It Is Friday
And…
Happy New Year!
But what is time?
Do you feel any different? I remember as a kid thinking something magical should happen, right? Well, yeah! But, no….
WE… and I mean, only WE mark it. Nothing else. WE could pick any day or time and call it the start of a new year, a new month and new day, and it would be so.
And no, not really because we don’t affect the universe all that much…
Or do we?
On the one hand, we did—or we were supposed to. It was our job to manage things. Adam was supposed to name things, and so naming the start of a year and the beginning of another is what we are to do—were supposed to do…
What God told us to do. And so it is…
Well, but we lost that job. We abdicated that position of management. Now it is just arbitrary.
I mean we use names and such to organize our lives and all we do, but it is not the same thing really. They conflict with others who do it too and nature does not comply all that much…
As it should… as it was supposed to.
And so on the other hand, we do affect the universe. It is hurting because of us. Sin has corrupted everything. It has introduced rot and ruin—decay and chaos…
But, it also has been redeemed. There is a good reason to have the New Year begin right after Christmas. Because that is when the beginning of the New Creation. The 8th day. In the depth of the coldest and darkest times, a light has dawned. God became flesh and has dwelt among us. And He is the light of all men that has come into the world (or universe is the actual Greek word here).
He is here to re-name, remake, undo and redo, all that has been undone and wronged. He is the New Adam to call (to name) things that are not, to be. As in the beginning there was no light, and He said let there be. After the fall, darkness of a different kind came. He came to bring light again.
So sinners are now made righteous by His Word—renamed as justified. What was unclean He calls now clean. What was corrupt, He now calls incorruptible. What was dead and dying, He call alive and it lives, but not just for a short time, rather now it is for eternity.
So yes, we can say Happy New Year… because of Christmas…
This New Year contains Easter… if you have not thought that far ahead…
But it may be our Easter… that will be coming too! Maybe all of creation will no longer have to wait in pain and expectation for this present and prevailing darkness to be over with completely so that it can also be remade anew…
Yes, it is Friday…
But Christmastide is not yet over! 12 days remember! January 6th begins something special as well…
Epiphany…
Yes, just what was wrapped and small in those swaddling cloths? The same that the wind and waves obey… that would call that which was dead out of tombs…
That would take away all that is wrong in the world. Even our sin.
Friday it is, but Sunday is just 2 days away! Come and behold Him! Eat and Drink and be merry, for tomorrow, we LIVE! And this forever more!
This coming Sunday – Second Sunday After Christmas – January 4th 2026
Readings –
Psalm 77, 145
Old Testament – Isaiah 42:1-9
Epistle – 1 Peter 4:12-19
Gospel – Matthew 2:13-23
Sermon Theme – GOD’S PROTECTION – Based on Gospel reading
Prayers: For a lasting peace that would be established and would remain between the people of Israel and Gaza as well as for the People of Russia and the Ukraine. For our congregation that it would please our Lord that we would increase in numbers and there remain in this place a congregation that calls upon Him rightly, practicing the faith according to the Scriptures. For those who are being persecuted and murdered because they call upon the name of Jesus—especially in Africa. For the end of violence in our cities and that our schools and congregations would be protected from those who wish them harm. For our families that parents would courageously discipline their children and raise them in the fear of the Lord, teaching them about salvation in Jesus alone.
A Reflection By Luther on How God Does Things:
Christ fights with the devil in a curious way, the devil with great numbers, cleverness, and steadfastness, and Christ with few people, with weakness, simplicity, and contempt, and yet Christ wins. So he wished us to be sheep and our adversaries to be wolves. But what an unequal contest to fight with ten or a hundred wolves! He sent twelve disciples into the world, twelve among so many wolves. I think it’s a remarkable war and a strange fight in which the sheep are killed and the wolves stay alive. But they’ll all go to ruin as a result, because God alone performs miracles. He’ll preserve his sheep in the midst of the wolves and he’ll crush the jaws of the wolves forever.
–Martin Luther, Luther’s Works, Vol. 54 –Table Talk No. 5031.