Looking forward to promise of new year

Happy New Year! By now, many of us have already abandoned our New Year's resolutions and returned to the wayward ways we promised we would end with the coming of the new year.

Oh well, there's always next year.

There is no longer anything certain in this world except for the reality that change is coming. And without a doubt this year will bring change.

In the world of politics, the final months of the Obama era will likely bring ample changes with the promise of even more executive actions that many of us will not likely favor.

The end of this nearly eight-year nightmare of federal overreach should bring joy and hope and promise. But like many nightmares, the worst part is almost always at the end.

We'll also say goodbye to the somewhat lackluster years of Gov. Jay Nixon. But his successor is far from assured at this point.

Regardless of what transpires in any political arena, it appears that the problem issues of the world will undoubtedly continue long after this new year is history.

There is little hope that ISIS will be conquered, that racial tensions will diminish or that the economy of this great nation will return to the robust years that mark our past.

It would be easy to remain cynical and pessimistic over the prospects for this year.

Yet, I still have faith.

I have a higher regard for the American public -- perhaps more than most. I believe that common sense, decency and sanity can, and will, return to this nation. I also believe that somewhere, somehow, we will find the leadership required to change the course of mankind for the better.

Collectively somehow we have thus far survived an era of upheaval orchestrated by a federal administration that is hell-bent on the destruction of the pillars that form the foundation of this nation.

Granted we have been in retreat on the world stage, we have seen a resurgence of racial strife and an unprecedented and highly designed path of economic ruin.

And yet we have survived.

Perhaps all we can do at this point is pray for a better year, for good health and for a resurgence of the strength of this nation.

But little will change without strong and loud public voices calling for an end to this insanity. Our culture is at stake. And lives are at stake as well.

We pray for this new year.