A new year always greets us like a doorway — one side opening toward the unknown, the other side framed by everything we’ve lived through to get here. We step into January with a mixture of hope and hesitation, expectation and reflection. It’s human nature to look forward and backward at the same time. We can’t help it. Even as we imagine what might be different this year, something inside us quietly replays what has already been.
Turn on a television during this season and you’ll see it everywhere — the “best and worst of the year,” the highlights, the failures, the milestones, the losses. The world looks back before it looks forward. And in a way, so do we. Because memory is not just a scrapbook; it’s a spiritual instructor. It teaches, warns, strengthens, humbles, and clarifies. Our memories become the mile markers of our faith journey.
Some memories lift us.
Some burden us.
Some remind us of God’s goodness.
Others remind us of our weakness.
But taken together, they become the story we carry into the next year.
And here’s the truth: how you remember determines how you begin.
If you only remember the disappointments, you enter the new year limping.
If you only remember your successes, you enter the new year drifting.
If you forget God’s faithfulness, you enter the new year unanchored.
If you forget your own need, you enter the new year unprepared.
This is why Scripture cares so deeply about memory. God tells His people over and over again: “Remember. Remember. Do not forget.” Not because He needs the recognition — but because we need the clarity. When we remember rightly, the future suddenly becomes something God can shape.
So as we stand at the edge of a new year, we do what Israel often did — we look back and we look up. And sometimes, when we look back, we discover something uncomfortable: that somewhere in the mixture of busyness, routine, and survival… we drifted. We prayed, but not like before. We trusted, but not consistently. We obeyed, but not completely. We lost something — not intentionally, not rebelliously, but gradually.
Israel knew this feeling all too well. They had memories of God’s faithfulness, but the story of their last season was a story of spiritual drift. They lost battles. They lost courage. They lost direction. And in the saddest twist of all, they even lost the ark — the very symbol of God’s presence among them.
And when the Philistines captured it, they celebrated like children who’d stolen a treasure. They marched it from city to city, showing it off, parading it like a trophy. Until God reminded them He was no trophy. And when tumors and rats plagued their land, they panicked and sent the ark back with an unforgettable guilt offering — five golden rats and five golden tumors. You almost have to smile at the absurdity of it. It’s as if they said, “Here, Israel — we’re sorry, please take your God back before He destroys us!”
But when Israel received the ark again, something profound happened:
The presence of God did not automatically return.
Because the people had drifted too far.
The symbol came home,
but their hearts did not.
The ark was back,
but their devotion wasn’t.
They placed the ark on a hill and left it there for twenty long years — untouched, unreturned to the tabernacle, unhonored. They wanted God’s protection but not His authority. They wanted the memory of His presence without the surrender of their lives.
And that’s where some of us stand at the beginning of a new year.
We have the symbols — the language of faith, the familiarity of worship, the memory of better days with God — but if we are honest, our hearts have wandered. We want a fresh start, but not always a surrendered one. We want Ebenezer — the stone of help, the reminder that “thus far the Lord has led us” — but we want to skip past the place where help actually begins.
And so God, in His mercy, leads His people to Mizpah.
Mizpah — the place of honest return.
Mizpah — the place where you stop pretending.
Mizpah — the place where repentance has more power than resolution.
Mizpah — the place where you pour out the old year before God so He can fill the new one.
This is the doorway into our title.
This is the truth behind the journey we’re about to make:
You cannot end at Ebenezer until you first start at Mizpah.
You cannot celebrate God’s help until you surrender at the place of return.
You cannot lift a stone of remembrance until you bow at the altar of repentance.
You cannot claim victory until you yield control.
A new year does not begin with promises to try harder.
It begins with the humility to come back to God.
Mizpah is where the return begins.
Ebenezer is where the testimony ends.
And between those two places lies the story God wants to write in your life this year.
---
Part 2 — When God Steps Into the Battle
What happens at Mizpah is nothing short of remarkable. For twenty years the people lived with the ark on a hillside, their faith on pause, their worship hollow, their memory of God only half-lit. But Mizpah becomes the turning point. Samuel calls the nation to gather — not for a meeting, not for a festival, but for a reckoning.
And the people actually come.
