New!

By Royce Frederick

We often like to have new things. God has some very important new things for us:

The NEW BIRTH — “...‘Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.’ Nicodemus said to Him, ‘How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?’ Jesus answered, ‘Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God’ ” (John 3:3-5). A child is born when it comes out of its mother. A sinner becomes a child of God when he or she comes out of the water of baptism. When a sinner is “baptized into Christ Jesus,” he is “buried” in water, then rises out of the water to “walk in newness of life” (Rom. 6:3-4; see Acts 8:36-39). This is the new birth. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new” (2 Cor. 5:17).

The NEW COVENANT — God foretold through the prophet Jeremiah: “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah — not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, though I was a husband to them, says the Lord” (Jer. 31:31-32). When Jesus died on the cross, He fulfilled the old covenant, removed it, and replaced it with His new covenant (Matt. 5:17-18; Col. 2:14; Rom. 7:4-7; Heb. 8:6-13; 9:15-17; Lk. 22:20).

The NEW HEAVENS & NEW EARTH — No one knows when Christ will return. “But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in which the heavens will pass away with a great noise, and the elements will melt with fervent heat; both the earth and the works that are in it will be burned up. Therefore...what manner of persons ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness...? Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells” (2 Peter 3:10-13). The apostle John was given a vision of the eternal home of faithful Christians: “Now I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away. Also there was no more sea. Then I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband...And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away” (Rev. 21:1-2, 4). This earth will be totally destroyed. But what a glorious, eternal home awaits us on the new earth!