31. The end goal

‘All things new’ Meditations No.31: The end goal

Rev 21:5 “He who was seated on the throne said, ‘I am making everything new!’

This is God’s end game – a new world (21:1), and a new experience of God with man (21:10,27). The end is about holiness and relationship with God for all those whose names are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life (v.27). The history of the world so far has been about every day being a new day with God working to establish relationships with mankind – with you and me – but there will come a time that only He knows, when all that will be ended for it will be complete. We probably have questions but that is the big picture given to reassure us that there is a definite goal in mind. All we have to do is remain faithful (Lk 18:8). Can we do all we can to ensure that is us.

But is it that simple, is that all there is? Well, there is clearly a divine expectation of us. At the end there is the language of the coming together of the bride (the Church) and the bridegroom (Christ) and this will clearly be at a specific designated time for there is talk of “the wedding of the Lamb” (v.7a) and “the wedding supper of the Lamb” (v.9) when, we are told, “his bride has made herself ready,” (v.7c) so that, “Fine linen, bright and clean, was given her to wear,” and it then adds, “(Fine linen stands for the righteous acts of God’s holy people.)”

Now look at the language used. She – the Church – makes herself ready (see my underlining above) by clothing herself with clothes given to her (again see my underlining) and these ‘clothes’ are righteous acts, i.e. behaviour achieved by the work of Christ on the cross but brought about within us by the work of the indwelling Holy Spirit.

Now it seems to me – and I could be wrong – that not only are we called to be faithful, but that faithfulness is to be expressed by the righteous lives and service that are ours, that we live out and work out as we respond to Him. It is that simple. Now here’s the tricky part: at this moment in time, we don’t know what the Lord will yet call us into in all our ‘tomorrows’. Each day – for the rest of our lives – will be a new day, a day no doubt when we build on the previous days.

The apostle Peter says we, “may participate in the divine nature” (2 Pet 1:4) and exhorts us to “make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love.” (v.5-7) Note this is a process of growth, eight things (eight, the number of resurrection life). AS these things develop in you, day-by-day, you ARE changing, a new ‘you’ emerging, because He is making all things new – and that includes you and me! Hallelujah!  

30. Uncertainties & fears

‘All things new’ Meditations No.30:  Uncertainties & fears

Mt 14:26 “Shortly before dawn Jesus went out to them, walking on the lake.”

Now before we finish this series we must confront the truth that there are various things in the Christian life that we don’t like: we don’t like the unexpected and we don’t like the scary, but if you are hostile to those two things you are someone who would NOT like being in the company of Jesus and his disciples, for again and again Jesus did the unexpected and even led them into times when even they, big tough men of the world, were scared. Some of us intensely dislike, and therefore react badly, to being egged on in faith and can get seriously defensive. We must learn to confront this and overcome it. Faith is often scary because it pushes us out beyond our natural abilities, often into the realm of the divinely supernatural, i.e. stuff that could only have been Him!

I touched on this two studies back in another context so we must confront it here. There is part of Christendom that balks at anything that might be called ‘charismatic’ or even perhaps, ‘Pentecostal’ because both carry with them the reputation of going over the top in behaviour, but then look at the disciples in Acts and they certainly go beyond what a nice comfortable middle-class Christian community would like today.

But I want to remind us that the things that scared the disciples were things that were unexpected and took them beyond their belief values. I cited earlier the encounter dealing with Legion (Lk 8:26 on), and they only encountered him because Jesus led them there.

Doing a study on the word ‘afraid’ in Matthew’s Gospel, in respect of the disciples, shows us them on the lake in a storm (Mk 4:39), them seeing Jesus walking on water (Mt 14:26,27), of Jesus teaching them about being witnesses and possibilities of persecution (Mt 10:26,28,31), the three disciples on the Mount of Transfiguration (Mt 17:7), and the women meeting an angel, post-resurrection, and seeing the resurrected Jesus. (Mt 28:5,8,10).

Now we may laugh at these, but they were each examples of times when the disciples were out of their depth, struggling to cope with what was happening because it was beyond anything they had experienced before. And that’s where the rubber hits the road, for modern-day Christianity tends towards being entirely materialistic and comfortably ‘under our control’ but unfortunately Jesus isn’t, which may be why we see so little of him moving and speaking, because that would require us to step out of our comfort zones into Jesus’ zone as some of us have experienced in past moves of God.  If we’re going to see it as a ‘new day’ it has to be Jesus’ day where we let him lead and we obey – whatever!  

