Today, we look at a passage often shared a funerals. It's a passage of new life, new creation, all things will be made new. What does that mean for us? Is it just for after we die?
Today’s message is based on Revelation 21:1-7. To read it now,click here.
A few years ago, an angry man rushed through the Rijks Museum in Amsterdam until he reached Rembrandt’s famous painting “Nightwatch.” Then he took out a knife and slashed it repeatedly until security got him stopped. Not terribly long after, a distraught, a hostile man slipped into St. Peter’s Cathedral in Rome with a hammer and began to smash Michelangelo’s beautiful sculpture “The Pieta.” Two cherished works of art were severely damaged. What do you suppose the officials did? Throw them out and forget about them? Absolutely not! Using the best experts, who worked with the utmost care and precision, they made every effort to restore these treasures. By His sovereign grace, God does the same thing for us when we get broken. God can bring good out of our failures, and even out of our sins. J. Stuart Holden tells of an old Scottish mansion close to where he had his little summer home. All four walls of one room were filled with sketches made by distinguished artists – they drew right on the wall. The practice began after an entire pitcher of soda water was accidentally spilled on a freshly painted wall and efforts to clean it up removed some of the paint. At the time, a noted artist, Lord Landseer, was a guest in the house. One day when the family went for a walk on the moors, he stayed behind. Using charcoal, He began to turn that ugly stain into an outline of a beautiful waterfall, bordered by trees and wildlife. He turned that stain into one of his most successful depictions of life on the Scottish Highlands. Restoration - something new out of the brokenness. We saw in our reading in verse 5, “I am making everything new!” In Genesis, God created everything that is. And He declared it all good. Each day, He looked at what He created that day and said it was good. And when He was done, He looked over everything He had made, and said it was “very good.” I can’t begin to imagine how good something has to be in order to get a very good from God. But then something happened. Satan appeared in the form of a serpent, and convinced Eve to do something she knew she shouldn’t do. Adam was there, too, and not only didn’t he stop her, he joined her. And sin entered creation. And ever since mankind has suffered the consequences of sin. But not just mankind. The world, all creation, has suffered from our sin. But there is good news. God will restore all things. He will make all things new. That promise includes everything. All things will be made new. I know that’s a really broad statement, so let’s take a look at some of the things that are covered by that. I. First, God promises to make human beings new – that’s us, you and me. We will be made new. How does He propose to do that? What are some of the ways He makes us new? A. For some, He gives new health. There are countless examples in Scripture where Jesus heals people. One example is from Luke 4:38-39, “Jesus left the synagogue and went to the home of Simon. Now Simon’s mother-in-law was suffering from a high fever, and they asked Jesus to help. So he bent over her and rebuked the fever, and it left her. She got up at once and began to wait on them.” We all probably remember the woman with the bleeding issues, she suffered for twelve years, saw every doctor she could, spent all she had on trying to get better, but no one could help. No one, that is, except Jesus. Luke 8:44 says, “She came up behind him and touched the edge of his cloak, and immediately her bleeding stopped.” There are so many other examples of Jesus healing us and making us new when we suffer from various health issues. And we’ve seen some examples here in our congregation where God performed the miracle of healing. We’ve seen it! B. For some, He gives new life. There are least three stories in Scripture where Jesus raised someone from death. We heard about each of these two weeks ago in the Simon Peter Monologue. There was a boy from Nain, in Luke 7:11-15 we see the story of how Jesus had walked up to the funeral procession, laid his hand on the coffin, and in verse 14 says, “Then he went up and touched the coffin they were carrying him in, and the bearers stood still. He said, ‘Young man, I say to you, get up!’” Sure enough, the boy got up! We remember the story from John 11, when He brought back Lazarus, who was already in the tomb when He got there. The third was Jairus’ daughter, in Luke 8. So three examples showing that Jesus can bring life from death. And of course, His own resurrection shows the same thing. C. For some, He gives new sight. In Mark 8:22-25 we see an example “They came to Bethsaida, and some people brought a blind man and begged Jesus to touch him. He took the blind man by the hand and led him outside the village. When he had spit on the man’s eyes and put his hands on him, Jesus asked, “Do you see anything?” He looked up and said, “I see people; they look like trees walking around.” Once more Jesus put his hands on the man’s eyes. Then his eyes were opened, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly.” D. For some, He gives new hearing. We can see an example of this one in Mark 7:32-35, “There some people brought to him a man who was deaf and could hardly talk, and they begged Jesus to place his hand on him. After he took him aside, away from the crowd, Jesus put his fingers into the man’s ears. Then he spit and touched the man’s tongue. He looked up to heaven and with a deep sigh said to him, “Ephphatha!” (which means “Be opened!”). At this, the man’s ears were opened, his tongue was loosened and he began to speak plainly.” So the Bible contains several examples of ways in which Jesus makes men into new men. But my favorite is when (E.) Jesus gives us a new heart. While the others are fairly rare, every believer experiences this one to some extent. This one He does by literally transforming our hearts into the likeness of His own heart. Our heart, which at one time was filled with the desires of the sinful nature, become instead, filled with the fruits of the Spirit. Galatians 5:22-23 tells us what these are, “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.” So as Jesus creates a new heart in us, we become more loving, more joyful, more peaceful, more patient. We are kinder, more faithful, more gentle, and more self-controlled. God does that, we need to cooperate with Him, but it is work of the Holy Spirit in us that completes it. So there is no doubt that Jesus makes all things new in respect to believers. New life comes through the work of the Spirit in our hearts. What other new life might we see? II. He brings new life to creation. The world, every created thing, from the galaxies, down to our own planet, right down to the smallest thing created, will be made new. All creation has suffered the effects of our sin, and all creation will be made new. In Acts 3:21, Peter says, “He must remain in heaven until the time comes to restore everything, as he promised long ago through his holy prophets.” Everything will be restored, all of creation will be made new. Isaiah gives us glimpse of what that will look like, several glimpses actually, but the one I want to share is one that might be familiar, it’s from Isaiah 11:6-9, and Isaiah wrote, “The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will lead them. The cow will feed with the bear, their young will lie down together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox. The infant will play near the cobra’s den, the young child will put its hand into the viper’s nest. They will neither harm nor destroy on all my holy mountain, for the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.” In other words, the original order of things will be restored, all of creation will be made new. And that’s not just a promise for eternity, for after our time on earth is done. Our reading from Revelation spoke of a new heaven and a new earth. Both heaven and earth will be made new. I have no idea why a new heaven might be needed, but I see almost daily the need for a new earth. I mourn the effects of sin on the people around us, people in our community going through their daily struggle with little or no hope. I don’t know when Jesus will bring new life to creation. I don’t know when that passage in Revelation will be fulfilled. And I don’t need to know. What I do need to know is that the new life He promised to me is available now. The restored health, life, sight, hearing, and even our new hearts, are available now. But they’re only available to those who follow Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. Our reading this morning ended at verse 7, “He who overcomes will inherit all this, and I will be his God, and he will be my son.” If we went on one more verse, we would see, “But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the murderers, the sexually immoral, the idolaters and all liars – their place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death.” So perhaps, all created things will be made new. But only those people who are right with God will be made new. If you’re not sure you’re right with God, make sure now. And you will be made new.
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