They come with honesty.
They come with heaviness.
They come with the realization that all their drifting, all their dryness, all their unfruitfulness had a root deeper than circumstance — they had forgotten how to return to God.
At Mizpah, they pour out water before the Lord — a symbolic way of saying, “We empty ourselves. We surrender. We have nothing left to lean on but You.” It is a gesture of repentance so rare, so vulnerable, that Scripture remembers it with a dignified simplicity:
> “They poured out water before the Lord.”
No speeches.
No resolutions.
No promises.
Just surrender — clean, honest, complete.
But here’s what none of them expected:
Surrender attracts warfare.
Because the moment Israel returned to God, the Philistines noticed.
It is one of the great realities of spiritual life — the enemy doesn’t mind when you drift, when you live in neutral, when you survive on yesterday’s faith. But return to God? Bow the heart again? Pour out your strength before Him? Step into a new year with a heart that is willing to truly change?
That will get the enemy’s attention.
So as Israel is worshiping, confessing, returning, the Philistines march toward Mizpah. Not slowly. Not cautiously. Aggressively. Strategically. They remembered how easily they had defeated Israel before. They remembered how powerless Israel had been. They remembered the trophy they once carried — the ark itself. And so they come with confidence, certain this will be another easy victory.
And Israel sees them.
No weapons.
No preparation.
No battle lines.
Just a people on their knees, finally returning to God — and suddenly facing the threat of annihilation.
Can you imagine the fear?
They turn to Samuel in panic:
“Do not stop crying out to the Lord for us!”
Notice what they didn’t say:
They didn’t say, “Give us a strategy.”
They didn’t say, “Organize the troops.”
They didn’t say, “Run for your lives.”
They said, “Pray.”
Because somehow, in their first moments of real surrender, they realized something profound:
If God didn’t fight for them — they had no fight at all.
This is what Mizpah teaches us.
Victory never comes from preparation alone.
It doesn’t come from plans, from resolutions, or from human strength.
Victory comes from returning — because surrender invites God into the battle.
So Samuel takes a lamb and offers it wholly to the Lord. While Israel trembles, Samuel worships. While Israel looks at the enemy, Samuel looks at heaven. While Israel fears what is coming toward them, Samuel focuses on the One who stands above them.
And then it happens.
Scripture says the Lord thundered with a mighty sound. Not a soft rumble. Not a distant warning. A thunder so violent, so disorienting, so overwhelming that the Philistines could not advance. Lightning split the sky. The ground shook beneath their feet. Their confident march turned into chaotic stumbling. Fear gripped their ranks. Confusion tore their strategy apart.
What Israel could not do with weapons,
God did with His voice.
What Israel could not accomplish in their strength,
God accomplished in His sovereignty.
What Israel could not win through their past efforts,
God won in a moment — simply because they had returned.
This is the spiritual equation that changes a year, a life, a family:
When you start at Mizpah, God meets you in the battle.
Some of us misunderstand the nature of spiritual victory.
We think God fights for the strong.
We think He helps the competent.
We think He blesses the prepared.
But Mizpah shows us that God fights for the surrendered.
He doesn’t need your skill; He wants your heart.
He doesn’t ask for your plan; He asks for your return.
He doesn’t wait for your perfection; He responds to your surrender.
The battle at Mizpah reveals a God who steps in not when you have everything figured out — but when you finally admit you don’t.
And once God thundered, Israel did something they had been unable to do for two decades — they advanced.
They chased the Philistines.
They reclaimed territory.
They regained confidence.
They walked in a victory that was impossible the day before.
But notice the sequence:
1. Return.
2. Surrender.
3. Battle.
4. God intervenes.
5. Victory.
You cannot reverse it.
You cannot skip the first step.
You cannot claim the fifth without the first.
The victory at Mizpah was not won because Israel became stronger — but because Israel became humble. Their hearts bowed before their enemies fled. Their repentance preceded their courage. Their return opened the door to God’s intervention.
And that is what this year can become for you.
Not a year of trying harder.
Not a year of managing everything better.
Not a year defined by control, effort, or self-improvement.
But a year defined by returning.
Surrender will do more in one moment than striving will do in twelve months.
Repentance will open doors resolutions could never reach.
