All Things New
God has a plan that He is currently executing to make all things new:
Revelation 21:5 Then He who sat on the throne said, "Behold, I make all things new." And He said to me, "Write, for these words are true and faithful."
The reason God is making all things new, is because sin entered the world and corrupted what He made in Genesis 1. When God made the earth, and placed mankind in it, it was to be with them. A royal family is what God desired in His relationship with mankind. God is love, and love expands. God wanted to extend His love to us. That is why He made man....for love.
Love requires free will. Love can never happen by force. Because God chose love, He chose free will....God will never violate the free will of the objects of His love. That is why we have to choose God. That is why God leaves the start of the conversation to us. We love because He first loved us, but we can still refuse that offering of love.
Love is why God put the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil in the garden. Love requires a choice to refuse love:
Genesis 2:15-17 Then the LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it. ( And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, "Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; (17) but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die."
God wasn't mistaken. When Adam and Eve ate the fruit, they died. The Bible says man is made in God's image - triune. We are body, soul (mind, will, emotions), and spirit. As soon as Adam and Eve bit into that fruit, their spirit died. Shame filled the place where the Spirit of God had dwelt. Soon corruption touched their soul, and eventually their bodies died. What had been made to live forever was now fragile, stained, and broken. What was made to stand before God's bright holiness was now incapable of being in His bright glorious presence. For love, God, who desired evenings walking in the garden with the objects of His love, withdrew from earth to protect these fragile rebels whom He loved.
But God had a plan. What rebellion had corrupted, He would restore...He would make new. God called living with man on earth "very good." He hasn't changed His mind about what is very good. God with man has always been the plan. God's plan to make all things new was to send His own son, Jesus, who is God and was always with God, to become a man to pay the price for sin, for the price for sin...the price for saying "no" to love...is, in fact, death.
Jesus became a man, lived a perfect life without sin, proved He was God's Son by the miracles He performed and the love He showed, and then gave up His own life on a cross. He was the only man who ever lived that shouldn't have died, but He died so that anyone who would choose to say "yes" to love could be made new again.
We say "yes" to love by agreeing to accept His death as payment for our sin, which instantly renews our spirit (justification), and then remaining in Him, allowing Him to make our souls new (sanctification). Eventually, we will get new bodies (glorification) capable of being in front of the Father again. God makes us new in the same order that mankind died to sin: spirit, soul, then body. Just as all of creation groans under the weight of sin...even the rocks have become corrupted and erode...Jesus will renew even the earth, returning it to what the Father called "very good."
Because of love, we still have to choose. We can say no to love. If we say no, we will live forever separated from that love ...consumed in fire that never goes out. If we say yes to love, we say yes to being made new. We confess it with our mouths, but then we live it with our choices...we allow God to first make our spirit new, but then to make our heart new. We allow God to make our heart new...to sanctify us... by letting the Holy Spirit lead us. By remaining in (talking to) Him and listening as He talks to us. By reading the Words of the Bible and asking God to help us live lives that agree with those words. Step by step, day by day, our soul is made new. This process of being made new will affect our living condition forever.
God created man to live forever. Not 80 years, not 1,000 years, not just a billion years...forever. Forever, the condition of our heart will affect our proximity to God's bright holiness. The more we allow God to make our hearts new...the more we remain in Him now...the closer we will live to Him forever...the more of His glory we will experience. Jesus called this storing up treasure in heaven. Jesus often taught on rewards for our obedience:
Matthew 16:27 For the Son of Man will come in the glory of His Father with His angels, and then He will reward each according to his works.
In Revelation 2 and 3, Jesus demonstrated that the rewards for overcoming, letting Him make us new, are directly related to our position near Him. In fact, the reward offered to each group of overcomers gets progressively closer to His throne! Check it out:
Church 1
Revelation 2:7 "He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes I will give to eat from the tree of life, which is in the midst of the Paradise of God." '
Church 2
Revelation 2:11 "He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. He who overcomes shall not be hurt by the second death." '
Church 3
Revelation 2:17 "He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes I will give some of the hidden manna to eat. And I will give him a white stone, and on the stone a new name written which no one knows except him who receives it." '
Church 4
Revelation 2:26-28 And he who overcomes, and keeps My works until the end, to him I will give power over the nations— 'HE SHALL RULE THEM WITH A ROD OF IRON; THEY SHALL BE DASHED TO PIECES LIKE THE POTTER'S VESSELS'— as I also have received from My Father; and I will give him the morning star (Jesus is the morning star...this is saying more revelation of Jesus).
Church 5
Revelation 3:5 He who overcomes shall be clothed in white garments, and I will not blot out his name from the Book of Life; but I will confess his name before My Father and before His angels.
Church 6
Revelation 3:12 He who overcomes, I will make him a pillar in the temple of My God, and he shall go out no more. I will write on him the name of My God and the name of the city of My God, the New Jerusalem, which comes down out of heaven from My God. And I will write on him My new name.
Church 7
Revelation 3:21 To him who overcomes I will grant to sit with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne.
Letting Jesus make me new NOW really matters. Living wholeheartedly for Him now will greatly affect my experience of the New Jerusalem and my proximity to God. This isn't because God has favorites, it is because we have a choice in how "new" we are made by Him. His bright holiness requires an agreement for holiness. He desires all would walk in the holiness we were designed for...God right next to man. But God has committed to love. This is love, for love requires a choice. God has already chosen for me to sit on His throne with Him...what will I choose?