29. The Potential of ‘today’

“All things new’ Meditations No.29: The Potential of ‘today’

2 Cor 5:17“if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.” 

Back to one of our original verses, but now I want to add it in to the mix of what we have just been considering that, as Jesus’ disciples, every day is a new day and in one sense yesterday doesn’t matter; we can learn from it, but I am not bound by it. Today it’s what Jesus leads me into, and I know that under his direction, he will only lead me into stuff that I can handle by his grace. Sometimes the challenge may appear such that I think that I’m not up to it, but Moses’ example, at the burning bush, tells me that God will go ahead and enable me in whatever He leads me into. His direction, His wisdom, His resources (and my weakness) and His glory. That’s how it works.

But the big thing is that this day can be completely different from yesterday; it depends on what He sees He can achieve with me and what I am open to receive, how open I am to change. Identity has been a thing that has been highlighted in the last few decades and the enemy has used it to upset many and even cause division in the Church, but rather than get into that, may I just focus on this one thought: Today I am different from yesterday’s ‘me’ – at least if I let Him work in me.

You’re not quite sure of that? Well let’s go back to the beginning that this starter verse speaks about – every believer, every true born-again Christian, is a ‘new creation’, and the Creator of the ‘new creation’ is God the Father working with what God, the Son, has achieved on the Cross, and what God, the Holy Spirit, has achieved in actually making us anew when we turned to Christ, repented and opened ourselves to him as Lord.

Remember what Paul wrote: “I am convinced and confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will [continue to] perfect and complete it until the day of Christ Jesus [the time of His return].” (Phil 1:6 Amp version) Now that was Paul saying, “Look God started a work in you (when you were saved) and I am utterly convinced He’s carrying it on in you and will keep on carrying it on in you until either you go to be with Him or Jesus returns.”

So ‘today’ is a day when God will be looking to bring some change in you as you pray, as you read His word, as you fellowship with others, as you share the good news, as you go about your business, as you go to school or college, or whatever else it is. The blank sheet of the day ahead is a sheet where the Lord wants to write something new, so that when you get to heaven, He’ll be able say as you reflect over your life together, “Hey, do you remember what happened on that day, wasn’t it a turning point for…?” So, what’s going to happen today, what will He envision you with, nudge you into, so all you do is say, “Yes Lord, great.”   

28. The coming day

‘All things new’ Meditations No.28: The coming day

Psa 118:24 “This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.”

We have been considering life as a day-by-day life-transformation and I tried to parallel it with the day-by-day experiences of the disciples travelling with Jesus for three years, bit by bit changing them, probably without their awareness of it, initially at least, but acting as a foundation for what the coming Holy Spirit would be able to achieve through them; it was here that it started. For us we probably don’t see it as dramatic as this, for our lives are cluttered with what we may sometimes consider as the mundane, but in the clutter of the mundane, Jesus is still working out his Father’s purposes with the help of his Holy Spirit. But I have found myself getting anchored by this concept of ‘day-by-day’.

Consider our starter verse. Is this a general truth? Is today a day that God has made? Well, the writer to the Hebrews wrote of Jesus, “The Son is … exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word,” (Heb 1:3) having just written of how Jesus was part of the Creation process. The logical implication of this – although few realise this – is that ‘today’ is a gift of God. It exists PURELY because He wills it. He created this world – for us to enjoy – and now He sustains it so that time-space history continues to roll out.

When we wake in the morning, we only know there will be new opportunities, new experiences, new encounters. Link that now to the disciples ‘following Jesus’ (and subsequently us), can we view ‘today’ in a new light of faith, a day of potential adventure with him?

Now, just in case you haven’t done this, pause and think about this, the three things I’ve just mentioned that so much of the time we take for granted – opportunities, experiences, and encounters.

Opportunities are about potential and suggest that with Jesus, we may have the capability today of changing this world. It may only be in a small way, a smile or the words ‘thank you so much’ or, ‘I’m really sorry’, or maybe, ‘I want you to know I really appreciate you.’ Or it may be that the Holy Spirit has nudged you with a picture of something that could be. Don’t write it off, don’t just forget it and push it away. Check it out with Him and then take a step of faith.

Experiences are about awareness, being aware of the significance of what you are doing in this day. Don’t despise the small things but recognize that the things you do, can bless you (if you appreciate them and are thankful) and go on to bless others.

Encounters speak about people you will or might meet today. Will they finish the day better off because they’ve met you? Ponder on how that could be. Each of these are about the unknowns of the new day ahead. Step into it prayerfully AND with a sense of expectation.

