Tag: Creation

New Creation

17 For I am about to create new heavens
and a new earth;
the former things shall not be remembered
or come to mind.
18 But be glad and rejoice forever
in what I am creating;
for I am about to create Jerusalem as a joy,
and its people as a delight.
19 I will rejoice in Jerusalem,
and delight in my people;
no more shall the sound of weeping be heard in it,
or the cry of distress.
20 No more shall there be in it
an infant that lives but a few days,
or an old person who does not live out a lifetime;
for one who dies at a hundred years will be considered a youth,
and one who falls short of a hundred will be considered accursed.
21 They shall build houses and inhabit them;
they shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit.
22 They shall not build and another inhabit;
they shall not plant and another eat;
for like the days of a tree shall the days of my people be,
and my chosen shall long enjoy the work of their hands.
23 They shall not labor in vain,
or bear children for calamity;
for they shall be offspring blessed by the LORD—
and their descendants as well.
24 Before they call I will answer,
while they are yet speaking I will hear.
25 The wolf and the lamb shall feed together,
the lion shall eat straw like the ox;
but the serpent—its food shall be dust!
They shall not hurt or destroy
on all my holy mountain,
says the LORD.

Isaiah 65:17-25

It might interest you to know that while writing this blog post I had a strange thing happen with my computer and I lost the entire post before I could publish it. So, let’s try this again!

We are drawing near to the beginning of the season of Advent, which is supposed to be a time of anticipation, expectation, and waiting. The question is: What exactly are we anticipating? What exactly are we expecting? What is it exactly that we are waiting for?

The first obvious answer is that we are waiting for the coming of the Messiah with great anticipation and expectation. That is the central hope of Advent. The coming Christ will save us from sin and death and afford us the great hope of resurrection and life everlasting.

The second answer which we may not always think about is what Isaiah is talking about here. The coming Messiah will not just save us from our sins, but will usher the inbreaking of the kingdom of God into the world. It marks the beginning of God initiating a new act of creation. Isaiah refers to things that people experience in life, things that bring pain and suffering, and turns them completely upside down. This is what God is doing in this new creation: Turning this broken world upside down, rebuilding what has been destroyed, and recreating in us God’s image in which we were first created. Isaiah describes what this new creation will look like and how it will operate, which is completely the opposite of what we know.

So, not only are we waiting expectantly with great anticipation for the coming Christ, but we are also waiting, expecting, and anticipating with joy the new thing God is doing.

May we seek to be a part of that new creation not only during Advent, but every day that God has given us.

New Creations

For the past few weeks, we have been working on creating a new website that is up-to-date and working to provide information about FUMC Mountain View to anyone who wants to learn more about our local church. This new website is a new creation: We have retired the old website and published a new one.

As such, the new website doesn’t work in the same way the old website did. That’s because it is entirely new. It really is a new creation.

A new creation does not operate in the same way its predecessor did.

In his letter to the Colossians, the apostle Paul encourages them to “get rid” of the way they once conducted themselves because they have “clothed [themselves] with the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of its creator” (Colossians 3:7-10). As the creator of our new website, I had to spend time designing the site to function in the way I intended it to function. Everything about the new design is aimed toward having the site provide certain types of information in certain ways. That’s how it was designed and created.

You and I are designed and created to glorify God by being who we were created to be. As disciples of Jesus Christ who have been raised with Christ and whose lives are hidden with Christ in God (3:1-3), we are being continually renewed by God’s sanctifying grace, renewed in the imago Dei – the image of God in which we were created – to bring glory to the Creator as new creations.

Renewal is a process that takes a lifetime.

I didn’t just get up one morning, drive to the church office, and sit down and throw up a website. It took time to design, create, and publish it. What we refer to in the Methodist tradition as entire sanctification, or sometimes Christian perfection – that is, being made perfect in love of God and neighbor by the sanctifying grace of God at work within us – does not happen overnight either. It is a process that lasts a lifetime. During that time, we are consistently growing in the grace and love of God, reflecting the image of God as new creatures justified by the righteousness of Christ our Lord. We are new creatures who are being continually renewed as we grow in the grace of God.

May we continue growing in the grace of God together, seeking first the kingdom of God and God’s righteousness, being made new each day by the power of the Holy Spirit.