Revelation 21:5 Then He who sat on the throne said, "Behold, I make all things new." And He said to me, "Write, for these words are true and faithful."
The reason God is making all things new, is because sin entered the world and corrupted what He made in Genesis 1. When God made the earth, and placed mankind in it, it was to be with them. A royal family is what God desired in His relationship with mankind. God is love, and love expands. God wanted to extend His love to us. That is why He made man....for love.
Love requires free will. Love can never happen by force. Because God chose love, He chose free will....God will never violate the free will of the objects of His love. That is why we have to choose God. That is why God leaves the start of the conversation to us. We love because He first loved us, but we can still refuse that offering of love.
Love is why God put the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil in the garden. Love requires a choice to refuse love:
Genesis 2:15-17 Then the LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it. ( And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, "Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; (17) but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die."
God wasn't mistaken. When Adam and Eve ate the fruit, they died. The Bible says man is made in God's image - triune. We are body, soul (mind, will, emotions), and spirit. As soon as Adam and Eve bit into that fruit, their spirit died. Shame filled the place where the Spirit of God had dwelt. Soon corruption touched their soul, and eventually their bodies died. What had been made to live forever was now fragile, stained, and broken. What was made to stand before God's bright holiness was now incapable of being in His bright glorious presence. For love, God, who desired evenings walking in the garden with the objects of His love, withdrew from earth to protect these fragile rebels whom He loved.
But God had a plan. What rebellion had corrupted, He would restore...He would make new. God called living with man on earth "very good." He hasn't changed His mind about what is very good. God with man has always been the plan. God's plan to make all things new was to send His own son, Jesus, who is God and was always with God, to become a man to pay the price for sin, for the price for sin...the price for saying "no" to love...is, in fact, death.
Jesus became a man, lived a perfect life without sin, proved He was God's Son by the miracles He performed and the love He showed, and then gave up His own life on a cross. He was the only man who ever lived that shouldn't have died, but He died so that anyone who would choose to say "yes" to love could be made new again.
We say "yes" to love by agreeing to accept His death as payment for our sin, which instantly renews our spirit (justification), and then remaining in Him, allowing Him to make our souls new (sanctification). Eventually, we will get new bodies (glorification) capable of being in front of the Father again. God makes us new in the same order that mankind died to sin: spirit, soul, then body. Just as all of creation groans under the weight of sin...even the rocks have become corrupted and erode...Jesus will renew even the earth, returning it to what the Father called "very good."
Because of love, we still have to choose. We can say no to love. If we say no, we will live forever separated from that love ...consumed in fire that never goes out. If we say yes to love, we say yes to being made new. We confess it with our mouths, but then we live it with our choices...we allow God to first make our spirit new, but then to make our heart new. We allow God to make our heart new...to sanctify us... by letting the Holy Spirit lead us. By remaining in (talking to) Him and listening as He talks to us. By reading the Words of the Bible and asking God to help us live lives that agree with those words. Step by step, day by day, our soul is made new. This process of being made new will affect our living condition forever.
God created man to live forever. Not 80 years, not 1,000 years, not just a billion years...forever. Forever, the condition of our heart will affect our proximity to God's bright holiness. The more we allow God to make our hearts new...the more we remain in Him now...the closer we will live to Him forever...the more of His glory we will experience. Jesus called this storing up treasure in heaven. Jesus often taught on rewards for our obedience:
Matthew 16:27 For the Son of Man will come in the glory of His Father with His angels, and then He will reward each according to his works.
In Revelation 2 and 3, Jesus demonstrated that the rewards for overcoming, letting Him make us new, are directly related to our position near Him. In fact, the reward offered to each group of overcomers gets progressively closer to His throne! Check it out:
Church 1
Revelation 2:7 "He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes I will give to eat from the tree of life, which is in the midst of the Paradise of God." '
Church 2
Revelation 2:11 "He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. He who overcomes shall not be hurt by the second death." '
Church 3
Revelation 2:17 "He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes I will give some of the hidden manna to eat. And I will give him a white stone, and on the stone a new name written which no one knows except him who receives it." '
Church 4
Revelation 2:26-28 And he who overcomes, and keeps My works until the end, to him I will give power over the nations— 'HE SHALL RULE THEM WITH A ROD OF IRON; THEY SHALL BE DASHED TO PIECES LIKE THE POTTER'S VESSELS'— as I also have received from My Father; and I will give him the morning star (Jesus is the morning star...this is saying more revelation of Jesus).
Church 5
Revelation 3:5 He who overcomes shall be clothed in white garments, and I will not blot out his name from the Book of Life; but I will confess his name before My Father and before His angels.
Church 6
Revelation 3:12 He who overcomes, I will make him a pillar in the temple of My God, and he shall go out no more. I will write on him the name of My God and the name of the city of My God, the New Jerusalem, which comes down out of heaven from My God. And I will write on him My new name.
Church 7
Revelation 3:21 To him who overcomes I will grant to sit with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne.
Letting Jesus make me new NOW really matters. Living wholeheartedly for Him now will greatly affect my experience of the New Jerusalem and my proximity to God. This isn't because God has favorites, it is because we have a choice in how "new" we are made by Him. His bright holiness requires an agreement for holiness. He desires all would walk in the holiness we were designed for...God right next to man. But God has committed to love. This is love, for love requires a choice. God has already chosen for me to sit on His throne with Him...what will I choose?
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