New Year's Eve devotional: a 25-minute guide with Psalm 90, Lamentations 3 and a closing prayer
A short New Year's Eve devotional from Psalm 90 and Lamentations 3:22-23, with review questions, a closing prayer and the story of watch night services.
In this article
A good New Year's Eve devotional does two things: it looks back honestly and hands the next year to God. This 25-minute guide uses Psalm 90 to number your days and Lamentations 3:22-23 to remember that God's mercies are "new every morning." It ends with review questions and a prayer you can pray before midnight.
New Year's Eve falls on a Thursday in 2026. You might be home alone, at a church watch night service, or leaving a party early enough to get five minutes on the edge of your bed. All of those can work.
Everything here can be done with a Bible, a pen and something to write on. There's a shorter version too, for when the night gets away from you.
How to spend 25 minutes with God on New Year's Eve
Find a spot and put your phone in another room, or at least on Do Not Disturb. Here's the outline.
| Minutes | What to do | Passage |
|---|---|---|
| 2 | Be still and ask God to speak | Psalm 46:10 |
| 7 | Read and think through a prayer of Moses | Psalm 90 |
| 6 | Read and think through hope in the middle of grief | Lamentations 3:19-26 |
| 7 | Review the year with four questions | 1 Samuel 7:12 |
| 3 | Pray the closing prayer | Psalm 31:15 |
If it helps to write as you go, use the four parts of the SOAP method (Scripture, Observation, Application, Prayer) on one verse from each passage. You'll have something to read next December.
The app keeps those SOAP entries in one journal, so this year's notes are still there when next year's end comes around.
Read Psalm 90: learn to count your days
Psalm 90 is headed "A Prayer of Moses the man of God." That's a man who had watched a whole generation fall in the wilderness (Numbers 14:29), and he doesn't begin with himself. He begins with God.
A Prayer of Moses the man of God. Lord, thou hast been our dwelling place in all generations. Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God.
Read that slowly on a night when everyone around you is counting down. God has no countdown. "A thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night" (Psalm 90:4). The year that felt endless, or that vanished, was never out of his sight.
Then Moses turns to how short we are. He says "we spend our years as a tale that is told" (Psalm 90:9), and he doesn't soften it. Then comes the request at the center of the psalm:
So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.
To number your days doesn't mean you should be gloomy. It means you stop acting as though you have an unlimited supply. James says the same thing: "ye know not what shall be on the morrow" (James 4:14), so we learn to say, "If the Lord will" (James 4:15). Your 2027 goals can stay. Just hold them with an open hand.
Notice how the psalm ends. Moses asks God to "establish thou the work of our hands upon us" (Psalm 90:17). He asks it twice. Your job, your classes, your parenting and your ministry aren't too small to pray about tonight.
Think about it: What did you spend the most days on this year? If 2027 looks the same, will you be glad?
Read Lamentations 3: hope that has seen the worst
Lamentations 3:22-23 gets printed on a lot of mugs. The verses around it are not mug material.
The book mourns the fall of Jerusalem, and the writer (traditionally Jeremiah, though the book doesn't name its author) has been describing affliction for 18 verses before he gets here. You can read more on the Lamentations overview. Start a few verses earlier, as the poet does:
Remembering mine affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall. My soul hath them still in remembrance, and is humbled in me. This I recall to my mind, therefore have I hope. It is of the Lord’s mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness. The Lord is my portion, saith my soul; therefore will I hope in him.
Look at verse 21: "This I recall to my mind, therefore have I hope." Nothing in the city has changed. What has changed is what he's choosing to remember. And notice that verse 19 says he hasn't forgotten his misery either. Hope in the Bible sits right next to pain.
If 2026 was hard, you don't have to pretend it wasn't. You can say exactly what you lost and then say verse 23 anyway.
Tomorrow morning is a good example of what this means. January 1 isn't magic. God's compassions were also new on March 12 and on that awful Tuesday in August. The calendar flips once, but "they are new every morning."
Think about it: What do you need to "recall to mind" tonight in place of what you keep replaying?
Four questions to review your year
After Israel's victory at Mizpeh, Samuel set up a stone and named it:
Then Samuel took a stone, and set it between Mizpeh and Shen, and called the name of it Eben–ezer, saying, Hitherto hath the Lord helped us.
Do the same on paper. Answer each question in a line or two:
- Where did God help me this year? Name specific things. Your own Ebenezer list starts here, and Psalm 103:2 says to "forget not all his benefits."
- What do I need to confess? Be honest about one or two things, and then remember the mercy you just read about.
- What do I need to let go of? Paul writes of "forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before" (Philippians 3:13). He means he won't let the past set the direction of his future.
- What is one thing I want to do differently with God in 2027? One thing. Make it small and specific enough to do on January 1.
