All Things New: The New Road
“If you are in Christ, whatever is next is better.”
Have we ever, as a people, more desperately needed to trade the old for the new than right now?
This season has brought to light some real pain & some real brokenness in all of us.
Doesn’t something within us long for something totally new after these last two years?
Revelation 21:1-5
Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,” for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”
This year friends, our Easter series “All Things New” is based on the idea that we not only like new, but we also desperately need “new” and that new is available to us through literal new life in Christ – the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.
The new that’s offered to us today in Christ, is a down payment on the ultimate new we read about in Revelation 21 – BOTH are offered this very day.
Every year the Easter season reminds us that Christ not only did resurrection (in the past tense), but that he IS resurrection in the present, and he is the source of the new that we so desperately need in our lives and in our world.
Isaiah 43:16-19
This is what the Lord says— he who made a way through the sea, a path through the mighty waters, who drew out the chariots and horses, the army and reinforcements together, and they lay there, never to rise again, extinguished, snuffed out like a wick: “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.
-The Lord is reminding His people of the Exodus from Egypt, one of the greatest displays of His power and provision.
-We expect the promise (“forget the former things”) to apply to former moments of pain and frustration, but that’s not the complete context here.
-The message is this: “remember God’s faithfulness, but trust that He has something new ahead. “
-Both implications are true: we can’t be looking for yesterday’s blessings and we can’t be held captive by yesterday’s failures.
If Isaiah 43:16-19 were written for you right now, right at this moment, what would be your “former things” and what would you want him to make new?
Had the people of God allowed their failures and mistakes to deter them from seeking the Lord, or had they only remembered God’s faithfulness in the past- they could have easily believed that it was over. That there was no way they would ever see a new life.
As with so many prophecies in the Old Testament, the prophet wasn’t just speaking about the immediate fulfillment of the return of the Jewish people to their homeland, he was looking ahead to the time when Christ would come, and deal with the real oppressor of his people… Sin
Just as God made a way for the children of Israel then, he has made a new way for all to be free from sin through the life, sufferings, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
In Christ we have literal new life because of him.
When we have experienced new life in Christ, the new is here and until we reach heaven, God is doing new works of grace in our hearts and lives, making us to be like He is.
He is making all things new!
Verses for further study/reflection:
Lamentations 3:22-23
Philippians 3:13-14
Ephesians 2:4-5
John 3:3
John 3:5
Romans 10:9
2 Corinthians 5:16-17