A NEW CREATION

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Colossians 1:18

Genesis 1:1 HCSB
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
John 1:1 HCSB
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
Revelation 21:1–4 HCSB
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea no longer existed. I also saw the Holy City, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared like a bride adorned for her husband. Then I heard a loud voice from the throne: Look! God’s dwelling is with humanity, and He will live with them. They will be His people, and God Himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will no longer exist; grief, crying, and pain will exist no longer, because the previous things have passed away.
Some of you may be wondering, I thought this would be a message about Christmas? Listen to Paul’s explanation of the Christmas event:
Galatians 4:4–5 HCSB
When the time came to completion, God sent His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.
In summary, all that God has been doing since Genesis, all that God has done in Jesus, and all that God will do is bot about us. It’s not about making our lives better, nor is it about creating a more comfortable place for us here and now.
Listen to the text for my message today:
Colossians 1:18 (HCSB)
He is also the head of the body, the church; He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He might come to have first place in everything.
As we’ve been preparing for the BIG EVENT - Christmas Day - we are more often like those who stumble around in darkness. The season of Advent is more about darkness than light. Candles are one way we acknowledge the darkness because candles, though they provide light, the light is dim, flickering, and suggests that we move cautiously and carefully until full light is restored.
In Col 1:18 Paul affirms several certainties that allow us to live with confidence as we wait for the fullness of God’s light to chase away every particle of darkness.

A New People in a New Kingdom

Jesus, the One whose birth is heralded by angels, is born to occupy the throne of His ancestor, David (Luke 1:30-33
Luke 1:30–33 (HCSB)
Then the angel told her: Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. Now listen: You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you will call His name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David. He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and His kingdom will have no end.
As ‘head of the body’ Jesus occupies a throne, a place of power and authority over His people. The church, which is His body, is nothing less than a picture of the kingdom of God as it will be in eternity.
As we celebrate the birth of Jesus, we need to remember that this infant was born - not to be a king, He was born a king. Some time after His birth - perhaps two years - Matthew records the visit of some ‘wise’ men.
Matthew 2:1–2 HCSB
After Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of King Herod, wise men from the east arrived unexpectedly in Jerusalem, saying, “Where is He who has been born King of the Jews? For we saw His star in the east and have come to worship Him.”
The church, the body of Christ, is the clear expression of God’s kingdom.
This calls us as a people to re-evaluate how we act towards one another. We are to be of one heart, one mind, one goal. Yet far too often when people outside the church look what they see is a fractured people - groups seeking to exercise control over others, individuals promoting their own needs against the needs of the whole. Too often the ‘kingdom life’ we present is the best advertisement for NOT being a believer!

Better Life? New Life?

Twice Paul describes Jesus as ‘firstborn.’ In vs 15 Jesus is ‘firstborn over all creation.’ This is Paul’s way of reminding his readers that Jesus is firstborn not because He was ‘born’ but because He is the heir of all things, He alone is the designated One who is the ‘fullness of God’ in the flesh.
In vs 18 Jesus is identified as ‘firstborn from the dead.’’ Here Paul reminds his readers that the first one God raised to the new life is Jesus - He is the first, but in no way is He the last. In another letter Paul writes,
1 Corinthians 15:20–22 HCSB
But now Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead also comes through a man. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive.
As Christmas draws near and as more attention is given to the scenes surrounding Jesus’ birth we are not celebrating One who came to make life better. He came so that through His death and resurrection He might give New Life - life that is qualitatively different than the life people experience before Jesus.
There are multiple other ways to get a ‘better life.’ Your local WalMart has several books and magazines that promise a better life.
Only Jesus, the One whose birth we observe at Christmas can provide what we really need: New Life.

A New Strategy

As I scan newspapers (online) and magazines a topic i often see: Healing the Divisions in America. Writers from every specialty imaginable offer their ideas and suggestions on how we can heal the division occuring our lifetime.
A common thread through most of those opinion pieces suggests that simply talking with one another may very well be the easiest strategy available.
As Christmas nears most newspapers and magazines will carry suggestions on how to have a civil conversation about politics or religion with family members on opposing sides of the issues.
Churches, like families, are not immune to people holding diverse view points. There is a simple solution - allow Jesus to have the place God intends Him to have.
All that God is doing in and through Jesus has very little to do with a Republican or Democratic agenda. God’s work in bringing Jesus to the world isn’t about promotion our representative form of government over every other form.
What God did in sending His One and Only Son isn’t even about demonstrating that capitalism is a better economic system.
No. All that God is doing in Jesus is about insuring that Jesus has the highest priority, that Jesus takes first place - not just in the lives of individuals. No, God is working so that Jesus might come to have priority in all things - period.

New Creation - New Life - New Strategy = God’s Kingdom Revealed

When the time came to completion, God sent His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.” (Galatians 4:4–5, HCSB)
Paul, though a renowned scholar in his own day and still regarded as one of the brightest Christians to have written in 2,000 years never said much about the birth of Jesus.
It’s not because Jesus’ birth was unimportant or insignificant.
Paul took a different view - one I’d like to suggest we investigate this Christmas.
The birth of Jesus - and the miraculous events surrounding it - are God’s way of introducing His new creation.
The creation in which we live began with a Word. The new creation which is heralded at Jesus’ birth also begins with a word - a promise made to a virgin betrothed (engaged) to marry a commoner named Joseph.
The attendants at this birth - unnamed shepherds, a few farm animals, a chorus of angels - represent the kind of world God is creating and longing to reveal. It is a world where the humble are raised up and those who raise themselves up are humbled. The kind of creation God is promising is one where redemption is a gift, not a wage to be earned.
The new creation which Jesus’ birth unveils presents a different kind of king. Instead on One who exercises arbitrary authority over subjects, this King came to serve, to seek and save that which was hopelessly lost.
This new creation which is unveiled in the birth of a Holy Spirit conceived baby, is the result of a unalterable promise made to a young, engaged yet unmarried girl from Nazareth ,which is equivalent to the backside of nowhere (or maybe south county?) God’s new creation is unveiled in ways we would never have expected.
This new creation which is not really new (see thousands of years of prophetic promises) opens a new manner of life - one that is united around the priority of Jesus, The priority of Jesus is captured by John, one of Jesus’ earliest disciples when he tries to visualize what he experienced in heaven:
Revelation 7:9 HCSB
After this I looked, and there was a vast multitude from every nation, tribe, people, and language, which no one could number, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were robed in white with palm branches in their hands.
That is what is at stake this Christmas - really every Christmas.
Are you ready to enter into the new creation that God has promised?
To live in that creation requires a new life - one that Jesus was born, lived, died and raised again to give...
the church - those who have received this new life are God’s display of how this new creation will look...
To live in that creation requires that we agree to disagree about everything except this one thing: Jesus is Lord of all, King of Kings, and Lord of Lords.
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