JESUS WILL NEVER FAIL

JESUS WILL NEVER FAIL

The holiday season is over.  We have put all the holiday decorations in the attic for another year, and I am ready to begin this New Year.  I don’t make a list of New Year’s resolutions, as I believe they just are promises to myself that I never can keep.  

I am asking myself today what is on my heart for this next year.  There is a path ahead, I know, but it winds ahead, its curves and byways are unknown to me.  It is like having a clean slate for another year.  I pray for a safe year, a year without sickness or accidents, as I have seen for the last two years.  I long to reach more souls for Christ, especially among the elderly who have never accepted Jesus as their Savior, and I have many stories of those who have come to Jesus in their last days.  Some had been in church all their lives, even seminary and had never accepted Jesus.  One lady I remember had been in church all her life and no one had ever told her that Jesus Saves.

“Remember ye not the former things, neither consider the things of old.  Behold, I will do a new thing; now it shall spring forth; shall ye not know it?  I will even make a new way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert” Isaiah 43:18-19.

So He is calling me and you to put the trials and struggles of this last year behind us, although we may still feel the results of those things.  This year He promises to do a new thing in each of our lives.  He will make a new way when those wilderness places come in our lives, and promises living water, which comes from the Holy Spirit to overflow our lives and to reach others for Christ.  Oh, to reach more people for Jesus this year!  Oh, how I long to see “that light” come into a new Christian’s face, as Jesus comes in and begins their new life with Him.

But in all of this, there is one thing that I know.  Jesus will never fail me or fail you, as we face that unknown pathway ahead.   We used to sing this song as a chorus, but here is the history of this song and the full hymn, “Jesus Never Fails.”

“When he was a boy in elementary school, Arthur Luther wanted to be a foreign missionary.  As he got older and realized that he had musical talent, he wanted to write a song that the whole world would sing.  He wrote a song that he thought would be popular.  In fact, he thought it was pretty good, but apparently no one else did.  In his words, “It was a dismal failure.”

However, God made both of his dreams come true when Luther wrote the song “Jesus Never Fails.”  At the time he was working with an evangelistic team in Kentucky.  The he says, “I received some very disturbing news from my family some six hundred miles away.  Worried and homesick, I sat down at the old square piano in the home where we were staying and as my fingers wandered idly, a simple melody developed beneath them which seemed to sing, ‘Jesus Never Fails.’ Then and there the words and music of the chorus were born.”

This simple little song has been translated into more than a dozen languages, taking it to places that Arthur Luther could never have gone as a missionary.  No, Jesus never fails.  (“Hymns” by W. Petersen).

Earthly friends may prove untrue, doubts and fears assail; One still loves and cares for you: Jesus Never Fails.

Jesus never fails, Jesus never fails; Heav’n and earth may pass away but Jesus never fails.

Tho’ the sky be dark and drear, fierce and strong the gale, just remember He is near, and He will not fail.

In life’s dark and bitter hour love will still prevail; trust His everlasting pow’r, Jesus will not fail.” (Arthur A. Luther (1891-1960)

As we face the year ahead, there will be times of doubts and fears, and even friends or family may fail us, but we have a Precious Savior, Jesus, who will never fail us.  Oh, to just fall into His arms when storms of grief come!

And we may have dark and dreary days, and the storms of life may be upon us, but just remember that Jesus never fails, He is near.  Oh, to just look through the gloom and see and feel His presence.

And I know that some of you may face that dark hour, when eternity is so near, and the end of the road has come and one can see the light of the city just ahead.  But by faith you are held in His everlasting arms, and He will guide you into your heavenly home,because Jesus never fails.

If you do not know this Wonderful Savior, accept Him now.  You don’t know what is on the path ahead in this next year and He calls each one of us to be ready to meet Him.  Just ask Him into your heart, and to forgive your sins, and then praise Him for your salvation and your eternity with Him.  And then you, too, will know that Jesus never fails.

In the Precious Name of Jesus,

Pastor Sharon