Celebrating

Tuesday, November 2

Celebrating    

Then Ezra praised the Lord, the great God, and all the people chanted, “Amen! Amen!” as they lifted their hands. Then they bowed down and worshiped the Lord with their faces to the ground. Romans 7:19

For most of us celebrations come naturally. No one delays when it comes to celebrating a milestone or momentous events (like birthdays, holidays, and achievements). Now, we typically have no problem with this, and neither did those in today’s passage.

In Nehemiah 8, the people had just finished building the wall and were gathering to celebrate The Feast of Trumpets (a day to rest). This is the easy part, slowing down to refresh the hope we have in God. But, in Nehemiah 8, we also see the people celebrating progress. And this is where the struggle enters in.

As they are recalling all that has taken place up until this celebration, the people started to mourn. In vv. 9-10, however, Nehemiah encouraged the people not to mourn because it is a holy day. And in verse 12, the people make a sudden shift. Now, they celebrate with joy. What happened?

The verse states that the people celebrated because they now understood the words. Instead of seeing how far they have left to go, they reframed their perspective to focus on how far they’ve come. This gave them joy.

The key to this newfound joy is focusing on all that God has done. When we celebrate how far we’ve come, we’re encouraged to go farther. When we see how much God has done, we are encouraged to trust Him more. On the other hand if we only look at how far we have left to go, we’re encouraged to give up.

Today, you might be thinking you have nothing to celebrate in yourself. But think about how far you’ve come and praise God for the journey. You’re growing in your Christian walk.

Celebrate your progress. As you do this, the joy you reap will propel you forward!