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We all enjoy new things. There’s something exciting about all the potential held within something new— the promise and expectation for the future. A new school year. A new job. A new calendar year. As we flip the page to 2022, we all carry great expectations for what the new year will hold. Perhaps we’ll finally meet that goal we’ve been striving toward. Maybe this is the year that broken relationship will finally be restored. Maybe we’ll see fruit develop in our ministry. Perhaps this year will be better than the last.
That desire for the new is not misplaced. It’s not strange to feel hope and anticipation as we look to the future. It’s not a matter of foolish optimism or wishful thinking to want things to change for the better. We hope for what is new because we know that things are not as they should be. We know that the world God created is now broken and fallen in sin. We know that life should not be filled with suffering, heartbreak, and discord. And so we long for healing and redemption; we long for the world to be made right and new.
In Revelation 21:5, Jesus says, “Behold, I am making all things new.” What a marvelous truth. For all those who long for healing and redemption, this is news that our hearts need most. Jesus Christ entered this messy, sin-stained world to live the life we could not live and to die the death we deserved so that He could undo the curse we’ve carried since the moment our first parents sinned. And because Jesus conquered sin and death, in the words of Samwise Gamgee, “everything that is sad is going to come untrue.”
We witness Jesus making all things new each and every day as the Spirit works in the redeemed, remaking us into the image of Christ. We see it as He convicts and purifies us of sin and helps us put on righteousness. We see it, too, as we get up each morning and labor to push back against the effects of the fall—as we till the soil of this world and plant seeds of the gospel. We see it in lives that are transformed by the gospel as the good news of Christ bears fruit in the hearts of those in our communities, across our nations, and around the world. We see it as we pour into the next generation, passing on the truths of God’s faithfulness to our children, our grandchildren, and the youth in our congregations. We see glimpses of it as we worship together with the gathered body of Christ—as we practice and prepare for eternity spent worshiping in the very presence of God.
As we look at this new year, whatever goals we set, whatever “new” that we hope and long for, we can know with confidence that the very Spirit of Christ is on the move in our hearts and lives, ensuring we are “new” and blameless at the day of Christ (1 Cor. 1:8).
Behold, He is making all things new.