27. Daily renewal process

‘All things new’ Meditations No.27:  Daily renewal process

2 Cor 4:16 “Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.”

I concluded the previous study with the suggestion that grace means not obeying rules but following a living, acting, moving, ministering Saviour. Now if you look at our starter verse you may wonder at the connection. Well, this isn’t going where you might expect it to go. Instead, I want to focus on those last five words: “being renewed day by day”. Now we’ve talked much about us being new creations but this verse from the apostle Paul reminds us that this process of change is exactly that, a process, which implies slow change, change over a period of time.

So, now imagine you were one of Jesus’ close disciples and you had simply received the command, “Follow me.” No explanation, just ‘follow me’. Each new day was a new experience as he led the way and HE did the stuff, and as he did it and you saw it – you would be changed. You couldn’t not, not in the light of his life.

Yes, stop and think about that, what it must have been like following Jesus – literally – day after day, going where he went, watching what he was doing and every now and then getting drawn into it. Think about the feeding of the five thousand and see how he drew the disciples, in a very limited way, into it. Sometimes it was more like, to use a phrase I’ve used elsewhere, he just wanted them to tag along with him to learn as they watched him.

Read Acts 9:32 onwards and you see Peter exactly following Jesus’ example. First, he heals a paralyzed man (v.33-35) but then he heals and raises Dorcas from the dead in exactly the same manner that Jesus had healed Jairus’s daughter (compare v.40,41 with Mk 5:39-42). Peter had learned by watching the Master. Often it was simply to be spectators who would learn (e.g. dealing with Legion – Lk 8:26 on), sometimes learning in a crisis (e.g. the storm on the lake – Mk 4:39 plus Mt 14:26), and sometimes they were pushed to the front row (e.g. when he sent them out – Mt 10), and when they were with him in the Garden at the end. (e.g. Lk 22) Following Jesus was a very mixed bag of LEARNING and that’s what discipleship, simply ‘following Jesus’, is all about.

So, I ask again, do you think that as every day passed with Jesus, these disciples weren’t being changed? Yes, it would take the coming of the Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost to really get them under way but the foundation for what followed was being laid every day they walked with him. So, what will today hold? How will HIS activities be interweaved with yours and mine, for that’s how it works? How will his Spirit prompt, lead, empower and inspire us as we walk out this ‘new day’?  

26. Law versus Grace

‘All things new’ Meditations No.26: Law versus Grace

Heb 8:13 “By calling this covenant ‘new’, he has made the first one obsolete.”

A new day! Yesterday we asked some uncomfortable questions. Unfortunately, these things disturb many rather than create a heart set on glorifying Him, full of grace and TRUTH. Perhaps a problem is that we are more comfortable with the familiar and all this talk about ‘new days’ is disturbing. Well, here’s the bad news – we can stay just like we are if that’s what we want, but if we do, we’ll miss the wonders of the new ‘grace life’ that supersedes the old life of ‘the law’, the predictable but unsatisfying approach to faithless ‘religion’. Let’s not settle for that!

Let me explain what I mean by ‘grace life’ and ‘the law’. The life that is led by the Law comes from the preacher who says, “This is who you OUGHT to be,” or “This is what you SHOULD be doing!” Such imperatives become obligations that, if the preacher can be honest, seek to drive the congregation forward to be ‘better’ people, ‘better’ Christians, but what do you naturally do when someone seeks to drive you forward? Two likely responses. First, to resist. We don’t like being forced along a path that we’re not comfortable with (if we were we’d have gone down it already!).

Second, we feel guilty because we are being told we’re obviously not up to the mark, we’re failing in some respect, we’re not what our leader wants us to be. Now there may be a third option. We try to achieve the demanded goal but fail and then we feel shame and even more guilt. The Law just makes us feel guilty, makes us realise just how much we fall short (Rom 7:10 etc.) The Law focuses on the inadequacy of where we are, grace focuses on the wonder of where we could be.   

So how does grace work? It says this is what Christ has done and this is what he HAS already made you, this is who you are. But more than that it reminds us that Jesus’ will and the working of the indwelling Holy Spirit IS working for it in us. All we have to do is learn to be sensitive to Him and allow Him to envision us, inspire us and firmly establish a new hope within us – that this IS possible because HE is working to achieve it! The old covenant that the writer to the Hebrews was writing about was all to do with keeping the Law but, he says, that has now been superseded by the new covenant that Jesus has inaugurated by the giving of his life: “he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you.” (Lk 22:20)

In the old covenant the child of God had to keep on bringing fresh sacrifices for fresh sins; it never ended, but today the one and only needed sacrifice has been given so you don’t need to. Your sacrifice is similarly one-off, your body, your very life (Rom 12:1) so there’s nothing else you need to do except ‘follow him’ into this new day.

