God Restores, Redeems. Renames and Resurrects
And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” (Revelation 21:5)
Jesus’ death and resurrection changed all the rules. He undid the curse. Through dying and rising back to life, He is making all things new.
Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert. (Isaiah 43:19)
Be alert, be present. I’m about to do something brand-new. It’s bursting out! Don’t you see it?
There it is! I’m making a road through the desert, rivers in the badlands. (from THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language © 2002 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved.)
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. (2 Corinthians 5:17)
Because of His new mercies, He restores and reorients us toward Himself each day. It’s not a one-time thing.
God speaks into the situations in our lives and those situations are altered because of what God says about them.
God restores
Jacob said, “Few and evil have been the days of the years of my life…” (Genesis 47:9)
Jacob, looking back on his life, talked about, “the God who has been my shepherd all my life long to this day.” (Genesis 48:15) He went on to say that he had been “redeemed ... from all evil.” (Genesis 48:16)
Sam Gamgee: “I thought you were dead! But then I thought I was dead myself! Is everything sad going to come untrue?” (The Lord of the Rings)
“I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten…” (Joel 2:25)
God is the One who restores what has been stolen and even what we’ve squandered.
God redeems (in the sense of the redeemer kinsman)
The book of Ruth – an amazing story of God’s redemption.
Naomi said, “I went away full, and the Lord has brought me back empty.” (Ruth 1:21)
“The unique emphasis of the redemption/salvation/vindication associated with the kinsman-redeemer is the fact that this action is carried out by a kinsman on behalf of a near relative in need.”
(https://www.biblestudytools.com/dictionaries/bakers-evangelical-dictionary/kinsman-redeemer.html)
“I know that my redeemer lives.” (Job 19:25)
Do not move an ancient landmark or enter the fields of the fatherless, for their Redeemer is strong... (Proverbs 23:10-11)
Too often we live in the past. We live in our past mistakes.
Yet we have a Redeemer Who has brought us – and continues to bring us – into newness of life.
What if Joseph, in the Old Testament – after he was vindicated – continued to act like he was in prison?
That’s what the people of Israel did in the Old Testament. God rescued them from slavery in Egypt but they continued to live with a slavery mentality.
God renames
In the Bible, names often carried a lot of significance. But what I think is even more significant is the renaming of people in Scripture.
Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands. (Isaiah 49:16)
New Century Version:
See, I have written your name on my hand.
We are that special to God that He wants be sure to remember us.
I will give him a white stone, with a new name written on the stone that no one knows except the one who receives it. (Revelation 2:17)
If you ever start thinking that God is far off, impersonal, beyond our reach, remember that He is going to give you a new name that only He and you know.
God today is saying you’re His child, you’re forgiven, you’re loved by Him.
You’re a new creature in Christ and you have a new identity. Use it. Act like it.
God resurrects
Ravi Zacharias has frequently said, “God didn’t come to make bad people good. He came to make dead people alive.”
Through the death and resurrection of Jesus, God resurrects us.
If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you. (Romans 8:11)
An ongoing action. That same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead keeps on giving life to our mortal bodies.
“But I haven’t seen it yet.”
· David taking food to his brothers at the front lines in the standoff with the Philistines.
· Saul of Tarsus on the road to Damascus.
· Lazarus just before Jesus cried out, “Lazarus, come forth.”
· The woman with the issue of blood for 12 years.
In an instant, everything can change.
Christian Outreach Church, 31 December 2017