Honesty before God will accomplish what discipline alone never could.
If you want God to fight battles you cannot see,
start at Mizpah.
If you want breakthrough in areas where you have only known defeat,
start at Mizpah.
If you want spiritual authority again,
start at Mizpah.
If you want to recover what you’ve lost,
start at Mizpah.
Because this is the God who thunders.
This is the God who intervenes.
This is the God who turns surrender into victory,
and repentance into restoration.
But the story doesn’t end with the battle won.
Mizpah is only the beginning.
There is another place — a place where memory becomes testimony, where the past becomes praise, where the journey finds its voice.
And that place is Ebenezer.
---
Part 3 — Ending at Ebenezer
When the thunder faded and the shouting ceased, Israel found themselves standing in the aftermath of a victory they never should have won. Moments earlier they were trembling, unarmed, unprepared, and surrounded. Now they were walking across ground God Himself had cleared for them. The battle belonged to the Lord, but the victory was placed in their hands.
And as the people gathered around Samuel, breathing the air of a miracle, Samuel did something profound — something every believer needs at the start of a new year.
He took a stone.
Not a small stone —
not a pebble to slip into a pocket —
but a large, immovable stone that required effort to raise.
He set it between Mizpah and Shen, between the place of repentance and the place of restored strength, between where Israel cried out and where God answered.
And he named the stone Ebenezer — “Stone of Help.”
And then Samuel declared words that have echoed through every generation, words that still breathe life into weary hearts:
> “Thus far the Lord has helped us.”
Thus far —
through failure, through wandering, through grief, through fear, through doubt —
thus far He has helped us.
Not because Israel earned it.
Not because Israel was strong.
Not because Israel was worthy.
But because Israel returned.
Ebenezer was not the monument of a perfect people; it was the testimony of a faithful God.
That stone stood as a witness — not to Israel’s power, but to God’s mercy; not to Israel’s memory, but to God’s presence; not to Israel’s worthiness, but to God’s covenant love.
Ebenezer was not a trophy.
It was a testimony.
And that is exactly what you need this year.
Not a list of resolutions.
Not a fresh attempt at self-improvement.
Not a promise that “this time I’ll try harder.”
What you need —
and what God desires to give —
is an Ebenezer.
A place in your spirit where you can say:
“Thus far the Lord has helped me —
and He will not stop now.”
When Samuel raised that stone, everything began to shift. Israel had been living under oppression, fear, and defeat for decades. Their identity had been shaped by loss. Their memories were filled with failure. Their hearts were marked by drift.
But Ebenezer changed the narrative.
Because Ebenezer says:
“You made mistakes — but God never left you.”
“You drifted — but God drew you back.”
“You were unprepared — but God thundered for you.”
“You were fearful — but God gave courage.”
“You were defeated — but God delivered.”
Ebenezer is the place where God writes His name across your history.
And here is the part we cannot miss:
You cannot end at Ebenezer if you refuse to start at Mizpah.
Many believers want the testimony without the turning.
The victory without the vulnerability.
The strength without the surrender.
The remembrance without the repentance.
But God’s help does not begin where we pretend to be strong;
it begins where we finally admit we are weak.
That is why Samuel did not build the stone at the battlefield.
He built it between Mizpah and Shen, right in the middle of the journey.
It was not a monument to a moment —
it was a monument to a movement.
A movement that began with repentance,
continued with God’s intervention,
and ended with restored hope.
You might be in the middle of your journey right now.
Not at the beginning, not at the end — just somewhere between Mizpah and Ebenezer.
Between surrender and testimony.
Between pouring out and being filled.
Between needing help and seeing the help of God unfold.
Let this reassure you:
If you have returned, you will be helped.
God does not meet surrendered people with abandonment.
He meets them with thunder.
He meets them with presence.
He meets them with deliverance.
He meets them with stones of remembrance.
And your Ebenezer may not look like Samuel’s.
It may not be carved in rock or raised in a field.
Your Ebenezer might be:
A journal entry where you wrote,
“God carried me through this.”
A doctor’s report that says,
“Your heart is stronger than it has been in years.”
A relationship restored that you thought was gone forever.
A financial provision that arrived the week you had no idea how to make it.
