God's Grace Is Enough for This Year, Too - Your Nightly Prayer - January 5th
Your Nightly Prayer
Audio By Carbonatix
By Peyton Garland, Crosswalk.com
God's Grace Is Good Enough for This Year, Too
Your Nightly Prayer
by Peyton Garland
TONIGHT'S SCRIPTURE
“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” - 2 Corinthians 12:9
SOMETHING TO PONDER
As the New Year unfolds and confetti flies, I wonder if our bedazzled celebrations aren’t about welcoming a new year but finally escaping the old one. Time isn’t always on our side. Life isn’t always kind. And New Year’s Eve is often a reminder of both these unsavory truths.
Nonetheless, a new year grants us the chance not to dodge hard times (because they will certainly come), but to become someone who can face those hard times with hope, perseverance, and, yes, even joy.
Cultivating these spiritual disciplines isn’t easy, though. That’s why they are fruits of the Spirit—not fruits of humans. They aren’t natural byproducts of our being but quite the contrary. Despite this tough reality, where we truly live in a spiritually dystopic world, I want to share a bit of my heart that I offered to the world a few years back, a bit of conviction that I still believe holds true:
Getting to the other side of hard things, whether gut-wrenching or glorious, has never come without a price.
This uphill journey makes me think of God’s people, the children of Israel. They wandered through the wilderness for forty years, making mistakes, learning lessons, and repeating their mistakes. They lived true days of glory yet adopted a frugal faith, their ungrateful perception of mercy dwindled to only dull, expected monotony…
[But] why would a good God drive his children into a land lacking all resources necessary for survival?
So his goodness could be their sole pursuit. So his love could carry them home. So when they returned home healed, they could truly sing hallelujah over a season God used to bring reason to bloodshed and brokenness.
Amid such mysterious yet marvelous truth, I firmly believe that your season has, and will have, purpose that the broken pieces of your spirit are meant to be healed. Your cup is destined to overflow with milk and honey, the sweetest, purest kind.
I once believed that I only received God’s grace and favor if I gladly accepted the trials of life within the Christian faith, but the more I read Scripture, the more I recognize the humanity of the Apostle Paul, the more I see that God bestows grace not because our hearts are postured correctly but because His grace isn’t limited by our fickle hearts. His character isn’t hindered by our lack of character. His goodness is perfect, even and especially in our weakness.
If you see the New Year as a chance to escape the treachery that has become your life, I understand. Fully. But rather than escaping the past, I encourage you to embrace the present with this simple truth: God’s grace is enough this year, too. Don’t fight against His grace. Don’t fight to earn it. Rest in it. Accept it with a heart that is repentant and willing to change.
You don’t have to be strong to begin again. You have to be wise in being weak, surrendering your humanity to His perfect, shepherding divinity. Embrace God’s love despite who you are and what you’ve done. Only then, in this posture of humility, will you discover that God truly delights in you, regardless of mistakes, hardships, and all.
“That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” 2 Corinthians 12:10
I pray your new year is truly a happy one, that you find God’s joy in the months that lie ahead.
YOUR NIGHTLY PRAYER
Father,
In this new year, grant me your grace to discover that rather than escaping a challenging season, you invite me to become a believer whose faith is made strong because of it. Your love casts out fear of both a heavy past and an unknown future (1 John 4:18). May I remain steadfast in my commitment to reading Scripture, pursuing your character, and allowing other believers to hold me accountable as I stay the course. Thank you for radically loving me despite my humanity. Thank you for sustaining me no matter what unfolds.
Amen.
THREE THINGS TO PONDER
1. God doesn’t ask you to be strong—He asks you to surrender.
True strength comes when we give up striving and rest in His perfect grace (2 Corinthians 12:10).
2. The wilderness isn’t wasted.
Like Israel, our hardest seasons can lead us to deeper dependence on God—and prepare us to rejoice in His goodness.
3. Grace isn’t earned, and weakness isn’t failure.
God’s favor isn’t reserved for the flawless. It flows freely to the humble, even in our mess and need.
Reflect on tonight’s prayer and share how God met you there. Join the Your Nightly Prayer discussion on the Crosswalk Forum.
Photo Credit: ©GettyImages/Jochen Sand
Peyton Garland is an author, editor, and boy mama who lives in the beautiful foothills of East Tennessee. Subscribe to her blog Uncured+Okay for more encouragement.
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