After 2016: How to Have a Happy 2017

"Happy New Year!" I want to be able to genuinely say it. But, something has to be said about 2016.

The elections, Aleppo, even terrorist attacks in our beloved city of Orlando and throughout the world have rocked us, threatening to tear many of us apart. In some ways, they already have.

How does one heal after such a tragic, divisive year?

When will the darkness in the world, the trauma, the fear of the next headline end?

As with any revival, it begins with one.

One person starting that rippling affect, creating a wake for a wake up call to those in the global Christian church.

We need revival.

We need to wake up and stop getting caught up in the lesser things.

Those things don't matter.

Only one thing matters. Did you love?

"We love because He first loved us (1 John 4:19)."

If we truly believed this, we'd live it. We'd cross that divide and love the people feeling unloved right now. We'd lower ourselves to lift others up. We'd be that person to start revival in our midst.

And, there's no way we can do it on our own. "On our own" is what got us into this mess.

Only the One who made us clean can wash, renew, and heal our families, our communities, our nation, and our world.

Will we rise up? Will we stand in the gap to close the very gap that keeps us apart? Will we humble ourselves and pray?

Because there's no other way, 2017 is going to be brighter than if we first go to the cross.

We must seek the gentle face of Christ, the one who bears the scars on His brow from the thorny crown He took for us. Repent. Forgive as we have been forgiven. Live for His Kingdom instead of for our own.

Then our light, which is really His Light will shine in the darkness and no one, no, not anything can quench that Light.

It goes on and on forever.

So, here's to 2017 and to a new us. A renewed, revived, repentant us. Walking hand-in-hand let us live in the Spirit of Christ and not after the gratifying, preserving and exalting self. In one word, walk. And, keep on walking with Him by faith. One step at a time, we can make a brighter tomorrow.