Redefining New in the New Year
I found myself chuckling as I walked the aisles of my local grocery store. In the household cleaner section, Clorox had products marketing a “new” bleach.
“How in the world could bleach be new?” I thought.
It really can’t. Bleach is bleach. They can try to add a scent or a spray bottle for application, but at the end of the day, bleach has been the same for hundreds of years.
Yet marketers know something that works — we all want something new. New car smells. New and improved products. We are naturally drawn to something new.
Because of that understanding of what “new” means — brand-new, never seen before — we can miss the true meaning of “new” that Jesus offers and the opportunity that a new year brings.
In Revelation 21:5, Jesus is quoted when John writes, “And he who was seated on the throne said, ‘Behold, I am making all things new.’” Yet the Greek word John used for “new” here is not our marketing influenced understanding of the word.
The word we may assume was used here is “neos,” which is the word meaning “new in time, newly made.” Your new car or just-built house is “neos.” A new baby is “neos.” But John used the word “kainos,” which means “new in quality, different, superior, transformed.”
The new life that Jesus offers is a transformed life, different from what it was before. This is an important nuance that reflects the redemption and restoration of creation that will take place when Jesus returns. Isaiah 65:17 speaks of a “new heaven and a new earth,” which Romans 8:19-23 seems to give context to when it teaches that creation will be “liberated from its bondage to decay.” Creation will not be discarded. It will be redeemed. The Garden of Eden will not be erased. It will be healed and restored.
When you followed Jesus, you were not discarded by being given a new life. You were redeemed. With a new year upon us, there is no need to erase the year that is behind us. Rather, we can with hope and expectancy pray for a new year of redemption, resurrection, and restoration.
That is my prayer for our churches, our communities, our nation, and our world. “Oh God, please give us a year that ushers in new life for our leaders and churches, marked by transformation into something different than ever before. Please give us a year where your Spirit moves and countless lives are marked by redemption.”
We can have bold confidence that this is what we will experience because in those last days that John saw, what Jesus said is, “I am making” all things new. It’s already happening. It’s already underway. It’s a promise waiting for God’s people to embrace.
