As a new year begins, people start to make plans for improving themselves. Many want to make themselves into something very different than what they are currently. They want something different, something new.
The thing is that mankind is not the creator. The created can only work with what the creator has given to them. They can try but, ultimately, on their own they will fail. They may do some things to improve their way of living but they cannot change who they are.
There is only one individual in all of our history who has the ability to take what exists and create something new out of it. Jesus Christ is the name of that person who is also the Son of God. He is the creator. He created everything that is and he can change you in the blink of an eye. All you have to do is ask him.
He will change you and bring you redemption and bring you into his family as a member of his own body.
The world around us is crumbling. The universe is falling apart. These are not things to overlook but they are not things to dwell on. God has promised that he will do something new and he will. That day is coming.
This old world will be done away with along with everything in the universe. God will create a new heaven and new earth. They will be the place where he and his people will dwell together forever in harmony and peace.
It’s not that you should not do things to improve your life and to be a good shepherd of what has given you, including the environment. It’s that those things pale to nothing in comparison with the state of your soul.
The most important thing that you can do at the start of this year is to look at yourself as God sees you. If you are a Christian and a follower of Christ, look to see if you have strayed away from God’s path. If so, ask him for help to start fresh in living your life for him.
If you are not a Christian, then you are an unredeemed sinner. When God sees you, all he sees is the sin and that is something he cannot tolerate around him. The only way to come into the presence of God is to have that sin removed.
Jesus will do that for you. He died a horrifically painful death on the cross to save you. He is waiting for you. He already made the gift of pardon for you. It’s there and once you accept it, you will be saved.
If a prisoner has a pardon and decides to stay in prison, what can the pardoner do? It’s up to you to take the action to gift what Jesus has done for you.
Isaiah 43:18-21
“Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past.
See, 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.
The wild animals honor me, the jackals and the owls,
because I provide water in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland, to give drink to my people, my chosen, the people I formed for myself that they may proclaim my praise.”