All things new
It’s the start of another new year… so, what’s new? Traditionally this is a time for fresh resolutions. Perhaps to exercise more and eat less? To watch less television and read more? To do those jobs we’ve been putting off for weeks, months or even years? To get in touch with a friend or relative you’ve not spoken to for ages? Such resolutions are no bad thing; the only people who don’t need to make them are those whose lives are already completely ‘sorted’.
However, and without being at all cynical, it doesn’t take us long to discover that this year will be pretty much the same as last year, and that we’re still much the same people as we were in 2014. That doesn’t mean that changes and improvements aren’t worth making; it’s just admitting that they will inevitably be partial and temporary.
Imagine, then, what it would be like for everything to be new, and for ever. Yet that is exactly what God promises when Christ returns: “I am making everything new” (Revelation 21:5). And on that day we will find that “the old order of things has passed away” (verse 4). That is the order of things we are used to: a world that largely refuses to accept what God says and which is dead and dying as a result. Imagine a day when we ask, “So, what’s new?” and the answer comes back, “Everything” – and it’s true. Happy New Year!