Another year of grace. . .

Now Greet the Swiftly Changing Year

Now greet the swiftly changing year
With joy and penitence sincere.
Rejoice! Rejoice! With thanks embrace
Another year of grace.

 Remember now the Son of God
And how He shed His infant blood.
Rejoice! Rejoice! With thanks embrace
Another year of grace.

This Jesus came to end sin’s war;
This Name of names for us He bore.
Rejoice! Rejoice! With thanks embrace
Another year of grace.

His love abundant far exceeds
The volume of a whole year’s needs.
Rejoice! Rejoice! With thanks embrace
Another year of grace.

With Him as Lord to lead our way
In want and in prosperity,
What need we fear in earth or space
In this new year of grace!

 “All glory be to God on high,
And peace on earth!” the angels cry.
Rejoice! Rejoice! With thanks embrace
Another year of grace.

God, Father, Son, and Spirit, hear!
To all our pleas incline Your ear;
Upon our lives rich blessing trace
In this new year of grace. 

This marvelous hymn is from the Slovak line of Christianity (Moravia in particular) and was introduced to English speakers in 1969 in the LCMS Worship Supplement.  Jaroslav Vajda drew upon his own childhood memories in East Chicago, Indiana, as the family gathered around the piano at midnight before the congregation took it up on New Years' Day.  As is typical, fifteen stanzas were compressed into seven but what really his me is the repeated last line -- another year of grace!  It occurs to me that many of us find it hard to sing with gusto such a sentiment at a time like this.  Maybe we have been troubled by the fear or dread of the future for a long time.  The hymn so wonderfully draws us out of our angst and into the knowledge of Romans 8 and its poignant question:  If God be for us, who can be against us?  We struggle to believe those words.  We want to but our knowledge of all the things that are wrong in the world and in our lives are too much for us and we tend to surrender our hope to the dread.  How sad it is!  Whether the world is looking up or things are going to hell in a hand basket, God is with us.  We live under the banner of His love, by the power of His grace, confident of His favor, and with hope toward the eternal future Christ has prepared for us.  We ought to do more than provide lip service to this hope.  We ought to offer the world more than anxious thoughts.  We ought to be able to give answer to the hope in us -- if it is!  The gifts of God exceed not only what we need for the coming year but also what we dread.  So go ahead and sing the hymn.  Sing it loud.  Sing it strong.  Gratitude is the answer to our fears.  We live by grace just as we have been saved by grace.  Thanks be to God!  Another year of grace!