"All Things New"
Notes
Transcript
Intro:
What I want to look at today is not so much the aspects of the kingdom that are here and now and in us, but I want us to look at the kingdom that will be here soon.
If Jesus said it's soon, then I'm allowed to say it's soon. I want to talk about Christian hope. I want to lift our eyes to what's coming, and I want to frame that around hope.
Here's why: Where you place your hope is imperative to your experience of joy. Where you place your hope is directly tied to joy.
If you put your ultimate hopes on things that cannot hold the weight of those hopes, you will more than likely be forced into anxiety and anger.
We tend to respond to anxiety and anger with control and manipulation, which, by the way, is not good for relationships. I don't think I need to flesh that out any more.
Anxiety and anger leading to control and manipulation is not the recipe for a good life, for deep relationships, for soul-satisfying experiences.
Instead, it's the cause of conflict, heartbreak, and destruction. Let me lay before you three examples where we have a tendency to put our hopes in things that break us.
The first is marriage. If you're a single person, you have a tendency to go, "Oh, if I could just get married. If I could just find that spouse…"
You're putting a lot of hope on this person who's going to come in and "Jerry Maguire" your life. They're going to complete you. There's that perfect one who's going to make everything better.
Look at me. No, they're not. They're going to make everything more difficult and a lot of things much harder. Don't agree too passionately, married folks.
Marriage is a wonderful gift, but if you put your hope in that you will paralyze yourself today, and God is not waiting for you to have a spouse to call you into something significant.
Don't you dare wait to step into the significance God has called you into by waiting for some other person to come in and complete you.
If you're married and you bet your life on marriage being the thing that started helping you make sense of your existence, you’ve probably begun already to find it’s not what completes you.
This is a place where we can put a lot of hope, and it's misplaced hope. Nine times out of ten, conflict in marriage is due to unmet expectations because those expectations were unrealistic.
Marriage can be difficult. There are a lot of sinners in the house. But it can also be really, really beautiful. So, it's just rightly placed hope, but it’s not ultimate hope.
The second place we tend to put a lot of hope is in our kids. We're like, "Oh, our kids. We're going to be able to do it right. We're going to be able to erase the mistakes of our parents."
Yet this is out of your control too. Kids make terrible gods. They're wild. Even the ones who are rule followers are just rebelling in a different kind of way.
If you're struggling with infertility… "If I just had a kid, then…" It's a good and right desire to want children, but it is not to be our ultimate hope.
The third place is work, and to be honest it does not matter what our work is. Tell me we don't put our hope for significance and meaning into work.
"If I could just get to this level of success, if I could just get to this level of the organization, if I could just get into this inner circle, if I could just make this much money…" Right?
Most of us actually tend to operate by thinking our hopes are in these things, but we just move so fast we don't hardly realize we're doing it.
We're so busy we can't breathe long enough to go, "Oh my gosh. This is why I'm so frustrated in my marriage. This is why I'm so frustrated in my singleness.”
“This is why I'm so frustrated at work. This is why I'm so frustrated at home." Because we’re placing hope on things that can't bear the weight of your hopes.
The Christian believes all these things are beautiful gifts of God; they're just not where our ultimate hope is to be.
In Jesus' day and age, the question "What must I do to inherit eternal life?" would not have been interpreted, "How do I get to heaven?" That would have been a foreign concept.
When you read in the New Testament questions about the future, it's always within the framework of the coming age.
Like, "How do I get into the coming age?" Not, "How do I get to heaven?" but "In the age to come, how do I get there?
How do I get to that place where the world has been liberated from sin and death and the enemies of God? How do I get there?" God help us.
Modern evangelicals have zero concept, for the most part, of what the Bible talks about when it comes to eschatology. Eschatology is just the things that are coming, the future kingdom.
For us, even our testimony of the gospel has everything to do with personal conversion and not a remade heaven and earth. We treat it the wrong way. We relay a false hope.
“He's either going to affirm my salvation in Christ and give me heaven or he's going to deny my salvation in Christ and send me to hell. That's the good news of the gospel. Won't you come to heaven?"
Let me set this straight. That is not how the Bible talks about your future or my future. Is there a heaven? Absolutely. But let me tell you, sometimes we make it sound boring.
But when all is said and done, is that your future and mine? Boring? No. No, it's not. Let's look at this together. Let's start in Revelation 21:1-7. Read: Revelation 21:1-7
1 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.
2 And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.
3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.
4 He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”
5 And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”
6 And he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment.
7 The one who conquers will have this heritage, and I will be his God and he will be my son.
What you're seeing in this text is the cosmos…earth, heaven, the expanse of the universe…remade as the kingdom in its fullness.
What we see in this picture is a far cry from where we find ourselves now. The world you and I live in doesn't look anything like this. The cosmos we are in now is a Genesis 3 cosmos.
It is broken and busted. There is plenty of mourning. There's a lot of death. There's a ton of crying. There's a lot of anxiety. There's a lot of loss.