25. New Approaches

‘All things new’ Meditations No.25: New Approaches

Mt 9:17 “they pour new wine into new wineskins.”

Let’s, for the remaining studies, focus on the fact that we are living in a new day, for that might focus more clearly what we have been saying recently, that God’s redeeming work is about delivering us from the old life of slavery to sin, into a new relationship that is all about love.

Jesus didn’t really explain this language in our starter verse, but two things are obvious in the context of the verses; the new wineskins are new approaches to spiritual life and the new wine is the Holy Spirit who effervesces and bubbles and brings new life – and life is all about growth and movement.

The context is set against the fasting of the Pharisees. In the wider context Jesus challenges the Pharisees to have a religion that is real and not merely performing ritual brought over from a former era. Our greater threat is to merely be performers. And you know the old name of those original mask-wearing performers, those actors – hypocrites.

Jesus’ challenge is always the same – to be real, for he came full of grace and truth (Jn 1:14). Perhaps to think this through some more we might ask, what sort of things in church life are not ‘real’? Here’s my list.

Well no, that might be unkind, but generally any of us, when we are praying, for example, can easily fall into the trap of just uttering words by habit instead of letting the Holy Spirit stir and inspire our hearts as we wait on Him. I wonder how often, if we’re a leader, we’ve felt the Lord seems at a distance and resort to using the material of others rather than simply waiting patiently on Him until we catch the wind of the Spirit in our sails and see the direction HE wants to lead us and our people.

We may have the best of intentions – to serve God and bless His people – but when we do it in our own strength, we are missing the mark and missing what He may yet want to bring us. Perhaps we could sum up each of these as those who are ’acting’ in the absence of the Holy Spirit’s inspiration and anointing. If we allow ourselves to settle into this ‘play-acting’ we are selling the Lord short, we are failing the people of God, and indeed we are grieving the Holy Spirit.

What do the ‘new wineskins suggest? A church that is alive with the presence and power and activity of God by His Spirit, where life and vitality, where fellowship and friendship, where power and authority, pour through the congregation, through this potentially wonderful ‘body of Christ’, bringing constant life transformations, with conversions, deliverances and healings being a regular feature of their life. Didn’t Jesus say we would do what he did? (Jn 14:12) Isn’t this an accurate picture of ‘the new day’ and if we aren’t experiencing it, then maybe we need to seek Him so that it will truly be ‘a new day’.

24. More on renewal

‘All things new’ Meditations No.24: More on renewal

Col 3:10 “put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator.”

In the previous study we observed how the Lord instructed Joshua to hold fast to the Law of Moses when they entered the Land. It was a new day with new hopes but an old Law. We compared that to the new day in which we live and suggested our parallel blueprint is the New Testament revelation and teaching. Now we should pick up about what we said before about the purpose of the Law: both guidance for everyday living as a community and, indeed, how to put things right when wrongs have been done.

Now when we look at the New Testament, we see that it is exactly the same, but the blueprint focuses on us living in community as the people of God, how we relate to one another and to God, but also how we are to view the world around us (1 Jn 2:15-17). Yet more than that, the Lord still recognises that we may yet get it wrong and so gives us clear directives about these things: reconciling after an upset (Mt 5:24), forgiving one another (Mt 6:14,15), caring for the needy (1 Jn 3:17) and putting things right before God should we sin (1 Jn 1:9, 1 Jn 2:1,2). Because we are living in a new community (the kingdom of God) we have to learn these things and learn to apply them; they are the ways we work out this new life with God.

Now we remain with this starter verse to pick up the back end of it. One version puts it, “Now you have received a new nature. It is God who made it for you so that you can become more and more like him.” One paraphrase attributes this to Jesus but he is never referred to as the Creator of the world (although Heb 1:2 & Jn 1:3 point out he was part of the process with his Father – see Prov 8:29,30). The Creator is God (the Father), and it is by His sovereign will that we are what we are, and redemption is all about reconciling us back to Him through the work of Christ on the Cross, and we are being made like Him. Now when you put this together with what we had just been saying, we see that God has made us new beings who are able to relate to Him, and that is all part of the plan formulated from before the foundation of the world by the Godhead.

