what you thought they were going to be like. And yet, to experience newness, we have to accept that the old must be done away with.

2. New Beginnings Bring New Challenges

You’re going to face new challenges, and yet it can be incredibly easy to see the future through rose colored glasses. This is about the time of year when most people, at least in our culture, start thinking about next year and all the possibilities that lie ahead and the resolutions that they want to make, the things that they want to change for the new year because we’re turning it over a new leaf. We’re starting on January 1st. We have a whole entire year to be able to make life what we want it to be. Let me give you the typical top five New Year’s resolutions. In case you haven’t made any yet. One of the top five is usually health related. Maybe it’s exercising more, losing weight, eating healthier.

After the past couple of weeks that I’ve had of eating almost nothing but junk food, maybe those three will be in my top ten. All three of them. Exercise more, lose weight, eat healthier. Many people set financial resolutions or financial goals and they want to save more money. Maybe they’re trying to make a big purchase. Maybe they want to budget better or overall just improve their finances. They want next year to end financially in a better place than this year ended.

They want to spend more time with their family, or they want to spend more time with their friends, or maybe they want to figure out how to compartmentalize work more so that you spend less time or less mental energy with work and more time and more energy, mental energy with your family and friends. Maybe mental health is a resolution that is important to you. Improving your mental health, reducing stress. If anybody figures out how to reduce stress, please come talk to me. I would love to reduce stress, but it seems like the more that I try, the more stress just creeps in. Maybe I’m doing it wrong. And then rounding out the top five, many people like to learn. To learn a new skill, to learn a new hobby.

And when we look at January 1st, we look at the future. We look at this new chapter that is based on our calendar. And we might say to ourselves, well, once I get to January 1st, I’m going to do all these things. I’m going to make a budget. I’m going to set aside a specific amount of money to save or maybe to give to church. I’m going to decide that I’m only going to spend 50 hours a week at work instead of 60 hours. I’m going to go for a walk once a day. And we say, at this point in the future, life is going to be better. I’m going to make these changes. We vow to improve our lives, and we’re going to live with no regrets.

We’re going to accept no mediocrity like we did in 2025. Have you accepted mediocrity this year? Mediocrity of yourself? Have you accepted those times that you said, I’m going to do this, and then you didn’t, and you’re looking back and you’re saying, Well, that’s the old me. The new me in just a week is going to be drastically different. And we get to January 1st, and we feel the newness of the year and the excitement of change and creating a new life for ourselves and accomplishing all of these things that are important to us, that we care about, that are going to make our lives and the lives of people around us better. And on average, 80% of this excitement and change and potential is abandoned by February.

Most people who look at next year with rose-colored glasses and make all of these commitments have given up on them one month in. Kind of sounds like the Israelites, doesn’t it? Although it took them six weeks. Why? Why does this happen? Why do we look at the future and say, I’m gonna do these great things, I’m gonna make these great changes, and then not do them. Why do we give up by February? Well, it’s because inevitably we face a challenge to meeting those goals. Those who want to exercise more eventually, perhaps quickly, if you’re like me, get tired of their alarm going off any earlier than it absolutely has to. I’m gonna wake up and I’m gonna go for a walk, or I’m gonna wake up and I’m gonna lift some weights.

And my alarm goes off at 4 30, and I say, I could really use that extra 30 minutes of sleep before I gotta get up and deal with work. I’ll go for a walk tomorrow. That’s what I’ll do. Those who want to eat healthy, you’re absolutely committed, and you say, I’m gonna lose weight, I’m gonna exercise, I’m gonna eat healthy, and you’re committed to it until you have a bunch of errands to run and a bunch of tasks on your to do list, and you’re out and about, and you only have so much time, and fast food is right there. Well, I’ll just do this time, but tomorrow I’ll eat extra healthy. You’re said that tomorrow I’ll eat extra healthy. In my mind, that means a salad, and that’s not happening.

Those who want to save more money and improve their finances, they look at their budgets. Maybe you download one of those fancy budgeting apps, and you look at your spending habits, and you look at all the things, you watch the YouTube videos that tell you how to be financially successful in 2026 until you see that thing that you’ve been eyeing, and it’s on sale, but it’s not really a sale because they’ve jacked up the price and then lowered it, right? And you decide, you know what, I’m gonna go ahead and buy it. And suddenly you’re no better off than you were before because of the challenges that inevitably come our way.

