Summary
Things get old and we long for the new.
They get old and they get old to me, for I am part of creation.
God “subjected creation to futility,” writes Paul.
God subjected creation to entropy, to use scientific lingo.
The second law of thermodynamics stipulates that the state of a closed system will always move toward chaos.
Things get old . . . and we long for the new.
The old is replaced by the new and we long for the old.
We long for the new and long for the old and rarely live now.
It’s a bit like taking a drink: you long for the drink and once you’ve drunk you no longer thirst and the moment of actually drinking is so fleeting.
It does no good to hang on to the moments. As my father was dying, I tried to hang on to each moment, and stopped living in any of the moments . . . with him. Maybe sin is trying to take the Good in every moment, such that you can’t experience the Good in any moment; it’s trying to take the Good, like fruit from a tree.
We seem to have a problem with time; Physicists also have a problem with time.
They don’t know what it is or why it only moves in one direction. As far as they can tell, it’s just the way we experience entropy.
It’s interesting that, in the garden, God said to Adam (humanity), “The day you eat of it dying you will die.” That is, “The day you take knowledge of the Good from the tree, you will begin to experience entropy; you will make yourself a ‘closed system.’ You will long for the new, and long for the old and find the now to be very elusive. You will run from the now and long for the now. You will run from ‘I Am’ and thirst for ‘I Am’ in you.”
Sometimes I miss my Dad and I drive by the house I grew up in—someone had the audacity to paint it a different color and change the landscaping! I sit outside and think, “Peter, you can never go home again.”
That’s what they must’ve been thinking in the seven churches of Asia Minor around 70 AD: Rome literally plowed Jerusalem into the ground such that “not one stone was left standing on another.” Jerusalem wasn’t just a house; it was home. It was the location of Eden; it was Mt. Moriah, Mt. Zion, and Mt. Calvary. It was the presence of the Father in the temple in the heart of the Promised Land. They must’ve thought, “You can never go home.”
The day my bride came down the aisle I was afraid. I thought to myself, “Stop worrying about the new and the old and live now. If you don’t live now, you’ll miss the bride coming down the aisle and your house will never be a home, and one day she might just say, ‘Depart from me; I never knew you.’ You can only know and be known by a person “now.”
Physicists say that for light, everything is now—an eternal now.
But how would they know? Has anyone ever spoken to the Light?
In the Revelation, “the Light” speaks to John, saying, “Come up here and let me show you things from my perspective.” In Chapter 21, John sees a new heaven and a new earth, and a New Jerusalem coming down from God as a bride adorned for her husband . . . I guess you can go home.
John hears a voice say, “The tabernacle of God is with people.” As the Jews journeyed to the Promised Land, the Promised Land journeyed with the Jews; home was with God in His tent, His tabernacle. It turns out that we are God’s tabernacle—His temple—but we are not at home with “I Am” in ourselves.
On the tree in the Garden Christ cried, “It is finished,” and the curtain in the tabernacle of stone ripped from the top to the bottom and the Spirit of God began to fill the temple of God, His home—you.
The voice from the throne says, “Look! I make all things new . . . to him who thirsts I will give from the fountain of the water of life without payment.”
Are you thirsty for home?
Home is you at home with “I Am” at home in you.
He makes all things new by filling all things, and you, with Himself.
He is the river of life which you will constantly drink and constantly bleed into others; the moment of thirst and satisfaction will be forever new, forever one, and you will be forever young.
He doesn’t just save you in three dimensions, but at least four.
He makes all your moments new: past present and future.
He knows and loves all of you filled with all of Himself, not just half of you filled with nothing but an empty ego.
The voice from the throne says, “Outside are the lost, the liars, the murderers and whoremongers, etc. etc.” They come to an End in the lake of eternal Way, Truth, Life, and Love that cannot be purchased; they come to the End . . . who is also the Beginning. Jesus is the End of time and the manifest presence of the Eternal Fire.
The Lake of Fire makes sinners thirsty for the Water of Life, but it’s all Mercy.
Outside of the city is this fallen world of space-time.
Inside the city is your home and God’s home in you, the New Jerusalem and the age to come—eternity.
We have each run away from home, and begun to dream our own dreams. But our Father is waking us from this nightmare. He whispers His Word from behind the curtain and rips that curtain as He cries, “It is finished,” on the tree in the garden. When we awake, everything will be new, and we will know something we didn’t know before: “There’s no place like home; there’s no place like home.”
What does it matter?
If you truly knew that God made all things new, and all things are your home, perhaps you’d let Him . . . make all things new?
I mean: wouldn’t you forgive all things and all people, everywhere and everywhen?
Wouldn’t you forgive as you’ve been forgiven, in the very image of God?
Wouldn’t you bleed the river of life and eternal fire?
Wouldn’t you be new, and all things with you?
May you thirst . . . for Home.
*Discussion questions for this sermon are available here: “All Things New” You Can Go Home