Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old

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)

As one year closes and another begins, God calls us not to stay stuck in the past—but to get ready for the fresh, impossible work He still wants to do.

The Best of Times, 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 of 2015. This last year has been bittersweet. It has been one of the most difficult years I've experienced in ministry here—our leadership team and staff faced real challenges and tests, and I know many of you can identify with that in your own lives.

Yet as a year ends, I always find myself looking back at what God has done and looking forward to what He's about to do. And as I reflected over these past weeks, I was reminded that 2015 was also full of great things—personally and as a church.

Marvelous Things God Has Done

Pastor Mark and I figured that this year, counting the prayer cards filled out each week, our church prayed for about 5,000 prayer requests. The staff divides them on Tuesday mornings, and a group gathers Wednesday at noon to pray—so each request is prayed over by at least two groups. Among those were countless praise reports and answered prayers, a reminder that God is alive, hears, and is intimately involved in our lives.

We've had about 200 first-time visitors this year, and we've prayed with dozens who committed or recommitted their lives to the Lord. We've watched our Connect Groups grow, because it's in homes—living life with one another—that the "one another" commands of the New Testament actually take place. You can't truly connect when we give you ninety seconds to say hello on a Sunday.

This spring you raised $20,000 for the Alternatives Women's Center through the Walk for Life, a ministry we've partnered with since its start more than 25 years ago. You gave more than $12,000 in benevolence to people in crisis, and—a number that blew me away—$90,000 to missions and outreach.

Reaching the Uttermost Parts

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—men and women raised up to disciple their own people—on top of nine U.S. citizens serving abroad. You contributed 200 shoeboxes to Operation Christmas Child, part of the 11.7 million boxes Samaritan's Purse sent out this December. We hosted the Perspectives in the World Christian Movement class for a second time.

Through the Calvary Church Planting Network, which I direct along with Pastor Bruce Zachary of Calvary Nexus, we're helping mentor and train more than 270 young men preparing to plant churches in the U.S., Canada, and beyond. One of our own, George Lim—a former student of mine in my Isaiah and Jeremiah classes—relocated with his family this summer to plant Cross Connection Church in Glastonbury, Connecticut. When he first told me he wanted to plant there, I asked if he'd ever been to Connecticut. He hadn't. The Lord simply put it on his heart, and now they're there building toward a fall plant.

God Is Still Working Through This Church

We've ministered to veterans through the Interfaith Council, to hurting families at the Ronald McDonald House by Children's Hospital, and we've gathered each week to study God's living and powerful Word—our identity in Christ in Ephesians, joy in Philippians, freedom in Philemon, and a Christ-centered life in Colossians. Our series on hell became the most listened-to and watched series on our website.

This year we had more than 3,000 views on our YouTube channel and 18,000 unique website visitors from all over the world—Russia, China, the Netherlands, the UK, South Korea, Kuwait, Brazil, India, and dozens more. For twenty years we've also been on public access through Cox and Time Warner, reaching potentially three million homes—and because, thanks to Brett and Dave, ours is their best-produced show, they rebroadcast it as filler. Through the Calvary Church Planting Network website, ccpnetwork.org, we've had 5,600 downloads since September, trending around 200 a day.

Fear Not, the Lord Has Done Marvelous Things

All of this brought to mind 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 over 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—even the looming presidential campaign—it's easy to be overcome with fear. But 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

So as we step into 2016, consider Isaiah 43:18-19. On the surface there seems to be a conflict—Joel calls us to remember God's works, while Isaiah says, "Do not remember the former things." But there's no real conflict. The problem is that in remembering, we can get stuck.

Have you ever been stuck? In 2004 I lived in Germany, and one snowy Monday my roommate Mark—a Southern California native like me—headed out to teach, only to come right back fifteen minutes later. There was solid ice on our hill and his wheels just spun. Christians can get stuck like that.

First, we get stuck over past failures and sins. I've prayed with more than a hundred people who say, "Pastor, 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 over past victories. So many people can only talk about the amazing things God did in 1972 at the tent in Costa Mesa with Chuck Smith, or at the North Park Theater with Mike McIntosh. The names change, but they're stuck in the past—like Uncle Rico reliving his 1982 football season. When I started in ministry seventeen years ago, I'd attend meetings with other pastors where all anyone discussed was what God did years ago, as if He were finished. It was deeply discouraging.

God Chooses the Weak

Third, we get stuck thinking we're too weak, foolish, and insufficient for God to use us. But hear this encouragement:

For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty; 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, that no flesh should glory in His presence. (1 Corinthians 1:26-29)

If you can find yourself in "weak, foolish, despised, base, and nothing," then God chose you. Why? So that when He works in your life, everyone says, "That couldn't have been them—that's the Lord." That's exactly how He wants to work.

