God loves us and wants us to be happy. How do I know this? The Bible tells me so.  Its repeated many times in the Psalms. The LORD is good and his love endures forever. Give thanks to the LORD for he is good; his love endures forever.

One key to understanding that God loves us and wants us to be happy, is the word “good”. In the beginning, in Genesis 1, God makes light, land and sea and it is good.  He makes plants and trees and calls them good. He makes the sun, moon and stars, and guess what? They are good. He creates animals, birds and fish. He says, ” They are good.” They are all good in their own right, but who are they good for? Humans! I don’t think the creation so far made God particularly happy, but he knew it would make humans happy. Adam and Eve; you and me. Finally he makes humans in his image and likeness, and then stands back and takes a look at it all and declares, “It is very good!”

The second key to understanding that God loves us and wants us to be happy, is the word “love”.  All of us who have children love them and want them to be happy.  We are not perfect, and often make mistakes in showing our love for them. Those who are in Christ are God’s adopted children. Our heavenly Father never makes mistakes in loving us. I like what Jesus said in Matthew 7, ” If you being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good gifts to his children. ”  This goodness all starts with God’s love. Not with us. 1 John 4:10 tells us, “This is love, not that we have loved God, but that he has loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice for our sins.”

If that thought, act, gift and love doesn’t make us happy, nothing will!

As we enter a new year, we can imagine it as a kind of new creation. A blank slate, an empty book, and we can look forward to seeing what good words that God is going to write on the slate of our hearts; on the pages of our lives. We can anticipate wonderful gifts that our Heavenly Father is going to give us. Let’s look forward to the new year with excitement, joy and anticipation, knowing that God loves us and wants us to be happy!

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Praying that in 2023 you have –

12 months of success

52 weeks of laughter

365 days of fun

8760 hours of joy

525600 minutes of blessing

and 31536000 seconds of happiness

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