It's the world we inhabit, and it's a world the Bible is honest about when it comes to our experience in it in Romans 8. Paul pretty much says it like this …
“It aches. It wants to be set free, and it knows its freedom is wrapped up in the children of God, so it watches the children of God with eager expectation that it's one day going to be set free.”
Illus: I love traveling and I have been all over this world and seen incredible beauty.
Do you know what Paul is saying about all the beauty that has been seen? Paul is saying it's groaning. It's not what it was, and it's not what it's going to be.
No matter how beautiful it is right now, it's not what it was, and it's not what it's going to be. Wherever you see beauty, you need to be reminded…
Every time the sun sets and you see the sky pink and red and stunning and you feel that little ache in you, just remember that's not what it was and that's not what it's going to be.
How beautiful, how mighty, how incredible is God that the most stunning beauties of this present age are broken in the fall? Yet this is not the picture of what is to come for us.
It's not just in Revelation we see this. We hear it prophesied about. Remember, the promise of the kingdom is through the whole Bible. The kingdom being remade is not just in Revelation.
God has, since the fall, been encouraging his people that the kingdom will be remade, that the fullness of the kingdom will be known, that it is on its way.
The prophet Isaiah explains it this way in Isaiah 11:6-9
6 The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, and the calf and the lion and the fattened calf together; and a little child shall lead them.
7 The cow and the bear shall graze; their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.
8 The nursing child shall play over the hole of the cobra, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder’s den.
9 They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.
"The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, and the calf and the lion and the fattened calf together…"
I love that he threw the "fatted calf" in there. The lion is going to dwell with the fajita, and they will dine together. The fajita will not be afraid for his life. Like, why do you have to throw the fatted calf in there?
We already have a calf there. He's going overboard and going, "The most delicious-looking temptation is right there, and the lion will not be interested even in the fatted calf."
Why? Because it will be as it was meant to be. The kingdom remade. Let me keep reading.
"The cow and the bear shall graze; their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child shall play over the hole of the cobra, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder's den. They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea."
Do you see what we have coming? This is what's coming. It's not disembodied, and it's not in the clouds.
It's not some ethereal spiritual experience; it's children on the ground playing in the dirt with the cobras, and the cobras don't have their mouths glued shut.
They're there, but they don't strike. This is what was meant to be. This is what comes when all things are remade. This is what Christ's blood has purchased.
Thomas Rausch says it like this: "…the coming of God's kingdom in its fullness, the triumph of God's justice that would vindicate all those who suffered injustice or persecution, binding up their wounds,
wiping the tears from their eyes, and raising them to life eternal with Christ. [All of creation will join in this celebration, participating] in Christ's victory over sin and death;
there would be a new heaven and a new earth, set free from corruption and slavery, subject finally to God, who would be all in all."
It's a remade cosmos. It's not you playing a harp with wings; it's all things remade. That's the remade cosmos. This little body you're wearing right now is totally inadequate.
I don't want to begrudge this point. First, this body we have right now, this physical body, is perishable and must go in the ground. We have been built for a fallen world at this point.
In the kingdom to come, the new heavens and new earth, we will not need the energy used to defend ourselves there, because that energy will be given over to praise and love for God.
So, this thing needs to go in the ground, because this thing is perishable. He doesn't give us a lot of details, but he says what will be raised is imperishable.
No cricks in the neck in glory. No bad knees, no bad backs in glory. It's imperishable. That's just, "Yes, please." The older I get, "Yes, please."
If you're in your 20s in here and perfectly healthy, you're like, "That's not that big of a deal." All right. I've started my timer on you. We'll talk to you in a bit.
Here's what I know about glory: whatever you're imagining, it's better. If you're like, "Oh, I hope we can fly there…" All right. Well, whatever is there is better than that.
"Man, I hope we can…" Okay, whatever is in your imagination, just know the Lord is smiling at you. He thinks that's cute.
You're like a kid coloring something. You're like, "Oh, that's great." There's something coming for us there.
The last thing I want to look at is in Isaiah 65. I'm just going to read verses 17-25. Chapters 64, 65, and 66 are all this new heaven and new earth that are coming for us. Let's look at verse 17.
Read Isaiah 65:17-25
17 “For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered or come into mind.
18 But be glad and rejoice forever in that which I create; for behold, I create Jerusalem to be a joy, and her people to be a gladness.
19 I will rejoice in Jerusalem and be glad in my people; no more shall be heard in it the sound of weeping and the cry of distress.
20 No more shall there be in it an infant who lives but a few days, or an old man who does not fill out his days, for the young man shall die a hundred years old, and the sinner a hundred years old shall be 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 the offspring of the blessed of the Lord, and their descendants with them.
24 Before they call I will answer; while they are yet speaking I will hear.
25 The wolf and the lamb shall graze together; the lion shall eat straw like the ox, and dust shall be the serpent’s food. They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain,” says the Lord.
