I greet you in Jesus’ precious name! It is Tuesday morning, the 30th of December, 2025, and this is your friend, Angus Buchan, with a thought for today.

We go straight to the Gospel of John 12:43:

“for they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God.” 

When I read that Scripture I just think of one thing, the fear of man, and I want to say to each one of us as we are facing the new year of 2026, let us stop chasing the approval of man and start doing things for God’s glory alone. It will change our lives dramatically. I looked up the translation of this Bible verse in The Message Translation, and it is quite interesting. It says,

“They were afraid of getting kicked out of the meeting place. When push came to shove they cared more for human approval than for God’s glory.”

How true is that? Let us change our complete outlook this coming year. Let us start asking ourselves that question, “What would God do?” - before we do it.

I have spoken to men who got trapped in alcoholism, alcoholics, and I asked them, “Why did you do it?” And they have told me, “No, we didn’t do it because we wanted to. We did it because we wanted to stay in favour with the crowd”, and of course when you become an alcoholic, you are immediately chucked out of the crowd and you are on your own. I have spoken to drug addicts, and I said, “Why did you get into this hellish thing?” And they said, “We were just trying to keep in with the crowd, to be popular, and so we thought we would dabble in these drugs.” And now, they have been caught up in that horrible thing called addiction. The young girl, a virgin who loved the Lord, why did you sleep with that man? “No, not really, but I was just wanting to be popular with the crowd because all my friends were doing it.” And because you did it thinking it would be safe, you ended up getting pregnant and marrying the man you did not love.

Let us not go down that road this coming year. Let us start doing what the Lord Jesus Christ wants us to do for our own sake and for His glory. Let us start to walk in holiness and then we will have a life that is full of joy and purpose and victory!

Jesus bless you and have a wonderful day,
Goodbye.