Christians usher in New Year with church services

Christians through out the world ushered the new year in with church activities, with most churches keeping vigil for the new dawn.

In Accra a lot of worshippers converged in their various places of worship clogged in white apparels. Most churches witnessed large number of congregation some of whom were unable to find seats.

Those unable to find seat were equally happy to be within church premises to welcome the New Year. As the minutes ticked by into the new year, there were shouts of praises and prayers that could be heard from distances signifying the dawn of year 2002.

At the Presbyterian Church of the Resurrection, Reverend Grace Joyce Ocran, Assistant Pastor said as Christians throughout the world prepare to enter the New Year, each one must re-examine his or her life.

"We all need to re-examine our lives to enable us take a new course in life," she said.

"Just as the wise men who visited Jesus were warned in a dream not to go back way they came, so also should Christians change their ways of life with each passing year."

Rev. Ocran said there might be some 'King Herod' seeking to destroy Christians if individually, they keep a dogmatic kind of life without doing away with the old ways of doing things.

The Grace of God, she said, abounds continually on those who diligently seek for eternal life. Rev. Ocran said last year was a very rough one for a lot of people, "Yet those who entrusted their lives into the hands of God were not put to shame."

She urged all Christians to let their lives be example to the non-Christians in order to draw more people to God. At the Calvary Methodist Church, Adabraka, The Most Reverend Doctor Samuel Asante Antwi, Presiding Bishop of the Methodist Church of Ghana said the year 2002 has come to rebuild the country.

He said "with a new approach, new attitude, a sense of direction and true spirit of reconciliation we can build a prosperous nation in the new year."

The Presiding Bishop urged the church and the nation to usher into the New Year with a new sense of determination. He said nation building required values such as humility, discipline, diligence, sense of responsibility and love from all persons.

Most Rev. Dr Asante Antwi said nations have manpower resources including "nurses and doctors who must regard their profession as a calling and not for personal gains."

He said "we need to examine ourselves, sit up and ask whether we are building the nation in love and sincerity. Be a builder not a destroyer", he added. Prayers were said for the nation and members for God's guidance and progress.

At the International Central Gospel Church (ICGC), the Reverend Doctor Mensa Otabil, the General Overseer, encouraged members to be inspired by the word of God to transform their lives.

Rev. Otabil said any form of transformation in the New Year should change the lives of the broken hearted, the poor, the captives, backsliders and anything bad into righteousness. He wished Christians prosperity in all their endeavours in 2002.