Jonah 43:18

Do not remember the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I will do a new thing. Now it shall spring forth. Shall you not know it? I will even make a road in the wilderness and rivers in the desert. (Isaiah 43:18-19)

A year-end call to stop living off old defeats and old victories, and to get ready for the fresh, impossible work God wants to do in the coming year.

The Best of Times and the Worst of Times

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times." Those twelve words open Charles Dickens' A Tale of Two Cities, and in my opinion they could serve as a summary for 2015. In some ways they fit nearly any year, but they fit this one well.

This last year has been bittersweet. It has been one of the most difficult years I've experienced in ministry here. Coming up on January 4th will be my seventeenth year serving at this church—time goes by frighteningly fast. As a leadership team and staff, we faced challenges and tests, and I'm sure many of you can identify with that in your own lives. Talking with people between services, I heard about hard things they have faced this year. And yet in that there is an anticipation, a looking forward to new things.

Marvelous Things God Did in 2015

As I've reflected over these last weeks, we also experienced many great things in 2015. Pastor Mark and I figured that as a church we prayed for about 5,000 prayer requests this year. Every week the staff divides up those cards on Tuesday mornings, and a group also gathers Wednesdays at noon to pray. So every request is prayed over by at least two groups of people.

In the midst of those requests have come many praise reports—reminders that God is alive and well, that He hears and answers prayer, and that He is intimately involved in our lives. We've had about 200 visitors come for the first time, and we've prayed with dozens who committed or recommitted their lives to the Lord. We've also seen our Connect Groups grow, because the "one anothers" of the New Testament—loving, praying, caring, sharing—happen best when we live life together in homes, not just in 90 seconds of greeting on a Sunday morning.

Giving, Missions, and Outreach

As a church you raised $20,000 for the Alternatives Women's Center through the Walk for Life—we've partnered with them since their start more than 25 years ago, and (I confess) we've been first place several years running. You gave more than $12,000 in benevolence to people in crisis. And, a number that blew me away, you contributed $90,000 to missions and outreach.

You sent hundreds of talking Bibles to Mozambique, Uganda, and Sudan, and 100 water filters to Nepal after the earthquake. We support eight native missionaries in other countries and nine U.S. citizens serving abroad. You contributed 200 shoeboxes to Samaritan's Purse for Operation Christmas Child—part of 11.7 million boxes that went out worldwide. We hosted the Perspectives class for the second time, and we've ministered to veterans through the Interfaith Council and to hurting families at the Ronald McDonald House.

Church Planting and a Worldwide Reach

Along with Pastor Bruce Zachary of Calvary Nexus in Camarillo, I direct the Calvary Church Planting Network. Through it we are helping mentor, train, and resource more than 270 young men preparing to plant churches in the U.S., Canada, and beyond. One of our own, George Lim and his family, left this past summer for Glastonbury, Connecticut, to build a core team and plant Cross Connection Church there next fall—a very religious yet deeply unchurched region.

We've gathered each week to worship and study the Word—our identity in Christ in Ephesians, joy in Philippians, freedom from bondage in Philemon, a Christ-centered life in Colossians, and a series on hell that became our most-watched series online. We've had over 3,000 views on our YouTube channel and 18,000 unique website visitors from dozens of nations—Russia, China, the Netherlands, South Korea, Kuwait, Brazil, India, and many more. Through the Calvary Church Planting Network website, relaunched in September, we've had 5,600 downloads, trending around 200 a day.

Fear Not, for the Lord Has Done Marvelous Things

All of this reminds me of Joel 2:21. In Joel's day, more than 2,500 years ago, the nation and the world were in chaos and people were fearful—sound familiar? Little has changed in two millennia. Yet God said:

Fear not, O nation. Be glad and rejoice for the Lord has done marvelous things. (Joel 2:21)

As we look at an unstable world that stirs fear—following the news, hearing about the presidential campaign—be glad and rejoice, for the Lord has done marvelous things. And I'm here to tell you He has much more He wants to do.

Get Moving or You'll Get Stuck

In Isaiah 43:18, God says, "Do not remember the former things." That seems to conflict with Joel calling us to remember, but it doesn't. The problem is that in remembering, we can get stuck. I lived in Germany in 2004, and my roommate Mark, born and raised in Southern California, came back into our apartment one snowy morning saying there was no way he could get up our icy hill. You know what it is to be stuck—and Christians can get stuck too.

First, we get stuck over past failures and sins. I've prayed with more than a hundred people who say, "You don't understand the things I've done; God could never use me." Don't get stuck in that mindset. Second, we get stuck in past victories. Some people can only talk about what God did in 1972 at the tent in Costa Mesa with Chuck Smith, or at the North Park Theater with Mike McIntosh. They're like Uncle Rico still reliving 1982. The location changes, but they're stuck in the past. When I first started in ministry, it discouraged me deeply that at pastors' meetings all anyone talked about was what God did years ago, with no thought of what He wanted to do now.

God Chooses the Weak

The third way we get stuck is thinking we can't do what God wants because we're weak, insufficient, and foolish. But listen to this encouragement:

For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called. For God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise... and the base things of the world and the things which are despised, God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are. (1 Corinthians 1:26-28)

If you find yourself among the weak, foolish, despised, base, and "nothing," God chose you. Why? Verse 29: "that no flesh should glory in His presence." God gets the greatest glory from insignificant nothings, because when He works through us, everyone says, "That couldn't have been them—that's the Lord."

