Thanking God for new beginnings

Even though our Roe v. Wade issue has never been the first issue of the calendar year, to me it always marks the real beginning of our year. This year, it marks even bigger beginnings, on the heels of quite a few endings that I wrote about last issue. For all of those who just concluded their service with WORLD, this means a new beginning for you as well.

This issue also marks a new beginning for WORLD Magazine. Like the Apostle Paul, we are “straining forward to what lies ahead,” and “press[ing] on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.” For WORLD, specifically, that means finding fresh ways to present our journalism with ink on paper.

As with all new beginnings, we trust that God will provide all we need to follow His call for us. A few things He has provided already:

He has provided seasoned editorial leadership for the magazine by bringing us Tim Lamer (for a second round!), John Carpenter, and David Freeland.

Tim Lamer has been around WORLD for 23 years and was the magazine’s editor prior to taking on WORLD Digital’s executive editor role two years ago. He now moves, temporarily, he insists, back into the magazine’s editor role to see us through this transitional time. John has been with WORLD for weeks, not years, but brings a career’s worth of experience as a journalist and journalism professor, and with it a lot of creativity, to the role of managing editor. Among the three, David has the longest tenure at WORLD, almost 27 years, and leads the magazine’s design team.

In addition to these editorial leaders here at the magazine, God already has provided WORLD’s editorial council (Tim is a member) to lead all of our work on all of our many platforms beyond the magazine. God already has provided the energizing effort of the reporters, correspondents, and contributors whose bylines you have seen, and we expect that He will provide even more as we go.

Through your faithful and generous giving, God already has provided the financial resources to undertake at least the first steps of this new beginning. Thank you.

God already has provided all these things for WORLD, as He always provides for new beginnings. We trust He will provide—for the entire family of WORLD’s staff and readers, listeners, and viewers—all we need to begin what He has called us to in this new year.