5 Ways Advent Helps You Prepare for the New Year

1. Advent helps you embrace hope.

Advent emphasizes the hope you can find through Jesus as your Savior and Advocate. Hope is a powerful spiritual force that shapes how you approach the New Year. While many people place their hope in temporary circumstances – such as career advancements, financial stability, or personal accomplishments – Advent calls us to anchor your hope in something much greater: the eternal promises of God. Unlike goals based on changing circumstances, hope rooted in God’s Word endures, carrying you through both joyful and challenging seasons. Hope reminds you that, no matter what the New Year holds, God’s plans for you are greater than anything you could foresee. Advent allows you to reflect on God’s promises, renewing your spirit with anticipation for what God will do in your life in the future.

God reminds you in Jeremiah 29:11: “‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.’” As you meditate on Bible verses like these during Advent, you can develop a forward-looking hope that is rooted not in something unreliable – like New Year’s resolutions, which are often broken – but in the completely reliable character and purposes of God. This hope empowers you to view each challenge as an opportunity to grow in faith and to align more closely with God’s will for your life. Hope not only fuels your journey but transforms it, helping you see each step as part of God’s larger plan for your life.

Photo Credit: ©Unsplash/ Kelly Sikkema 

2. Advent helps you seek peace.

Advent also highlights peace, which is essential for going into the New Year with a steady heart and mind. This peace includes more than just feeling calm; it involves your complete well-being. Advent encourages you to examine the sources of stress in your life and to actively invite God’s peace into these areas. Doing so might mean pursuing forgiveness from God after confessing and repenting of your sins, forgiving the people who have hurt you and pursuing reconciliation when possible, letting go of unhealthy habits in your life, and starting new habits that allow you to thrive in the New Year and beyond. Pursuing peace is a radical choice in our fallen world that’s full of stress and anxiety. Advent helps you pursue peace by surrendering to God’s design for rest and balance.

In Matthew 11:28-29, Jesus invites you: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” Advent reminds you that true peace comes from depending on Jesus, trusting that he will bear your burdens and lead you with wisdom. By entering the New Year with a heart rooted in God’s peace, you can resist the pressures of worry and hurry, choosing instead to walk with God at a pace defined by faith, not fear. This choice can lead you into a healthier, more focused year in which you can fully engage with God’s work without being overwhelmed by life’s demands.

Photo Credit: ©Getty Images/Deagreez 

3. Advent helps you rejoice.

You also experience joy as you celebrate Advent, and that shifts your perspective so you can see the goodness of God in every season. In a culture that often confuses joy with happiness, Advent teaches you to discover the deep and lasting joy that arises from your relationship with God. That joy is not dependent on success or ideal circumstances. Instead, it’s based on recognizing and celebrating God’s blessings. By choosing joy, you gain the ability to manage challenges while maintaining a faithful attitude of gratitude, because joy gives you the confidence that God is with you. Advent shows you that joy is not something you wait for, but something you actively cultivate by embracing God’s presence in your life.

Going into the New Year with a mindset of joy helps you expect the best, not the worst, for your future because God loves you. James 1:2-3 encourages you: “Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.” When you enter the New Year prepared to rejoice even in challenges, you shift your focus from what you lack to what God is doing in your life. Advent encourages you to build a habit of enjoying joy through gratitude. That can help you enter the New Year with both resilience and hope, ready to embrace whatever comes your way. 

Photo Credit: ©Getty Images/Tetiana Soares 

4. Advent helps you put love into action.

Advent reminds you that, just as God loves you unconditionally through Jesus, God calls you to love without limits. You can learn how to love God, yourself, and other people in deeper ways during Advent. Then, you can use what you’ve learned to put love into action during the New Year and beyond. Advent encourages you to focus on relationships and prioritize service, empathy, and compassion. As you reflect on the love you have received from God, you become inspired to share that love with others in ways that bring healing, connection, and unity.

In 1 Corinthians 13:13, the Bible describes love as the foundation of all virtues: “And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love.” Advent is an invitation to love in ways that are sacrificial and powerful – not motivated by self-interest but by a genuine desire to reflect God’s heart to others. That involves intentionally practicing kindness, stepping out of your comfort zones to serve people, and choosing to forgive others for their mistakes as God forgives you for yours. As you enter the New Year, this commitment to love redefines your purpose. By making love your primary goal, you can show the people in your life the reality of God’s love as it flows through you. Your New Year’s resolutions and ambitions will then be about more than just your own life; they’ll reflect the important part you play in the greater story of God’s work in the world.

Photo Credit: ©GettyImages/jacoblund 

5. Advent helps you focus on Jesus and his work in your life.

Advent invites you to center your entire life around your relationship with Jesus. Colossians 1:17 says about Jesus: “He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.” When you focus your attention on Jesus during Advent, you come to recognize that all you hope, dream, and plan must ultimately point back to him. Advent challenges you to evaluate what holds the central place in your life and to renew your commitment to make Christ the focus. By anchoring your life in your relationship with Jesus, you enter the New Year with clarity about your core values and priorities.

This Christ-centered approach to life will empower you to regularly set aside distractions and discover the wonder of Jesus’ work in your life. That will inspire you to keep Jesus at the center of your life in the New Year and beyond, seeking his guidance in your decisions, relationships, and goals. Advent’s focus on Jesus helps you develop a habit of paying close attention to what Jesus is doing, and be inspired by awe as a result. You can carry that habit over into every future day God gives you to live, so you can keep enjoying living to the fullest and experiencing God’s best for you. Noticing and appreciating Jesus’ wonderful work in your life will continue to strengthen your faith and help you go into the New Year with confidence and trust in God’s good plans for you.

In conclusion, the season of Advent is an awe-inspiring journey of spiritual renewal that extends beyond Christmas, preparing you well for the New Year and beyond. Celebrating Advent equips you to enter the New Year with a deeper connection to God. Advent challenges you to look beyond New Year’s resolutions and focus on eternal values instead. It shows you that Jesus is truly with you every single day of your life, loving you with power and faithfulness. As Lamentations 3:22-23 points out: “Because of the Lord’s great love, you are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.” As you carry the lessons of Advent into the New Year, you can do so with the assurance that God will continue to give you hope, peace, joy, and love, and Jesus will continue to work in your life in wonderful ways!

Photo Credit: Robert Thiemann/Unsplash