At the start of each new year, I’m compelled to engage in what I call a holy recalibration of sorts. I think about goals and the direction I’m heading. I gauge my involvements and priorities, evaluating what to continue and what to pause or end. And I consider what I can realistically accomplish in the coming year, Lord willing, writing out ideas, brainstorming, and talking with trusted people in my life to gain feedback and suggestions.
I ALSO PRAY.
It is wise for us to start each new year thoughtfully and prayerfully. Psalm 127:1 says, “Unless the Lord builds a house, its builders labor over it in vain.” I am not interested in coming up with my own ideas and hoping God jumps in. When we lay out all our ideas and thoughts and goals and ask the Lord to lead and guide us, He will!
It’s so important to commit the year to our faithful heavenly Father, to ask for His help, and to lift our hopes and plans to Him…then trust Him to lead and guide us, grant wisdom, divine connections, divine opportunities. We must also commit to entrusting everything to Him, trusting Him in every situation and circumstance.
As you seek to begin the new year thoughtfully and prayerfully, use God’s Word as your guide. Below I have created a short list of specific Bible verses to help as you prayerfully consider your goals and direction for 2026. May these verses help and guide you.
For those looking to do the January Write and Pray Scripture Challenge, I kept is simple this month, and we will focus on the 6 verses below. Write out each verse, then use the verse as a prompt to write a prayer. The theme is “Goals and Direction for 2026”.
6 Verses to Consider and Pray As You Start the New Year /January Write and Pray Scripture Challenge
- “Commit your activities to the Lord, and your plans will be established.” (Proverbs 16:3)
- “Now if any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God—who gives to all generously and ungrudgingly—and it will be given to him.” (James 1:5)
- “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared ahead of time for us to do.” (Ephesians 2:10)
- “Let the favor of the Lord our God be on us; establish for us the work of our hands—establish the work of our hands!” (Psalm 90:17)
- A person’s steps are established by the Lord, and he takes pleasure in his way. (Psalm 37:23)
- The Lord is my strength and my shield; my heart trusts in him, and I am helped. (Psalm 28:7)
A New Year Prayer For You
LORD, I commit this new year entirely to You. Please go before me and prepare the way and be my rear guard. Please grant me wisdom, leading and guiding me according to Your will and plans for me. Grant me divine connections, divine opportunities, and continually help me. LORD, I entrust this year to you – my hopes, my goals, my desires, my work, my body, my health.
I entrust to You all of my personal, professional, and spiritual goals; please establish my way. Help me to love You and people more, and cause my knowledge of and faith in You to grow. Give me a deep and abiding love for You and Your Word. Make me a student of Your Word and help me to read it daily. And help me to pray more!
Orchestrate all that lies before me, give me grace and help me to honor You with all of my choices and decisions this year. Fill me with Your peace. May Your joy be my strength, and may I continually depend on You, trusting You every single day. In the mighty name of Jesus Christ my Lord and Savior I pray, amen.
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