Israel got stuck this way. When Moses sent twelve spies into the Promised Land, ten returned saying there were giants and "we were like grasshoppers in our own eyes," and the people wept all night. Only Joshua and Caleb had faith to see that God was bigger. So point one: get moving or you'll get stuck. Don't dwell on and ponder the things of old.

Remember That the Lord Has Forgotten Your Sins

I, even I, am He who blots out your transgressions for My own sake, and I will not remember your sins. (Isaiah 43:25)

The Lord Himself has promised to pardon and not remember your former sinfulness—so stop pondering it. He hasn't literally forgotten, for He is all-knowing; He is choosing not to remember, not to charge it to your account, because He blotted it out by the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross.

This is a promise to those who have trusted in the saving grace of Jesus. If you've not yet received that forgiveness, I'll give you an opportunity at the end. For if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation—the old has passed away and all things have become new.

Behold, I Will Do a New Thing

Behold, I will do a new thing. Now it shall spring forth. (Isaiah 43:19)

The word "new" literally means fresh. God wants to do something fresh, alive, and vibrant in your life. We've all opened the refrigerator, gone to pour the milk, and had it come out like cottage cheese. God does not want you to be a cottage cheese Christian. If you're living on victories from twenty years ago, it's spoiled and sour—it's time to move on. Another translation says, "Look, I am about to do something new." In other words, get ready.

Then He says, "Shall you not know it?" Sometimes we get so stuck dwelling on the past that opportunities pass us by, and I confess there are many times I'm oblivious to them. Lord, open our eyes; help us not to miss the open door. Yesterday on the freeway interchange, someone slammed on their brakes at the last second, jamming everyone up because they didn't know where they were going. Some of our lives cause a pileup because we're missing what God is doing. So point three: be ready for a fresh work from the Lord.

With God, Nothing Is Impossible

I will even make a road in the wilderness and rivers in the desert. (Isaiah 43:19)

This is God's promise to do impossible things, to bring to pass what is not. Only God can do the impossible. When the angel told Mary she would bear a child, she asked, "How can this be?" and he answered, "With God nothing shall be impossible." God puts us in impossible situations so we recognize that He is the one who accomplishes it, and so He receives the greatest glory. Point four: remember, with God nothing is impossible.

Great Things for 2016

I'm convinced God has great things for us in 2016. We're expecting great things from God and attempting great things for God. In February, people from our church will serve at Gleanings for the Hungry in Dinuba. We'll be praying with George and Joelle as they plant Cross Connection Church in Glastonbury this fall, and continuing our outreaches with Alternatives, Julian Oaks Youth Camp, the Ronald McDonald House, the Interfaith Council, and veterans.

We want to see more people in Connect Groups—right now only 28% of our church is involved, and I'm convinced we won't grow into the maturity God wants apart from true fellowship with one another. There are more than 400,000 people within five miles of this building, and more than a quarter of a million of them are not connected to any Bible-teaching church. That's your neighbor, your coworker, the parent on the sideline of your kid's soccer game. They need Jesus.

My prayer is not only that we would reach more people, but that Mission Hills, Emmanuel Faith, Revive Escondido, Valley Baptist, North Coast, and every gospel-preaching church would grow. These pastors are my friends; we're not in competition. We'll keep training and resourcing church planters through the network, with a conference in February. I've been invited to teach church planting at the Bible College, to do conferences in Germany in April and with missionaries in Western Europe in May. Everyone tells me Christianity is dead in Europe—it's not. For 1,500 years everyone was "Christian" by birth; now that people have a choice, what looks like a mass exodus is simply revealing who actually is a Christian. God is doing amazing things there and here. We're also partnering with the Southern Baptist Convention, which has 4,500 fully funded missionaries and aims to plant 9,000 churches in the U.S. in the next ten years. Anyone who preaches the gospel, we want to come alongside.

How You Can Be a Part

Four things. First, pray—for wisdom, vision, strength, and resources, and for how God can use your gifts more in 2016. Second, get connected. If you're not in a Connect Group, you're disconnected. It drives me crazy when someone says, "I was in the hospital three weeks; I didn't know who to call." That should never happen. You're not meant to be anonymous.

Third, get involved. If you're not on a team serving here, plug in—go to the Connection Point. Come on an outreach to Tecate, the Ronald McDonald House, Gleanings, or a missions trip. Don't be a spectator on the sidelines of God's work; be on the field. Fourth, give. None of this happens without your support. This church gives almost double the national average per capita—an awesome thing God does through you. We're only about $30,000 short of our giving goal this year, just over one percent, and God will make it up. Every year you give, and it is fruit to your account in heaven.

Closing Prayer

Father, I thank You for Your grace. I thank You that You have saved us by grace through faith, not of ourselves; it is a gift from You. And Lord, that with that salvation You have removed our sin as far as the east is from the west, never to be remembered again. You've blotted out our transgression. I pray that You'd help us not to be stuck on our former failures or victories, or to be stuck thinking we can't do what You're calling us to do because of lack of ability or resource or talent. God, free us from these things. Help us to bring glory to You as we come into a new year, to rejoice in You and Your goodness and the marvelous things You've done.

And if you've never received the grace and forgiveness of Christ, never received Jesus as your Lord and Savior, but you want to today, pray this with me: Dear Jesus, would You come into my life and save me from my sin? Forgive me for the wicked things I've done. Help me to follow You by faith. Use my life for Your glory. Shine through me. In Jesus' name. Amen.