So, we’ve had lots of talk about new creations and a new life, but if we want to put content to that we have to study the New Testament to see what God has done and the effects of it AND how you and I are to work it out on a daily basis. The big picture is all about Redemption, about how God has made it possible for us to be restored to Him after the Fall, and how we are to relate to Him and to each other in the Church. Looking at the divisions in the Church across the world, we have lots of work to come in line with His wishes (see Jn 17:20,21)

23. A new day for Israel and us

‘All things new’ Meditations No.23: A new day for Israel and us

Col 3:10 “put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator.”

To continue the thoughts of the past two days we continue to recognise that our walk as new believers, is a walk where we choose to act in specific Christlike ways that are different from the ways of self that we used to live before we came to Christ. But notice what Paul says, “renewed in knowledge”. We’ve said this many times before, but we are no longer wandering aimlessly, we are walking according to the blueprint we’ve been given called the New Testament, which is why it is so important that we read and study it. As we do that the Holy Spirit will clarify it and apply it to us and we will be changed, but for the change to come about, for faith to be built, we’ve got to be reading it!

In the Old Testament, the commands to Joshua as he was about to lead the Israelite army to take the land, are particularly instructive: “Be strong and very courageous. Be careful to obey all the law my servant Moses gave you; do not turn from it to the right or to the left, that you may be successful wherever you go. Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.” (Joh 1:7,8) What is interesting is that he is an army commander, admittedly one who has spent much of his life in God’s Presence (Ex 24:13, 33:11) so he has probably had plenty of time absorbing the Law given to Moses (Ex 20-23), but now, as part of his leading his people into the Land, he is told to have the words of the Law ever before him, even meditating or thinking deeply about it. Now why would that be?

Well, let’s go back to basics. Since the Fall, the Lord has constantly been working to recreate a people who are able to relate to Him. Because of the Fall, mankind have been doing their own harmful and self-destructive thing, but when the Lord constituted Israel on Sinai, as a holy nation, He gave Moses the Law, a blueprint of how they should live as this holy people, giving both guidance for everyday living as a community and, indeed, how to put things right when wrongs have been done. So they’ve left  Sinai, crossed the desert to Canaan, failed to go in a first time, spent forty years in the wilderness while the older unbelieving generations died off. Now they have been given the go-ahead to go in and take the Land, BUT nothing has changed since Sinai, the Law still applies, and so in his leading Joshua must never forget that, it’s a new day but the old Law still applies. Now, of course, we aren’t physical Israel, and the Laws of Moses (apart from the Ten Commandments) don’t apply to us BUT our blueprint is now the teaching of the apostles in the New Testament. Read it.

22. Led by word and Spirit

‘All things new’ Meditations No.22: Led by Word and Spirit

Eph 4:22-24 “put off your old self… be made new in the attitude of your minds; and … put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.”

Let’s look again at this verse but now take note of the first five words which can make some feel uncertain. We may be retreading old ground, especially noted in the previous study, but we continually need to hear this.

To recap, when we surrendered to Christ and were ‘born again’ (as we considered in detail in the early studies) we WERE made anew. So now all we have to do is live as the new creations that God HAS made us, and not let aspects of the past resurrect themselves in our new lives. So to emphasise, we now simply have to live out what He has already made us by forgiving us, justifying us, adopting us, and empowering us by His indwelling Holy Spirit. Simply live what He’s made new, a new (and different) person. 

But as we highlighted in the previous study, and need to re-emphasise here, the truth is that we have free will and simply because we became a Christian, that does not mean we lose that. No, the truth is that our lives are now a combination of the prompting, leading and teaching of the indwelling Holy Spirit, helping us to understand His word and His will, AND the outworking of our daily lives by us choosing how we will live, what we will say and do.

Hence there is this enjoinder, this obligation on us, to choose to act in line (hopefully increasingly so) with His declared will in His Word, the Bible and for us, especially the New Testament, and respond positively to the prompting or nudging of His Holy Spirit. We tend to see and experience this in at least two different ways.

The first is what we might simply call conscience.  We speak out of turn perhaps, and immediately there is an inner nudge that suggests that that was how we used to speak (the ‘old self’) but is no longer appropriate as expressions of Jesus, and so (if we respond to the nudge positively) we apologize.

The second way He nudges is by what I will call ‘visionary guidance.’. I use the word visionary with the word guidance because that guidance comes as a possible action or direction to take in the moments or time ahead that shows us a path to take in this new life, probably a path that is an expression of faith. Remember faith is always a positive response to God’s word, either the written form or the nudges of the Holy Spirit. In each of these ways, and there are surely others, He seeks to lead us away from ‘the old life of self’ into the new walk of Christ in us, that expresses love and goodness.  It’s a new day!