And no doubt they would because who wants to be in that scenario? Who wakes up one day and says, This is what I want for my life, this is what I want for my future. I want to be entangled in slavery. And in my mind, I can just hear their complaints. And they would be warranted, in my opinion. We’re God’s people. I thought we were special. I thought God cared about us. Why are we slaves? Does God even know we exist at this point? Has he forgotten about us? Or maybe they said to themselves, if God loved us, we wouldn’t be sentenced to die in a foreign land as slaves.

You ever thought those thoughts about your own circumstances? Has God forgotten about me? Does God have better things to do? Is God working on more important things and he’s forgotten about me, or maybe he doesn’t care about me anymore? Satan’s good at what he does. And he can get those thoughts into our hearts and into our minds, even as children of God. If you go forward in Exodus to chapter 13 and verse 17, the account specifically says that God led his people out of Egypt on a specific route to try to avoid them quickly encountering hardship and wanting to return to Egypt. He helped them avoid a possible battle with a foreign group of people because he felt like if they saw these people, when they turned the corner, they’d say, Oh, let’s we might as well go back to Egypt because this is not happening.

God’s people have successfully left Egypt and they are being led by God himself. Led by God visually, a pillar of cloud in the day and a pillar of fire in the night. Now, the pillar of cloud, I like in my head. Maybe you have a different image in your head than I do, that almost seems less impressive because we see clouds in the day. When I think about the pillar of fire at night, imagine just this big ball of burning fire, and you’re walking towards it, you’re following it. Because that is the Lord leading you out of bondage. They were literally physically looking to God to lead them. Yet as they face their first true challenge of freedom, they shrink back almost immediately. It takes almost no time at all.

If you look in Exodus chapter 14, beginning of verse 12, it says, When Pharaoh drew near, so Pharaoh had changed his mind and said, Why do we let these people go? Let’s go back and get them and bring them back to Egypt, and they can continue being our slaves. And as they were drawing near, the people of Israel lifted up their eyes, and behold, the Egyptians were marching after them, and the Israelites feared greatly. And the people of Israel cried out to the Lord. They said to Moses, It is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness? Here’s more of their drama.

Is not this what we said to you in Egypt? Leave us alone that we may serve the Egyptians. For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness. The very first challenge that they faced, with a big body of water in front of them and Pharaoh behind them. After they had seen what occurred with the ten plagues, after they had followed a pillar of cloud in the day and a burning pillar of fire at night, they had quite literally followed God out of slavery. And at the first sign of difficulty, they say, you know what? Let’s just go back. Let’s just go back. Wasn’t that better? That was better, right? You remember the meat pots? You remember the bread?

Meat pots. I don’t know if that sounds appetizing or not. They thought it was. For years. They wanted they wanted freedom from the bonds of their slavery. They wanted to do good things like be able to worship God and freely be his people. They wanted a new beginning, but they didn’t consider the challenges that a new beginning was inevitably going to send their way. And this certainly wasn’t the last challenge that they had to face. We don’t have time for those of you who are brave enough to be here this morning. We don’t have time to look at all of the challenges that they faced. Just like if you were to sit down and think about the challenges that you faced, you could be there for a while, I’m sure.

Writing down the difficulties. And the same is true for us today. Whether we’re committing to some sort of resolution because of a calendar change, or whether we’re thinking about or being baptized into Christ for the forgiveness of our sins, the start of something new does not mean that the newness by default is going to be easy and free from trials. It doesn’t matter how difficult this year has been. Just because next year is a new year does not mean that it’s going to be easier.

3. New Beginnings Require New Growth

The fact is, new beginnings require new growth. You might be thinking about growth in the term of in the perspective of resolutions and the idea of learning new skills and exercising and being more healthy and all those sorts of things. And because new beginnings invariably bring new challenges, we must understand that new chapters in life mean that we have to expect that we will grow. And I don’t mean passively grow. I don’t mean that just because we turn the calendar to January 1st, that we will suddenly magically grow and develop and become the kind of people that we want to be. What I mean is that the growth has to be purposeful and intentional, and it’s something that we have to put effort into. Because if a new chapter in life, if any kind of newness means new challenges, how are we going to be better prepared to face them than we were in the past?

If you are no stronger, if you are no more grounded in God, if your faith is not deeper today than it was yesterday, it doesn’t really matter what kind of challenge you face in the future. Because isn’t your future going to be the same as your past? New beginnings require new growth. I think a lot of people, when they consider growth, they think about growth using the ideas of motivation and discipline. We all like to be motivated to do something. I know it’s a lot easier for me when I’ve got things on my list, and I wake up in the morning and I’m like, I actually feel motivated to get some stuff done today. It’s a whole lot easier to start marking stuff off my list.

