New Things. Normally new things are good things. Take for instance, Christmas and birthdays. Who doesn’t enjoy receiving new presents? As children we want new toys. As teenagers we want new computer games or the newest technology. But as we get older, we appreciate new clothes because we want to look nice and sharp and presentable before others. Maybe we’ve come into a new job, which might mean a new location, new friends, and new challenges. How about new beginnings? And these too, may mean new challenges, hopes, and dreams. In the Orient, it is a custom in some places that when the new year comes around, windows and doors are opened and old things of the past year are thrown out into the streets so that room can be made for new things to replace the old. Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 5:17 that when a person comes to accept Jesus Christ as their Savior, he becomes a “new creation; old things have passed away, new things have come.” Of course, he is talking about our new life in Christ. In the book of Romans, he says that our “old man, our old way of living has died, and we are given a new way of living instead.”
But what about this “New Man”? What about this new person that we have become? How are we to live our new way of life? In Paul’s letter to the church at Colossae, the Colossians letter, the third chapter, he says first of all, we have been given a new focus in life. We are not to look at the things, situations, and circumstances that we find ourselves in to be our guide in life, but to look towards Jesus Christ who gave His life for us so that we could have a new way of living. Have you ever been flying from one city to another on a cloudy day, especially if it is a dark and stormy day? The pilot takes off under bad circumstances, but when he goes through the clouds and emerges on the other side, it is nothing but a field of beautiful white clouds that look like you can walk out on. You see, we have been looking at life from the wrong side when we live our life in rebellion against God. Yet all along, God wants us to experience the best of life that He intends for us to live. Old things pass away, behold, all things become new.
Next, Paul tells us in Colossians to “set our minds on things above, and not on things of the earth.” Oh, there are a lot of good things in life, and a lot of nice things and things to buy and possess, but none of them can fill the emptiness inside when we don’t give our heart to Jesus Christ. Someone has said that “there is a God-shaped vacuum in our hearts, and the only thing that can fill that vacuum better than anything else is Jesus Christ!” When we ask Jesus into our hearts, He fills that empty space and satisfies us inside. Do you know what happens when a caterpillar spins a cocoon around his life? Sometime later he crawls out of the cocoon, only this time not as a caterpillar, but as a butterfly. He no longer crawls along the ground and leaves, but he now has wings and he can fly! You see, the Word of God, the Bible, can set you free from your worries and cares, from the burdens of life that you bear, and lift those budens from your shoulders so that you can fly spiritually, mentally, and emotionally and find peace and hope and joy and strength in the words that God has for you! And who doesn’t want to fly?
