THY KINGDOM COME, a devotional by Ludvig Hope (1939)

 

JANUARY 2


And when eight days were fulfilled for circumcising Him, His name was called JESUS, which was so called by the angel before He was conceived in the womb. Luke 2:21


NO one of us knows what the year we have just entered will bring us. We know only that the inheritance we received was sin and sorrow and sickness and death, and we know also that to this inheritance much cleaves that is against us. It is therefore easy to predict that this year too we will often be helpless and discouraged both in temporal and in spiritual matters. We surely do the right thing in taking these facts into consideration. Nevertheless the greatest and best thing of all is that God considers these facts both in your case and in mine.


God has given us the right to count on something else also: We may use the name of Jesus. God has bound all His promises to this Name: there He has put our entire future filled with light and hope. In this Name there is forgiveness for all our sin, and the right to go to God boldly to get all that we need. It was this Name that Jesus left here below. He gave us the right to use this Name when we appear before God, needy and helpless, so that we may receive everything that we ask of the Father in this Name. Yea, in His Name we may go out into all the world and proclaim repentance and forgiveness of sins for all people.


Considering this, can we not look into the future with confidence and hope?
“Go!” says Jesus. “Go! Go through this year too at my expense and on my responsibility!” Go through everything that meets you! Go through life and death! Jesus will go with you.


Blessed Name of Jesus!

Jesus, only name that’s given
Under all the mighty heaven,
Whereby man, to sin enslaved,
Bursts his fetters, and is saved.

Jesus, name of wondrous love,
Human name of God above:
Pleading only this we flee,
Helpless, 0 our God, to Thee.