Not a New Day but THE New Day

This week, we have looked at a number of places that people place their hope. We can hope in politics rather than worship, riches rather than sacrifice, even sin rather than holiness. Today we are going to look a one more, extremely common place people put their hope: a new day.

 

We have come up with a lot of ways to cope with the busyness of modern life, and one of the most popular is the line, “things will slow down in a couple weeks.” Things then don’t, in fact, slow down in two weeks, so we repeat the lie again, hoping this time, it is in fact true.

 

Now, that is meant to be funny because this is something that we do all the time, but many of us cope with much more serious things this way and use it as an excuse to view pieces of our lives as meaningless and without a job. We look at our lives as a series of “just gotta get through this” moments. We turn our lives as always just two weeks away from fulfilling. Or turning just after potty training as when life really begins, or just after the kids are married, or just after this medical scan, or just after this wedding.

 

Do you see what that does to your life? Raising children in the fear and admonition of the Lord turns into something you just gotta get through, which means, really, it is a waste of time. Fulfilling your marriage vows before God and caring for a spouse as a picture of the gospel as you await medical results becomes a chore-filled, meaningless, busy work. Joy is always somewhere over there.

 

This passage, however, should change literally everything, and in fact, it did. Even secular life, non-Christian people have reoriented the calendar around this. It is the year 2025, because it has been (more or less) 2025 years since Jesus was born. For the Christian, however, this passage should change every single part of your life, including those parts that you say, “I just gotta get through this, and then things will be better.”

 

How?

 

Well, before I answer that, I need to clear up a few things first.

 

Number one, I’m not saying that the resurrection makes life easy. It doesn’t (yet). It’s still a fallen world (for now). I’m not saying that the resurrection turns waiting on a cancer diagnosis fun. I’m not even saying that we can’t grieve when sad things happen in our lives, and we look forward to the pain fading. What I am saying is that the Resurrection gives us the hope, the full assurance, mind you, of THE New day when all things are made new, when all things are resurrected from their dying state. On that day, all of these things that are unpleasant and sad and terrible will be redefined as the very things that lead us to the joy of heaven (Romans 8:28). We will see, with redeemed minds with the greatest hindsight capability possible, will look back over our lives from the heavenly point of view, and see that every single struggle eventually led us to this moment. So again, I am not saying that it makes life fun, but it will make life understandable.

 

Number two, I’m not just giving you a longer time to wait. In other words, you might be saying, “Ok, so you’re just telling us to stop putting hope in two weeks from now but rather 100 years from now when I’m dead? Aren’t you just telling us to do the same thing, hoping for the future, but make it longer?” That’s an insightful question, but no.

 

Putting your ultimate hope in eternity is very different because, number one, that future is actually guaranteed to you if you are in Christ. Two weeks from now being better isn’t it. In fact, it almost certainly will be the opposite. And number two, life slowing down in two weeks doesn’t change anything about today. Knowing that we will know whether or not it is cancer in a month does nothing for today except remind us of how much we don’t know.

 

Jesus rising from the dead actually changes everything about today, because it proves that there is a new King Who rules the world, and He has something for us to do during the waiting times. Not only that, but He is also the God of the universe, who brings all things into our lives for a specific, and good—in all meanings of that term—reason.

 

Let’s walk through this passage to see what this means.