‘Now’ is the day of salvation …
I’m not sure why it feels exciting, but as the New Year approaches it carries a quiet sense of ‘let’s get it over with, roll up our sleeves, take a deep breath, and get on with it.’
Every January, we reach for the same emotive ticker-tape. A new year. A new season. Breakthrough is coming. As Donald Trump would say, “Favour is coming – big favour. And this time, folks, it’s going to be different. Totally different. You’re going to see things happen like never before. Believe me. People are saying it. This is the moment. It’s going to be huge. You won’t believe what God’s about to do.”
We have that deep longing, and hidden beneath it we may carry an ache we don’t talk about out loud. The ache of prayers still unanswered. Pain that didn’t lift. A God who felt close once, but now seems silent. A storm ahead and difficulties that we know we face – as if they were ready to ambush us, and even though disguised, we know they are there.
We say it’s a fresh start, (or we certainly hope for one) but the truth is, many are dragging last year’s fears into the next one. Same weight, different calendar. Deep down, we’re hoping God moves by dates and that He’ll show up now because the timing feels better. But that’s not how He works. Not once in Scripture did God wait for conditions to improve before acting. He doesn’t follow our schedule. He interrupts it.
Paul throws the ball in the air and serves a 164 kmh ace, “In the time of my favor I heard you, and in the day of salvation I helped you.” I tell you, now is the time of God’s favor, now is the day of salvation.” (2 Cor 6:2) He’s not trying to stir hype. He never does. He’s pulling back the curtain on reality. God isn’t on pause. He’s present. Not later. Not when you feel stronger. Now.
Here’s what that really means. It means grace isn’t waiting on your progress. It meets you in your exhaustion. It means God doesn’t ask you to pretend you’re okay. He draws near when you’re not. The gospel was never about pretending. It was about rescue. Not for the sorted. For the stuck.
Still, the quieter battle rages underneath… not “can God move?” but “will He move for me?” That’s the crack in the wall for most believers that can’t be papered over. They believe in His power. They just don’t think they’re the kind He uses it on. So they fold up their faith into something polite. Manageable. Safe. They pray with disclaimers. Worship with doubt. Hope, but not too loudly. Conviction and audacity are for ‘them’ over there in Jon’s home group who are laughing, hoping, believing and praying.
And the enemy loves that because as long as your hope stays in the ‘tomorrow’ future, you won’t contend for anything now. You’ll spiritualise delay and call it wisdom. But Scripture never teaches delayed obedience. It calls it unbelief.
I love the Old Testament, so let’s go there. In the searing heat of the wilderness, with no sunblock and no shade, Moses met God at the bush, it wasn’t a lesson in potential. It was a revelation of presence. I have surely seen the affliction… I have come down. That’s not poetic. That’s personal. God sees. God acts. He doesn’t announce good intentions. He invades with mercy. He’s here. Now.
Jesus did the same. Bartimaeus didn’t cry out because he’d mastered patience or tweaked the filters of civilised impropriety.. He cried out because he realised who was walking by. The woman with the issue of blood didn’t reach out because she’d finally sorted her theology. She was desperate. And she believed the kingdom was close enough to touch.
They didn’t wait for a better moment. They moved in the one they had.
That’s where faith lives and thrives – in the now. Not in a perfectly curated moment, as though someone were poised over the eBay app, waiting to secure the winning bid. Not in some future season where everything finally aligns. It lives in cracked voices, trembling prayers, dry seasons, and desperate groans. If you think God only meets the spiritually elite, you’ve missed the scandal of the gospel – the King stepped into the mud of our lives, entering the grit and grief of human existence. Not staying at a distance, not waiting for humanity to clean itself up, but entering the brokenness, the blood, the betrayal, and the raw physicality of life in a fallen world.
Romans 8:28 doesn’t whisper a milky-hot chocolate comfort for later either. It roars with purpose now. All things work together for good… That’s not pep talk. That’s covenantal certainty. Even when your situation looks dead, God is breathing resurrection under the surface.
And the silence you hear? Don’t mistake it for absence. He was silent in Gethsemane too – but He was still saving the world.
You don’t need a stage. You don’t need a sign. You need eyes to see that Jesus has not walked past you. He’s in the room. And when you see Him, you’ll move again. Maybe even with a limp, even with questions.
Faith isn’t pretending everything’s fine. It’s reaching out anyway.
Not because you’re strong. But because He already came down. Don’t worry about 2026 being a year of unprecedented favour, grace, mercy, compassion and the sublime manifest Presence of God – start here, now, whenever you read this!
And anyway, we invented the Gregorian calendar …