“So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see everything has become new!” This can be found in 2 Corinthians 17, written by St. Paul.
Paul was not talking about a New Year, but a new person.
As we look forward to 2021….and I think more than most new years, we really are embracing and looking forward to this New Year…….we may make resolutions, or collect our hopes for the upcoming year, or look forward to some anticipated events in our life planned for some time in the year ahead.
A New Year, really isn’t all that new, is it? It is just another date on the calendar, another year in our lives, another round of holidays, work, birthdays, and a few anticipated and unanticipated adventures. That may not have been quite true for 2020, but it is for most years.
What if instead of looking forward to a new year, we look forward to becoming a new person? No, I’m not talking about Botox or plastic surgery or even weight loss and getting in shape. I mean a new person. What might a new person look like for you? For me? What shackles can be tossed aside that now hold us back or hold us down? What new challenges might we embrace that might take us to places both figuratively and literally that we have never been and therefore have the possibility of changing us into someone new?
We all have characteristics about ourselves that most likely will never change. However we also all have possibility to change some parts of ourselves and become a new person. I feel sorry for people who seem to refuse to change. Over time they must become quite lonely and alienated as the world seems to march on and become new, thusly passing them by resulting in feelings of being alone and embittered.
I would not necessarily say God becomes new, but I can argue from scripture and from life that God is not afraid to express God’s self in new ways. There was the Creator way of “Young God”, there was the covenant way of a “Maturing God”, and ultimately there was and is the “Jesus Way” of “Mature God” in the birth, life, teachings, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. God is not one to say, “Let’s keep things the same.” God sees clearly that overall this does not work. Look at our world today: would it be wise to keep it this way? Take your historical pick back in time…..do you really wish life was just like that now? If we think some time in history was ideal, we probably weren’t paying attention.
Being made new is much more than a decision on our part. It is the work of God who keeps coming after us year after year making at least some part of us new despite our best efforts at resistance. Think of that when you raise a toast this New Year’s Eve. Yes, it is a new year, but the year is not all that will be new in 2021. You will also be new; at least some part of you will be. Will the newness result in bitterness or will you look to faith to struggle to find some better way to become new?
God is not going to forget to come after you in 2021. God does not tire of making us new. God has not run out of creativity. So, it will be a happy New Year in 2021 after all.