SO the world didn’t come to a dramatic end on December 21, 2012, did it? Looks like the Mayans got it wrong and all those folks who built bunkers in the hills or spent the run-up to Christmas stockpiling food and waiting for aliens to rescue them are looking a bit silly!

This funny old world of ours will keep spinning around the sun and our lives will continue into 2013 after all.

But – be honest – even if you didn’t head for the hills, did you not feel just a twinge of apprehension at all the murmurings of doom and destruction?

A friend put a great cartoon on Facebook a couple of weeks back. It showed a smiling Jesus with a big “thumbs up” and the caption ‘did you really think I’d let the world end four days before my birthday?’

It made me smile, but the serious point is that the one who made the sun and moon and stars is the one who determines the length of our days and the shelf life of our planet.

The psalmist writes ‘my times are in your hands’ and the last book in the Bible calls Jesus the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end.

So as we head into a new year, with all its challenges and opportunities, we can be confident that the one who started it all is the one who will end it all, at the time only he has decided.

And if someone who loves us is really in charge, we actually have nothing to fear.

Happy New Year everyone! – John.