I live by a famous poem, written by Minnie Louise Haskins in the turbulent years between the First and Second World Wars. Our King, addressing the British Commonwealth in 1939 when Britain and her Empire stood alone against Nazi Germany, concluded his Christmas and New Year message with this poem: ‘I said to the One who stood at the Gate of the Year: “Give me a light that I may tread safely into the Unknown.” And he replied, “Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the Hand of God. That shall be to you better than a light and safer than a known way.” So I went forth gladly into the night. And He led me towards the hills and the breaking of Day…’
This is so applicable to us all today. For myself, in 2025, I was looking back over 75 years of full-time ministry. But we’ve got to stop looking back; I’m looking AHEAD to the coming years, to the responsibility and ministry in front of me. Paul says, Phil 3:13-14: Forget those things that are behind… press forward to the goal, to the prize, to the high calling of God!
2 Corinthians 4:1 - this message is for you and for me: “Wherefore, seeing we have this ministry, seeing we have received mercy, we faint not.” We have received mercy, we have received a ministry - so we must not be afraid, we must not faint when we look at the enormity of the task in front! I must not faint when I look at the enormous task that is still in front of me in my ministry. Paul says, v3-4, the devil hides the Gospel from the lost and has blinded them, lest the Light of the glorious Gospel of Christ shine on them... But this is the Light we are called to bring to this dark world!
For us, v5ff, the reality is, we preach not ourselves, but Christ, for whose sake we are servants. God has commanded the Light to shine out of darkness, He has shined His Light IN US. It’s the Light of the knowledge of the Glory of God in the Face of Jesus Christ! This Treasure is IN US who are just ‘earthen vessels’. We have a Treasure IN US, which is our Faith and experience in Christ. No, we don’t need to boast and to commend ourselves, we don’t need letters of recommendation from men - we have the precious ‘letter’ of Christ written in our hearts by the Spirit of the Living God, 2 Cor. 3:1-3. Yes, in 75 years’ full-time ministry I have had a phenomenal witness and experience of Christ in my life.
But we are ‘earthen vessels’. Clay, pottery. Fragile, easily broken. It’s so that the ‘excellency of the Power’ in us can be seen to be from God. It’s NOT us, it’s NOT what we are and who we are. It’s who Christ is! We have to give Him the Glory and the Honour in all things! To God be the Glory!
2025 was a very troubled year. A year of instability, insecurity, anxiety, suffering, sickness, loss of loved ones. Many faced war. I think particularly of Ukraine. But not only Ukraine, countries all around the world are living in a state of war or under threat of war. Paul, in the early years after Christ, writes of his own experience, 2 Cor 4:8ff, “We’re troubled on every side, but I’m not distressed.” No, in the midst of trouble we are NOT distressed, because we have hope! “Perplexed, but not in despair. Persecuted, but not forsaken. Cast down but not destroyed. Though we are bearing in our bodies the dying of the Lord Jesus, it’s so that the Life of Jesus can be manifest in our body!” In other words, we’re must constantly die to self so that the Glory of Christ may be seen in us!
There are times we have to go through suffering. My life has never been easy. I’ve been miraculously healed of cancer twice, but through that, Christ got the Glory! I was in prison for Christ’s sake. Some of you have been in prison or suffered for His sake as I have done. But like Paul, we’re not forsaken, we’re not destroyed, so that through it all, whatever the difficulty, even if it be death, Christ might get the Glory! Yes. Persecuted, but not forsaken. Cast down, but not destroyed. Dying to self, we live for Christ! For where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty, 2 Cor 3:17. The Power is His! And we need to let the Glory of the Lord be seen in us.
2 Corinthians 5:1ff - this is the message we need in these uncertain times: we know that if our ‘earthly house be dissolved’ - that is, if we die - then we have a ‘building’, a ‘house not made with hands’, but built by God in Heaven. Our eternal future is in Heaven! Our Kingdom is not of this world! It’s not under the politics and governance of this world. Our Kingdom is in Christ, in Heaven! The whole of our Glory is in the future.
Whatever the past, good or bad, our Glory is in the future. I’m not looking at my past, I’m looking at the future, when we’re going to be with Jesus! Yes, Paul says as we wait for this, we groan, we’re burdened, waiting to be clothed in the ‘house’ God has made for us in Heaven. Our future is secure in Christ - 2 Corinthians 5:17 - ‘If any man is in Christ, he is a new creature, a new creation - all the old things have passed away and everything has become new.