If your answer to the fourth question is "read my Bible more," give it some structure. The 2027 Bible reading plan has dates, and the New Year Bible reading challenge is a good way to start smaller.
You can also let the app hold you to it, with 1 to 5 chapters a day at your pace and a short quiz after your reading.
A prayer for New Year's Eve
Pray this as written, or use it as a starting point and change it to fit your year.
Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations, and you were mine this year. Thank you for the ways you helped me, even the ones I didn't notice at the time. Forgive me for the days I treated as if they were mine. I bring you what hurt this year, and I won't pretend it didn't. Your mercies are new every morning, so I'll trust you for tomorrow's. My times are in your hand. Teach me to number my days. Establish the work of my hands, and if you will, let me know you better a year from tonight. In Jesus's name, amen.
The line "My times are in thy hand" comes from Psalm 31:15. It's a good one to memorize before midnight.
What is a watch night service?
A watch night service is a church gathering held late on New Year's Eve, with prayer, Scripture and singing as the old year ends. Churches from several traditions hold them, and the practice has deep roots in evangelical history.
According to Wikipedia's history of the watchnight service, the Moravians were holding watch services by 1733. John Wesley attended a Moravian watch night on New Year's Eve in 1738, then adopted the practice for Methodists in 1740. The first Methodist watch night in America probably took place in 1770 at Old St. George's Church in Philadelphia.
The tradition carries special weight in Black churches. On December 31, 1862, African Americans gathered in churches on what came to be called Freedom's Eve, waiting for the Emancipation Proclamation to take effect on January 1, 1863. Many Black congregations still hold watch night services today, and the night remembers both God's deliverance and the people who waited for it.
If your church offers one, go. Jesus told his followers, "Watch therefore" (Matthew 24:42), and while that verse is about his return, it's a good word to carry into a new year. Nothing in Scripture requires a midnight service, but there's real value in being with God's people when the year turns.
Other ways to use this devotional
The five-minute version. Read Psalm 90:12 and Lamentations 3:22-23. Say one sentence of thanks and one sentence of surrender. Go to bed or go back to the party.
With friends or your small group. Read both passages out loud, taking turns. Have each person share one answer to the first question, "Where did God help me this year?" Then pray for each other by name. Thirty minutes before the countdown is plenty.
With your spouse or a roommate. Swap answers to question four and agree to check in on February 1.
If you're going out. Do the devotional earlier, around dinner. Having already prayed changes how the rest of the night feels, and you won't be trying to focus at 12:40 a.m.
On January 1. Keep the momentum with this New Year devotional for young adults, or collect a few New Year Bible verses to memorize in January. Isaiah 43:19 is a good one to add: "Behold, I will do a new thing."
To see how much of tonight's reading stuck, try the Psalms quiz or the Lamentations quiz.
Quick quiz: Lamentations
Which city, according to chapter 1, has multiplied her sins and become an object of revulsion?
“Jerusalem hath grievously sinned; therefore she is removed”: the whole book mourns the ruin of Jerusalem. Lamentations 1:8
To what is Jerusalem compared in the first verse of the book?
“How doth the city sit solitary, that was full of people! how is she become as a widow!” Lamentations 1:1
When are the LORD’s compassions renewed?
“His compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness.” Lamentations 3:22–23
There are many more questions like these in Bible Academy, each with its explanation and verse. Start free, no card needed.
Frequently asked questions
What is a good Bible verse for New Year's Eve?
Psalm 90:12 is one of the best: "So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom." Lamentations 3:22-23 is a close second, because it promises that God's compassions "are new every morning." Psalm 31:15, "My times are in thy hand," is a short verse that works well as a closing prayer on December 31.
What should a Christian do on New Year's Eve?
Nothing specific is required by Scripture, but many Christians spend part of the night in prayer, reading and reviewing the year. You might attend a watch night service, read Psalm 90 with friends, or take 25 minutes alone. Celebrating with people you love is also fine. The goal is to give God the year that's ending and the one that's starting.
Where does the watch night service come from?
Watch night services are traced to the Moravians, who held them by 1733. John Wesley attended one in 1738 and adopted the practice for Methodists in 1740. In the United States the service took on deep meaning in Black churches because of Freedom's Eve, December 31, 1862, when people gathered to wait for the Emancipation Proclamation to take effect.
What is a short prayer for New Year's Eve?
Try this: "Lord, thank you for carrying me through this year. Forgive me for the days I wasted. My times are in your hand, so teach me to number my days and establish the work of my hands in the year ahead. In Jesus's name, amen." It draws on Psalm 31:15 and Psalm 90:12 and 90:17.
Why is Lamentations 3:22-23 read at the new year?
Because it promises fresh mercy: God's compassions "fail not" and "are new every morning." That fits a night about new beginnings. Its setting matters too. The words come from a book mourning Jerusalem's fall, so they offer hope to people who had a hard year and don't feel like celebrating, not only to those who did.