Well, what about when you wake up on a Saturday morning and it’s been a while since you’ve had a free Saturday and you’re like, well, I could get this stuff done. But also, it’d be nice to just enjoy a day where I don’t have to do all the things that I’ve been doing for months. Motivation is a powerful tool that can help us grow and learn to overcome challenges. Sometimes all it takes is a well-known quote. Maybe you have some quotes that really stick in your head, and every time you need a little bit of a little boost of motivation, you think about one of those quotes. I think about one. A ship in the harbor is safe, but that’s not what ships were built for.

That one, oh, that gets me going. When I think about that from the perspective of a child of God, I was not built to shrink back. I was not built by God to succumb to Satan and his temptations. I was built to be different. That quote always gets me going. Maybe for you it’s a particular song. Maybe you have a playlist on your favorite streaming music app that you play when you’re in a slump and you need some motivation. Maybe it’s a word of encouragement from someone. Maybe you’ve had those times in your life where you get a random text from somebody you’re close to and they say just the right thing, and you’re like, man, they don’t know how much I needed that today.

We can get an almost instant boost of confidence and a renewal that I can do what needs to be done. I can make this happen. I can overcome any challenge that faces me today because I’m motivated to do it. And motivation is what a lot of New Year’s resolutions are built on. You probably haven’t put on your to do list. Create list of New Year’s resolutions. But perhaps one day recently, you were doing something. You said, you know what? Next year, I’m gonna be healthier. In that moment, you are motivated to say, I’m gonna do something differently. I’ll make important changes in my life then, at that time, at some point in the future. I’m motivated now to make a commitment for later, even though the commitment for later may not pull through.

But motivation isn’t a lasting propellant. You ever been motivated to do something and you get halfway through the project or whatever you’re working on, you’re like, man, I think I’m done for the day. That happens to me when I’m done at work with meetings and I’ve just got like my to-do list of all the compliance stuff I have to do for the day. I’m like, I’m gonna knock this out, I’m gonna be done by four o’clock, and I get to spend time with the family. And four o’clock rolls around and I’m halfway done, and I’m like, I mean, this can wait till tomorrow. Because the motivation was there, and then it wasn’t. Motivation quickly dies out. And if we don’t find another source of motivation to take its place, we often find that there feels like there’s just no reason to keep going.

There’s no reason to stay committed to my commitment because I’m not motivated to do it anymore. However, if you add a little discipline into the mix, not only are motivators more effective, but you have something to keep you going even after the motivation is gone. Even after that quote about the ships is gone. If you have discipline, you can continue. Discipline really is the simple act of choosing to do what needs to be done, whether or not you want to, whether or not you feel like it, whether or not you’re motivated to make it happen. Have you ever fought through that lack of motivation and said, I’m just gonna do this? I’m just gonna make it happen. I’m just gonna be determined today. Many of you who are parents probably think about disciplining your children.

Children, when you think about discipline, you probably think about getting punished. The punishment is a form of discipline. Just like motivating can be a form of temporary discipline, just like rewarding can be a form of discipline. Ultimately, it means that we as parents are attempting to instill a mindset of discipline into our children. We want them to grow up, to not have to rely on motivation. We want them to grow up to be people that are not just able to understand the difference between right and wrong, and who are able to make good decisions, but we want them to have the mental fortitude to do what needs to be done even when it’s the most difficult thing to do. Every parent in this room wants that for their children.

And so we give them discipline, punishment, direction, rewards, incentive, etc., so that we can help them learn how to be disciplined people as they grow up. And in the same way, we as Christians should be disciplined people. We shouldn’t rely on those solely on those external forces of motivation. Because when the motivation is gone, guess what? Then we’re a victim. It’s out of our control. Well, I’m not motivated, so I guess I don’t have to do anything. We could easily spend all day talking about the things that God has done for us, the things that God has given us, the blessings that He’s sent our way, the tough lessons that He’s taught us just in this particular calendar year. I bet if we didn’t care about lunch, maybe we just brought some meat pots in.