This is a picture of what is to come when the kingdom is visible in its fullness. We see here that there's no more weeping or distress. I love that the word distress is here. It means worry or anxiety are gone.
Think about…God help us…how much of our energy goes into worry and anxiety, how much of the joy of today is robbed from us at our fears for tomorrow.
In the kingdom remade, there's nothing to be anxious about. I have two kids,, two grands, and a church I'm pastoring. Do you think I'm worried about stuff? I'm always worried about something.
I'm always having to go, "There's nothing I can do about that. Lord, I'm just going to lay this at your feet. Lord, I just trust you here.
Just work in his life. Just work in her life. Just do this thing. God, lead us here. I want to hear from you."
I'm constantly in that wrestle of finding myself worrying, finding myself being anxious, and instead having to drag that compulsion into the presence of Jesus.
That's not even a wrestling that exists when the kingdom has been remade. What it looks like to be a follower of Christ is you bring that compulsion into the presence of Jesus.
In the kingdom remade, the kingdom present, the wrestle ceases to be. Isn't that good news?
I don't know how your walk with Jesus is going, but my walk with Christ is constantly dragging bad compulsions into his presence and asking for maturation and grace and forgiveness and hope.
I thought I'd be farther along than I am 20-something years into following him. It's not an evil thing or a wicked thing to wrestle with compulsions.
The godly thing is to drag those compulsions into the presence of Christ by the grace of God. But in all things new, there's not even a wrestle. The compulsions are gone, whatever they are.
Do you have a compulsion toward anger? Do you have a compulsion toward lust? Do you have a compulsion toward selfishness? A compulsion toward worry? Whatever it is, it's gone.
If you're prone to depression, it's just gone. You don't have to fight it anymore. It's just not there. That alone makes me kind of go, "Maranatha! Come, Lord Jesus." Right?
He also says… This is important. There are real homes, and there is real feasting going on. I just want to pound this into your mind. It's not ethereal. You're not floating around.
We have houses, and we're eating, legitimate feasting together, in the same way Jesus' resurrected body ate real fish.
We're embodied creatures in a new heaven and new earth, new bodies that don't perish, actually living in homes and feasting with one another in the full presence of our Lord and Savior.
I am tired of living for the things that let me down and falter and keep me distracted. I am not living toward the day that I have more grand babies, a spouse, or financial security.
I am not living toward that day; I'm living toward this day, and every day I'm closer. This roots me in a kind of discipleship that I don't lose heart when my compulsions feel like I'll never beat them, because I will, and you will.
It doesn't matter what they are. It just doesn't matter what they are. Are you prone to depression? One day, by the power of Christ, you'll stand over that depression and mock it.
"Where is your victory now? Where is your sting?" This is what's coming for us, and we turn our face toward it, and we don't forget about it.
The days can be difficult. Life can be hard. Loss is real. Genesis 3 world is where we are, yet filled with the Holy Spirit, experiencing the kingdom now, breaking through in power, sustaining us to that day where we'll see this with our resurrected eyes.
This isn't a fairy tale. This is what you and I should be living toward. Every aspect of my behavior I want to wrap around this.
Am I living in this space in such a way that shows this is the kingdom I'm betting on, this is where I've placed my hope?
If this is where I've placed my hope, then any difficulty in marriage is put in its right category. Look at me. I'm not talking about abusive marriage. If you're being abused, I'm not talking to you.
I'm not saying you stay there and continue to be emotionally tormented while you look toward that day where that's not going to happen anymore.
Come and let us help you as best we can by getting you in a place where that's not your reality right now.
If you put your hope anywhere else, you're going to be anxious or angry, and that's going to lead you to control and manipulation, and that would rob you of the beauty of the kingdom, not just there but here.
If you're struggling with compulsions, hang in there. Don't hide. Be known. One of the things I fought for tooth and nail in this place is that it would always feel like an okay place for you to not be okay.
It's okay. Let's come together, love one another, serve one another, pray with one another, and drag that compulsion into the presence of Jesus Christ.
I'll end with this. Where have you placed your hope? If you've put it on something that cannot bear up under the weight of your expectation, you only have anxiety and anger and control and manipulation in your future.
Jesus wants so much more for you than that. Let's pray. Father, thank you for these men and women.
I am eager as ever for this to be our reality, eager as ever to experience this in the here and now as I wait for it to come in its fullness.
I pray for my brothers and sisters who have come into this place tonight weary, exhausted, beaten down, and maybe on the precipice of hopelessness.
I pray in this space that you might fan into flame that smoldering wick, that we might in this moment be reminded that you have not saved us to abandon us, that you will sustain us until this day, so empower us to keep running to you, to get back up and keep coming in.
Thank you that your grace is sufficient for the journey. Strengthen our hands, our resolve, our hearts by your Holy Spirit. Strengthen us all the more for the journey. It's for your beautiful name I pray, amen.