Head of the Year

The festival of Rosh HaShanah (head of the year) is celebrated in our September/October, when the Jewish New Year begins. Every Rosh HaShanah, in Jewish tradition, God opens and examines the Book of Life – where He has already written every person’s words, deeds and thoughts. If good deeds outnumber sinful ones for the year, that person’s name will be inscribed in the Book for another year on Yom Kippur.

And, the Shofar (ram’s-horn trumpet) is sounded before every Rosh HaShanah to call people to repentance and remind them that the Holy days are arriving…so they have a chance to get right. The day is celebrated…but, there is fear about the judgment.

Christians, on the other hand, aren’t clinging to their own deeds for salvation. They’re clinging to Jesus’ work that has already been done. Instead of sounding the trumpet and repenting, repenting, repenting in hopes that when He appears, we will have been down on our knees, seeking to be right…we sound the church bells, and seek the forgiveness we know is already there, and we fall to our knees in relief…that our names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.

We look forward, not with dread, but with hope and great anticipation, to the day of Messiah’s return and the trumpet call of God that announces His arrival, when He declares His final triumph over the grave. We will be caught up in the air to meet Him, and shall be with the Lord forever.

Arriving in heaven is not just the head of a New Year, but, the beginning of a New Life that needs no more Rosh HaShanah’s, because we will be in the midst of the One who fulfilled its purpose. Christ, our head. Christ, our life. Christ, our Messiah.

Happy New Year!

James Gomez

Prince of Peace Lutheran Church

Sturgeon Bay, WI 54235