From Self Pity to Joy for 2021

Today I am going to again break from our regular sermon series in Mark to do a special seasonal sermon. This week, it is a sermon for the New Year. I hear a lot of people talking about what a hard year 2020 has been and how glad they will be when it is over. They say that they hope very much that 2021 will be a much better year. Certainly, it is understandable why people would say this. I don't need to go over all the difficulties that we have experienced in 2020. But what I do want to do is help you learn how to look at your hardships with joy as God has commanded you to do. The truth is that many Christians have way too much self-pity right now about their hardships and we need to prepare for the New Year, not by engaging in a lot of wishful thinking, but by adjusting our attitude about our hardships.