Israel got stuck this way in Numbers. After the Red Sea and months in the wilderness, they reached the edge of the promised land, and ten of the twelve spies said there were giants there: "We were like grasshoppers in our own sight." The whole congregation wept all night. Only Joshua and Caleb had the faith to say, "Let's go in—God is with us." So the first point is simple: get moving or you'll get stuck. Don't get hung up on past failures or victories. To "consider" the things of old is to dwell on and ponder them—and God says, let's move on.

Remember That the Lord Has Forgotten Your Sins

Notice another crucial verse in the same chapter:

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. Remember that the Lord has forgotten your sins. This is the promise to everyone who has put their trust in the saving grace and forgiveness of Jesus. He hasn't literally forgotten—He's all-knowing—but He chooses not to remember them, not to put them to your account any longer, because He blotted them out at the cross.

If you haven't yet put your trust in Jesus, I'll give you that opportunity at the end of the service, so you can move forward unhindered. For if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away, and all things have become new.

Behold, I Will Do a New Thing

Verse 19 says, "Behold, I will do a new thing." The word new literally means fresh—something alive and vibrant. We've all reached into the refrigerator for milk and had it pour out like cottage cheese. God does not want you to be a cottage cheese Christian. If you're living on the victories of twenty years ago, it's spoiled and sour—it's time to move on. Another translation reads, "Look, I am about to do something new." In other words, get ready.

So the third point: be ready for a fresh work from the Lord. When we stay stuck, opportunities pass us by. God then asks, "Shall you not know it?"—help us, Lord, to be aware, to see the open door and not miss it. Yesterday on the freeway, someone in front of us decided at the last second they didn't want to take the 78 West, slammed on their brakes, and nearly caused a pile-up because they didn't know where they were going. Some of our lives cause pile-ups because we're missing what God is doing. Lord, open our eyes.

With God Nothing Is Impossible

"I will even make a road in the wilderness and rivers in the desert." This is God's promise to do impossible things and to bring to pass that which is not. Only God can do the impossible—and He often places us in impossible situations so we recognize that He is the one accomplishing it. In our Christmas Eve Eve service we read how the angel told Mary she would have a child, and when she asked, "How can this be?" he answered, "With God nothing shall be impossible." That's the fourth point: remember, with God nothing is impossible.

Expecting Great Things in 2016

With this in mind, 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 Janelle as they plant Cross Connection Church in Glastonbury—an unchurched yet very religious area where many have disconnected from formal faith.

We'll continue our outreaches with Alternatives, Julian Oaks Youth Camp, the Ronald McDonald House, Interfaith, and our veterans ministry. We want more people in Connect Groups; our survey showed only 28% of our church is involved, and we won't grow into the maturity God desires without being truly connected to one another.

I'll keep saying it: there are more than 400,000 people within five miles of this building, and over a quarter million of them aren't connected to a Bible-teaching church. They're your neighbors, coworkers, and the other parents on the soccer sideline. 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. Those pastors are my friends; we're not in competition.

God Is Working Around the World

We'll keep training and mentoring church planters through the Church Planting Network, with a conference alongside Calvary Nexus in February. I've been invited to teach the church planting class at the Bible College again, to lead a small conference in Germany in April, and to minister to missionaries and leaders in Western Europe in May—we had 500 of them last year.

Everyone keeps telling me Christianity is dead in Europe. It is not. For 1,500 years everyone there was "Christian" by birth, even though they weren't truly. In the last 50 years, given a choice, many have left the church—but that mass exodus is simply revealing who actually is Christian and who isn't. God is doing a work there, and the same is happening here. We're also partnering with the Southern Baptist Convention, which has 4,500 fully funded missionaries worldwide and aims to plant 9,000 churches in the U.S. over the next ten years. Anyone who preaches the gospel, we want to come alongside and rejoice.

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 fully in 2016. Second, get connected. If you're not in a Connect Group, you're disconnected, and that's how people end up in the hospital for three weeks without anyone knowing. You're not meant to be anonymous. I'll meet someone at Home Depot who says, "Hey, Pastor Miles," and I have no idea who they are—we want to know who you are.

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

Closing Prayer

Father, I thank You for Your grace—that You have saved us by grace through faith, not of ourselves, a gift from You. And Lord, 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 transgressions. I pray You'd help us not to be stuck on our former failures or victories, or to think we can't do what You're calling us to do because of a lack of ability or resource. God, free us from these things, and help us to bring glory to You as we step into a new year. Help us rejoice in You and in the marvelous things You've done.

And before we close, 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 with me right where you are: Dear Jesus, would You come into my life and save me from my sin? Forgive me for the wicked things I've done, and help me to follow You by faith. Use my life for Your glory. Shine through me. In Jesus' name, amen.