Jan 1 - A New Song for a New Year

January 1

A new song for the new Year

Psalms 40:1-3

Ps 40:1  I waited patiently for the LORD; and he inclined unto me, and heard my cry.

 2 He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings.
 3 And he hath put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God: many shall see it, and fear, and shall trust in the LORD.

New Years is a time when we not only look forward to the coming year, it is a time when we also look back. During the closing days of December the media floods us with things that happened in the previous year. Before we look at the “new song”  we would do well to review what our “old song” was during the last year.  What was your song last year?  If you cannot remember perhaps a suggestion may help you recall it.     

    Your song in a year of trouble and difficulties might have been “Nobody knows the trouble I seen, Nobody knows my sorrow”

    There are any number of songs that might have been your theme for the last year.  The psalmist tells us he had a very real problem.  He was in a horrible pit. The pit spoken of here is like a well or cistern that is used as a prison. The single opening at the top would be closed by a heavy stone. It was dark, damp, and the dirt floor was a quagmire of filth and slippery clay. But his condition was even worse than just being in a pit like prison. The Bible says it was a horrible pit.  What could have made it worse than it was? The word horrible here speaks of noise, turmoil, people rioting, intense ongoing noise, like the rushing noise from a large waterfall.  I do not know what caused the noise just that the psalmist says he was in a horrible pit, filled with noise, darkness, slippery mire, with no possible way to escape.

     The first verse tells us what he did. He cried out to the Lord.  Then he waited patiently. I imagine he cried out continually as he waited but he did not lose hope. We ask God to remove some great problem. We want it all and we want it now! We pray and then rely on our own devices to solve the problem before giving God a chance.  

     But our man in the pit did more than just wait. He waited patiently. That talks of a settled disposition, even in the midst of being in a horrible pit. 

     Three things happened as a result of his patient waiting and crying unto the LORD.

He was lifted up from the miry clay, set on a solid rock and given a new song.

Tony Evans says it best. “Out of the mire and into the choir”.

May God grant each of us a new song for the coming year. If you have been lifted out of the mire and into the choir, join me in singing His praises this coming year.   


Ps 96:1 ¶ O sing unto the LORD a new song: sing unto the LORD, all the earth.