4. Haven't You Been Given Freedom?

We could sit here for hours sharing with each other about this particular calendar year, the things that have gone the right way, the things that have gone the wrong way, the lessons that we’ve learned. But sometimes, even when we’re disciplined, things are still difficult. Imagine then being one person among a large group of Israelites. You’re just one individual among thousands and thousands and thousands of people in Israel living under Egyptian slavery. Perhaps for as long as you can remember you and your family, everyone you know has been in this predicament. You’ve been enslaved in what was at the time essentially a world power. You weren’t just going to say, Pharaoh, we’re done, we’re leaving. That’s not how that works. Maybe as a child in that environment, maybe you would have daydreamed about what it was like, what life was like as an Egyptian.

Man, they must have it so easy. Can you imagine living the life that they lived? Or what life would be like for someone who wasn’t a slave like you were. Or perhaps as an adult feeling a sense of hopelessness, that the rest of your existence on this earth is just doing what you’re doing today. You’re going to do it tomorrow and the next day and the next day and the next day. One day, God sends one of his servants before Pharaoh. God says, Many severe plagues to assert his power over the weak earthly gods as they thought of themselves, as Pharaoh did. And your taskmaster agrees to free you. You and your family and your friends and everyone you know celebrates at the crazy, unthinkable reality that you are free.

The thing you never fathomed as a possibility, the thing that you grew up as a child believing was just a far-fetched idea, unless you happened to be born as an Egyptian. And one day you’re free. You pack your things, you observe the Passover, and you leave captivity. You walk away, you do the impossible. You follow a giant cloud as you walk during the day and a towering ball of fire at night. And you’re amazed by the goodness and mercy of God and his ability to deliver you from this crazy scenario. Only to bring you to the edge of an impassable body of water. With the Egyptians hot on your tail, angry at their decision to let you go instead of keeping you free. Talk about disappointment.

God does the unimaginable for you only to seemingly hang you out to dry. And we see this over and over and over again in the story of the Israelites. I mean, they had to wander 40 years in the wilderness before being brought to the promised land. Forty years.

Out of all the crazy things that they saw, they were removed from an impossible circumstance. They were given freedom by God Himself, and then they just wanted to go back to it. How could anybody want to go back to that? I want to ask you, for those of you who have committed your life to Christ, haven’t you been given freedom? Haven’t you been delivered from an impossible situation? One of being doomed to eternal separation from God. And yet he sent his son to die for you. To give you hope, to give you a chance at a future. And how many times do you consider going back to the old you? How many times do you let the temptation of sin creep back into your life?

Conclusion

And you say, well, you know what? This is really tempting. And it’s not that big of a deal. And I’m not really hurting anybody. I’ll be more faithful tomorrow. I won’t let Satan get me tomorrow. Because the reality is every new beginning does have an end. And whatever your beginning is, whether you are thinking about today as a new beginning, the idea of like the first day of the rest of your life, maybe you’re considering putting on Christ in baptism and becoming a child of God. Or maybe you’re thinking about the idea of the calendar flipping over and a new year starting, and thinking about all the great things that you want to accomplish, the great person you want to be able to become next year, that new beginning will inevitably have an end.

And the end of all of us at some point is the same. The end of every person in this room will be standing before God. Standing before God to give an account of the life that you’ve lived, of the choices that you’ve made, of the commitments you’ve honored or gone against. And the question that I want to leave you with this morning is are you ready for that end? Have you taken advantage of the beginning that you have had for those who have been baptized?

Have you lived that life that you have that God has given you? Have you lived it in accordance with His will? Have you lived it in a way that you are grateful and thankful for the blood that was spilled on the cross for you? Are you thinking about all of the things in your past that you wish could be different and all the things in the future that you want to be different, that you want to do differently, the kind of person who you want to become? One day, the chapter that you’re on will end. Are you ready for that ending? Because maybe you’ve watched a TV show or a movie or read a book where you weren’t expecting the ending, and suddenly there it was.

If it’s a good book or a good movie, that can be a little disappointing. If you’re a human being made in the image of God and you are not ready to meet your Maker, it’s a terrifying thought. But you have an opportunity. An opportunity to instead of saying, well, tomorrow I’ll get my life right with God. Next week, or you know what? January 1st is a great time to rededicate my life to God. Why not right now? Why wait? What if you never see January 1st? What if that never happens for you? And if you are not a Christian, if you have not been baptized, what are you waiting for? What are you hoping happens at some point to motivate you to make a change, to do what needs to be done?

If you understand what it means to be a child of God and what you need to do, you have an opportunity. Don’t let this opportunity pass you by. Make today your new beginning and be prepared for when you endure your end. If there’s anything that we can do for you this morning, please make it known by coming to the front as we stand and as we sing.