January 2

Read: Psalms 42:1-2

They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more;… and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes (Revelation 7:16-17).

The Wonder Of God’s Presence

We saw yesterday that happiness in the new year depends on keeping our spirits wide open to God. With deep insight, St. Augustine wrote: “God has made us for himself and we are restless until we find ourselves at home in Him.” Ah, what a day when we shall be “before the throne of God, and serve Him day and night in his temple”! Then shall all our restless hungers be satisfied; then shall all our thirsts be quenched. God himself shall satisfy our every longing; His presence shall wipe away all tears from our eyes. Heaven will be heaven because God is there.

But we know as we begin a new year that it is not enough to wait for heaven. We need God here and now. Always men have needed Him; and always God has found ways to make himself known to those who hunger for Him. “When the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son!’ (Galatians 4:4). When the Son left our earth, He sent the Holy Spirit to dwell in us.

Today, God’s Spirit can fill our hearts. Here and now, He can walk with us. Because of His help, hunger is easier to bear, and thirst is not impossible torture. Our crying is hushed, and our pain is eased. The most blessed hours in this life are those in which God’s presence seems most fully to surround our hungering spirits. As John Wesley lay on: his deathbed he cried out, “The best thing of all is that God is: with US.” And Wesley was right. Therefore We begin the new year with this assurance:

He leadeth me! Oh, blessed tho’t! Oh, words with heav’nly comfort fraught! Whate’er I do, where’er I be, Still ’tis God’s hand that leadeth me.

— Joseph H. Gilmore