A Blessed Year
Pastoral | January 22, 2026 | By: Rick Holman
“May this be your most blessed year yet.”
Those words were shared with me for many years on my birthday by a dear friend and pastor, Bobby Brewer. I know I wasn’t the only one who received that note from him, but every time he said it, I was encouraged. But it made me stop and think.
If you knew Bobby, you knew what he was not wishing. He wasn’t saying, “May this be the year everything finally goes your way.” He wasn’t wishing for financial ease, a new job, a spouse, a promotion, the resolution of every conflict, or answers to all your prayers in your perfect timeline. He certainly wasn’t praying for a pain-free year or a trouble-free life. Those things might happen, but that’s not what Bobby meant when he talked about blessing.
Bobby was a man who walked closely with Jesus. And because of that, he had a very different understanding of what it meant to live a blessed life. For him, blessing wasn’t measured by materials or circumstances; it was measured by closeness. A sincere, growing, daily closeness to Jesus. Not being a casual admirer of Jesus, not a fan who cheered from a distance, but a disciple whose life was being shaped, formed, and anchored by Christ.
For him, blessing wasn’t measured by materials or circumstances; it was measured by closeness.
So, when Bobby said, “May this be your most blessed year yet,” I believe what he was really saying was this: “No matter what happens this year, may you walk more closely with Jesus than you ever have before.”
And that’s where I always felt a little tension. It wasn’t the closeness to Jesus part. That was encouraging and comforting. It was that phrase, “no matter what,” that made me squirm.
Because “no matter what” leaves room for things I would rather avoid. It leaves room for uncertainty or disappointment, unanswered prayers, loss, grief, and suffering. I mean, who really wants that tough stuff? And if I’m honest, I often want God’s blessing to look more like protection, provision and even avoidance from those things, not presence within them.
In Romans chapter 8, the apostle Paul doesn’t just list promises; he redefines what blessing truly means, something far richer and deeper than our often-shallow expectations.
Romans 8 is written to believers who are not promised an easy road. Earlier in the chapter, Paul speaks openly about suffering, weakness, and groaning. He acknowledges that life in this broken world includes pain and struggle. Yet by the time we reach the closing verses, Romans 8:31–39, Paul lifts our eyes from the circumstances around us to the unwavering realities beneath us.
“What then shall we say to these things?” Paul asks. In other words, in light of the suffering, the struggle, the uncertainty, what can we possibly say?
“If God is for us, who can be against us?”
Notice what Paul doesn’t say. He doesn’t say, “If God is for us, nothing hard will ever happen.” He doesn’t say, “If God is for us, we will always understand what God is doing.” He doesn’t even say, “If God is for us, we will always feel like God is near.”
What he says is far stronger: God is for us.
And that single truth reframes what it means to have a blessed year.
Because if God is for you, then even the hard seasons are not wasted. If God is for you, then suffering does not mean abandonment. If God is for you, then trials are not evidence of God’s absence, but often the very place where His presence becomes most real.
If God is for you, then even the hard seasons are not wasted.
Paul goes on to remind us that God did not spare His own Son but gave Him up for us all. In other words, the cross is our permanent proof that God is for us. Long before we ever faced the hardships of our lives, God settled the question of His love toward us. He is not distant. He is not indifferent. He is not working against us. He is for us, even when life feels against us.
Then Paul asks another question: “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?”
Paul doesn’t leave us guessing. He names the things we fear most: trouble, hardship, persecution, famine, nakedness, danger, sword. In other terms, we might add grief, illness, betrayal, anxiety, loss, disappointment, unanswered prayers. Paul doesn’t deny their reality. He declares them as givens.
Then he affirms this amazing truth: none of them have the power to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Not suffering. Not hardship. Not loss. Not fear. Not even death itself. And no matter what.
And this is where Romans 8 reshapes our understanding of blessing. A blessed year is not one where none of these things touch us. A blessed year is one where none of these things separate us.
Because the blessing is not the absence of difficulty; the blessing is the presence of Jesus.
The blessing is knowing that when the year brings joy, God is for you. When the year brings sorrow, God is for you. When prayers are answered, God is for you. When prayers remain unanswered, God is still for you. When you feel strong in faith, God is for you. And when you feel weak, tired, or unsure, God is still for you.
So maybe Bobby’s words were never meant to make us comfortable. Maybe they were meant to ground us. To anchor us. To remind us that no matter what this year holds, the greatest blessing available to us is not found in what happens to us, but in Who we walk with and more importantly Who walks with us.
And if that’s true, if God is for us, if nothing can separate us from His love, then even the hardest year can become the most blessed year yet, not because of the things we gain or avoid, but because of the closeness of Jesus that sustains us through it all.
Rick Holman
SBC Cactus Campus Pastor
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