A moment when God calmed your fear,
healed your memory,
lifted your mind,
or spoke into your spirit when you thought He was silent.
It might be the morning you woke up and realized:
“I should have been gone — but God held me.”
Your Ebenezer is not built by your hands —
it is raised by God’s faithfulness.
And every time you walk past it, every time you remember, every time you whisper “thus far,” your faith finds new strength. Because what God did then becomes the confidence for what God can do now.
This is why the title of this message matters:
Start at Mizpah, End at Ebenezer.
Start at the place of surrender.
End at the place of testimony.
Start at honesty.
End at help.
Start with your emptiness.
End with His faithfulness.
Start where you return.
End where God restores.
Because if you will begin this year at Mizpah —
if you will come back to God with a whole heart,
if you will pour out what needs to be released,
if you will bow where He is calling you to bow —
then I promise you by the authority of Scripture:
You will end this year at Ebenezer.
You will look back and say,
“God has helped me.”
You will raise a stone of remembrance —
not to your strength,
not to your success,
not to your accomplishments —
but to the God who never stopped being faithful.
This year is not asking you to be stronger.
This year is inviting you to return.
Start at Mizpah.
End at Ebenezer.
Start with surrender.
End with testimony.
Start with pouring out.
End with being lifted up.
Start where God meets you.
End where God helps you.
And when the year is finished, when you look back over the months that lie ahead, you will stand on the far side of every fear, every trial, every battle — and you will place your hand on the testimony of God’s faithfulness and say:
“Thus far the Lord has helped me.”
---
Part 3 — Ending at Ebenezer
When the thunder faded and the shouting ceased, Israel found themselves standing in the aftermath of a victory they never should have won. Moments earlier they were trembling, unarmed, unprepared, and surrounded. Now they were walking across ground God Himself had cleared for them. The battle belonged to the Lord, but the victory was placed in their hands.
And as the people gathered around Samuel, breathing the air of a miracle, Samuel did something profound — something every believer needs at the start of a new year.
He took a stone.
Not a small stone —
not a pebble to slip into a pocket —
but a large, immovable stone that required effort to raise.
He set it between Mizpah and Shen, between the place of repentance and the place of restored strength, between where Israel cried out and where God answered.
And he named the stone Ebenezer — “Stone of Help.”
And then Samuel declared words that have echoed through every generation, words that still breathe life into weary hearts:
> “Thus far the Lord has helped us.”
Thus far —
through failure, through wandering, through grief, through fear, through doubt —
thus far He has helped us.
Not because Israel earned it.
Not because Israel was strong.
Not because Israel was worthy.
But because Israel returned.
Ebenezer was not the monument of a perfect people; it was the testimony of a faithful God.
That stone stood as a witness — not to Israel’s power, but to God’s mercy; not to Israel’s memory, but to God’s presence; not to Israel’s worthiness, but to God’s covenant love.
Ebenezer was not a trophy.
It was a testimony.
And that is exactly what you need this year.
Not a list of resolutions.
Not a fresh attempt at self-improvement.
Not a promise that “this time I’ll try harder.”
What you need —
and what God desires to give —
is an Ebenezer.
A place in your spirit where you can say:
“Thus far the Lord has helped me —
and He will not stop now.”
When Samuel raised that stone, everything began to shift. Israel had been living under oppression, fear, and defeat for decades. Their identity had been shaped by loss. Their memories were filled with failure. Their hearts were marked by drift.
But Ebenezer changed the narrative.
Because Ebenezer says:
“You made mistakes — but God never left you.”
“You drifted — but God drew you back.”
“You were unprepared — but God thundered for you.”
“You were fearful — but God gave courage.”
“You were defeated — but God delivered.”
Ebenezer is the place where God writes His name across your history.
And here is the part we cannot miss:
You cannot end at Ebenezer if you refuse to start at Mizpah.
Many believers want the testimony without the turning.
The victory without the vulnerability.
The strength without the surrender.
The remembrance without the repentance.
But God’s help does not begin where we pretend to be strong;
it begins where we finally admit we are weak.
That is why Samuel did not build the stone at the battlefield.
He built it between Mizpah and Shen, right in the middle of the journey.
