A New Thing

,     ​For my birthday I always love to receive flowering plants.  Growing up we had a beautifully landscaped yard, filled with Egyptian iris, roses, and many other pickable, long-stemmed flowers.  I looked forward to going out in the yard to see what kind of flower arrangement I could come up with for the house.  Each one was unique; every week a new creation of beauty.
     At our new home, however, I have to start over.  To be sure, it is a beautiful setting with the woods and mountains, but it started out with very few flowers.  So for my birthdays I ask my family for flowers and more flowers to plant.  Yesterday they brought me home a beautifully variegated dapple willow, sunset and white roses, along with a Japanese plum tree.  I couldn’t be happier!   

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    Right now they are sitting in my living room, awaiting their new home. That home, though, is my next issue.  It is all clay and highly acidic soil here.  With clay, the plant roots become encased in a sun-baked pot of dirt which doesn’t drain or receive the water well.  When watering, the water streams off and doesn’t sink into the ground.

      The hard soil rejects the life-giving water.

     In order to survive and thrive, I will need to dig out the old clay dirt and start over with fresh, nutrient rich topsoil that can receive the nurture and care necessary for the plants to thrive and rebloom. 

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     I was encouraged by my Bible app devotional for today, as it explained that the Hebrew word, “bara,” means to fashion or create (always with God as the subject) of heaven and earth, of man, of new circumstances of conditions, transformations, birth, something new, miracles.​
     Our God was and is and shall always be a creating God.  It is why we, as His image-bearers, find joy and pride in our gifts of creativity, whether that’s art, music, writing, building, gardening, or any number of work or hobbies. But while we always must use something He created to reform something of our design, He always makes something new and entirely good.
     From the beginning of our relationship with Jesus, He recreates us into a new and entirely good creation…completely NEW dirt from which to grow and bear fruit:

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“I will give you a NEW heart and put a NEW spirit in you!
I will remove from you your heart of stone
and give you a heart of flesh.”
Ezekiel 36:26
 
“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ,
the new creation has come: The old has gone,
The NEW is here!”
2 Corinthians 5:17
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     When we come to Jesus, we are broken, defeated and enslaved by our choices and past.  Our lives are a mess.  For too long we have rejected the life-giving Water that Jesus freely gives. Without Him and His transformation, the goodness of God hits our lives and runs off, unable to penetrate and bring healing and refreshment from the harshness of life.
     When we repent and put our faith and trust in Jesus, our lives are reset, rebirthed. We start to drink in that Water of Life, and we see immediate transformation!  The inward change is dramatic, but the outer actions and habits take more time...a lifetime. 
     Even after receiving Jesus as our Savior, we sometimes find ourselves sinking into habits that have been formed in every area of our lives, old habits that don't fit the new lifestyle of freedom and joy and love. In those habits we at times continue to follow ruts back to old lifestyle choices that only brought pain and destruction. 

     But Jesus, He makes all things new. 

     Every part of our lives.  He starts with our very foundational spirit, and makes it alive with all the essential ingredients necessary. He starts with our dirt.  But then?  Then He creates new habits, new ways of thinking.  Here he reforms our actions of service with a new and intimate knowledge of Him as our humble Servant.  Over there He transforms our words of habitual criticism to life-giving words with our knowledge of Him as our Life-creating Word.  In this section of our garden, He renews our hope to rise up again in a new day, because He is “The Sun of Righteousness [who arises] with healing in His wings,” Malachi 4:2.
     It can be difficult not to think on all our mistakes, failures and regrets, and to trust that God is yet even forming new life in our future.  The enemy would like nothing better than to cause us to halt and wallow in our past failures and broken rhythms.  By focusing backward, he knows that we will re-choose the choices that hurt us and others before. The enemy doesn't want us to live in the reality that Christ has set us free from those and given us the power and grace to make new and good choices through His death and resurrection to new life! 

     Praise God, we can look forward to a New Day in Jesus today!
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​"Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past.
Behold!
I am doing a NEW thing!
Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a Way​ in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.” Isaiah 43:18-19

     If what you are facing in your life seems like a wasteland---wasted choices, wasted relationships, wasted finances, wasted health,  wasted time---

     Look to Jesus! 

     Behold our God!

   He is creating a NEW thing today!

​“Behold! I am making all things NEW!”
Rev. 21:5