A New Year’s Meditation by Matthew Henry (1662-1714)

Matthew Henry  wrote the following on January 1, 1713. He was 50 years old and died the next year.

“My times are in Your hand!” Psalm 31:15

Firmly believing that my times are in God’s hand, I here submit myself and all my affairs for the ensuing year, to the wise and gracious disposal of God’s divine providence. Whether God appoints for me health or sickness, peace or trouble, comforts or crosses, life or death— may His holy will be done!

All my time, strength, and service, I devote to the honor of the Lord Jesus–and even my common actions. It is my earnest expectation, hope, and desire, my constant aim and endeavor–that Jesus Christ may be magnified in me. In everything I have to do–my entire dependence is upon Jesus Christ for strength. And whatever I do in word or deed, I desire to do all in His name, to make Him my Alpha and Omega.

I have all from Him–and I would use all for Him.

If this should prove a year of affliction, a sorrowful year to me–I will fetch all my supports and comforts from the Lord Jesus and stay myself upon Him, His everlasting consolations, and the good hope I have in Him through grace.

And if it should be my dying year–then my times are in the hand of the Lord Jesus. And with a humble reliance upon His mediation, I would venture into the eternal world looking for the blessed hope. Dying as well as living–Jesus Christ will, I trust, be gain and advantage to me.

Oh, that the grace of God may be sufficient for me, to keep me always a humble sense of my own unworthiness, weakness, folly, and infirmity–together with a humble dependence upon the Lord Jesus Christ for both righteousness and strength.

[excerpted from Memoirs of the life, character, and writings of the Rev. Matthew Henry By Sir John Bickerton WILLIAMS, pg. 157]

Inspiration for the New Year:

For Days of Auld Lang Syne
What are “The 70 New Year’s Resolutions?”
A New Year’s Meditation by Matthew Henry (1662-1714)
A New Year, A New Hope, It’s My Year – Guaranteed to Make You Smile! (video)
How Do I Change My Life? Two New Year’s Resolutions that will work!
Is a New Year’s Eve party biblical? What about the alcohol?  
At the Gate of the Year: A Message to a Troubled Nation
I Resolve To….(video)
A New Year, A New Start. . .Another Resolution? 
A New Year, A New Beginning   
Good Reminders for the New Year  
Ways to Glorify God - Bookmark
70 New Year's Resolution by Jonathan Edwards  
A New Year Lesson from the Book of Job, by Ray Stedman (1917-1992)
Daily Directions for Holy Living, by Richard Baxter

Not feeling in a celebratory mood?  Remember, you are not alone.  Read: Distressed and Despairing? You’re not alone!

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