It was not a monument to a moment —
it was a monument to a movement.
A movement that began with repentance,
continued with God’s intervention,
and ended with restored hope.
You might be in the middle of your journey right now.
Not at the beginning, not at the end — just somewhere between Mizpah and Ebenezer.
Between surrender and testimony.
Between pouring out and being filled.
Between needing help and seeing the help of God unfold.
Let this reassure you:
If you have returned, you will be helped.
God does not meet surrendered people with abandonment.
He meets them with thunder.
He meets them with presence.
He meets them with deliverance.
He meets them with stones of remembrance.
And your Ebenezer may not look like Samuel’s.
It may not be carved in rock or raised in a field.
Your Ebenezer might be:
A journal entry where you wrote,
“God carried me through this.”
A doctor’s report that says,
“Your heart is stronger than it has been in years.”
A relationship restored that you thought was gone forever.
A financial provision that arrived the week you had no idea how to make it.
A moment when God calmed your fear,
healed your memory,
lifted your mind,
or spoke into your spirit when you thought He was silent.
It might be the morning you woke up and realized:
“I should have been gone — but God held me.”
Your Ebenezer is not built by your hands —
it is raised by God’s faithfulness.
And every time you walk past it, every time you remember, every time you whisper “thus far,” your faith finds new strength. Because what God did then becomes the confidence for what God can do now.
This is why the title of this message matters:
Start at Mizpah, End at Ebenezer.
Start at the place of surrender.
End at the place of testimony.
Start at honesty.
End at help.
Start with your emptiness.
End with His faithfulness.
Start where you return.
End where God restores.
Because if you will begin this year at Mizpah —
if you will come back to God with a whole heart,
if you will pour out what needs to be released,
if you will bow where He is calling you to bow —
then I promise you by the authority of Scripture:
You will end this year at Ebenezer.
You will look back and say,
“God has helped me.”
You will raise a stone of remembrance —
not to your strength,
not to your success,
not to your accomplishments —
but to the God who never stopped being faithful.
This year is not asking you to be stronger.
This year is inviting you to return.
Start at Mizpah.
End at Ebenezer.
Start with surrender.
End with testimony.
Start with pouring out.
End with being lifted up.
Start where God meets you.
End where God helps you.
And when the year is finished, when you look back over the months that lie ahead, you will stand on the far side of every fear, every trial, every battle — and you will place your hand on the testimony of God’s faithfulness and say:
“Thus far the Lord has helped me.”
---
APPEAL
As we stand at the threshold of a new year, I want to invite you to a very simple but very sacred decision:
Will you begin this year at Mizpah?
Not with a resolution,
not with a promise to do better,
not with the weight of self-effort,
but with the humility of a heart that returns.
If you are tired of fighting battles in your own strength…
If you are weary of drifting…
If the symbols of faith are still in your life,
but the fire of faith has grown dim…
If you long for God to thunder again,
to intervene again,
to help again…
Then right now, in your heart,
whisper the first words of Mizpah:
“Lord, I return.”
If you begin there…
you will not end in defeat.
You will not end in fear.
You will not end in uncertainty.
You will end at Ebenezer —
in the place where God’s help becomes your testimony.
Start at Mizpah.
End at Ebenezer.
Let this be the year of your return —
and the year of God’s unmistakable help.
---
PRAYER
Father in Heaven,
we come to You at the beginning of this new year, not with inflated confidence in ourselves,
but with a humble desire to return to You with all our hearts.
Where we have drifted — draw us back.
Where we have grown weary — strengthen us.
Where we have forgotten Your presence — remind us.
Where we stand empty — fill us with Your Spirit.
Lord, meet us at Mizpah.
Hear our confession, honor our surrender,
and take Your rightful place in our lives again.
And as we walk through the battles ahead,
thunder for Your people.
Fight for us.
Guide us.
Protect us.
Provide for us.
Then, when this year is finished,
bring us to our Ebenezer —
to the place where we can lift our eyes and say,
with gratitude and certainty,
“Thus far the Lord has helped us.”
We trust You to lead us.
We trust You to keep us.
We trust You to finish what You begin.
In the name of Jesus, our Stone of Help,
Amen.
