God Wants To Do Something New In You
As we enter a new year or life changes, it's easy to pin our hopes on new resolutions toward self-improvement. However, are we overlooking the work that God wants to do in our lives? Like the exiled Israelites, are we only expecting God to work in previous methods? Here are three things that cause us to miss God's movement.
What causes us to miss the new things God wants to do in our lives?
What is our hope for a new year?
Many of us enter a new year with hopes that God will do something new in our lives this year. However, as we age, those hopes can become paired with a growing level of cynicism and skepticism.
If there was ever a group of people that had their hope of a new thing mixed with cynicism and skepticism, unsure that God is even in the business of doing new things anymore, it was the people of God in Isaiah 43.
Significant life changes or large purchases are hard to miss. So it tracks that if God, who is bigger than life changes or purchases, wanted to do a new thing in our lives, it would also be impossible to miss.
However, our passage shows that it's possible. It's so likely that in Isaiah 43:19, Isaiah asks, "Do you not perceive it? Do you not see it? Do you not know about it? Are you not aware of it?"
So we must ask: What causes us to miss the new things God wants to do in our lives?
What Causes Us to Miss the New Things by God in Our Lives?
1) Incorrect About God
But now thus says the Lord,
he who created you, O Jacob,
he who formed you, O Israel:
“Fear not, for I have redeemed you;
I have called you by name, you are mine.
When you pass through the waters, I will be with you;
and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you;
when you walk through fire you shall not be burned,
and the flame shall not consume you.
For I am the Lord your God,
the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.
I give Egypt as your ransom,
Cush and Seba in exchange for you.
Because you are precious in my eyes,
and honored, and I love you,
I give men in return for you,
peoples in exchange for your life.
Fear not, for I am with you;
I will bring your offspring from the east,
and from the west I will gather you.
I will say to the north, Give up,
and to the south, Do not withhold;
bring my sons from afar
and my daughters from the end of the earth,
everyone who is called by my name,
whom I created for my glory,
whom I formed and made.” (Isaiah 43:1-7)
In these verses, we see God proclaiming great truths about Himself and the people of God. Amid their exile and suffering, God calls out to them with powerful reminders about Himself. These reminders most notably include His character and actions, both in the past and promised in the future.
In these verses, we see the first reason we might miss what new thing God might be up to in our lives: We miss it when we have incorrect thoughts about who God is and who we are in the midst of our trials.
We must see how these two ideas are connected.
If you don't believe in a creator God, by extension, we are nothing more than products of random chance. Without realizing it, we've lost our foundation for human rights, dignity, justice, and flourishing. We've lost a foundation for hope.
But followers of Christ also fall into this same pattern when we acknowledge that there is a creator God, but begin to believe that His character and actions show Him to be uncaring, cruel, or distant. This type of God would be indifferent towards us and unworthy of our trust. An attempt to believe in new things would also be hopeless; our situations would seem louder than any other reality about God.
It's as if we are lost and need someone to tell us the directions because, in our lostness, we are beginning to lose sight of our identity and creator.
Isaiah does this for us with the words of God, directly telling us the truth about who God is, who we are, and the trials we face: God is the Lord, the Holy One of Israel, our Savior. He is our creator, forming us, making us, redeeming us, calling us by name, and telling us that we are His. Precious, Honored and loved to the extent that we would be called his sons and daughters.
Twice in these verses, God tells the people not to fear, not because there will be no trials, but because He is with us in them. In His love, God is prepared to go to the furthest extent for us and pay any price (see the language of ransom and exchange).
For some of us, the truth we need to hear is as simple yet as profound as this: God, the creator of the entire universe, is with you and loves you as His precious and honored son and daughter. Your trials from last year are not a sign of God's abandonment; He is with you in your weariness to provide rest.
2) Following Idols
Bring out the people who are blind, yet have eyes,
who are deaf, yet have ears!
All the nations gather together,
and the peoples assemble.
Who among them can declare this,
and show us the former things?
Let them bring their witnesses to prove them right,
and let them hear and say, It is true.
“You are my witnesses,” declares the Lord,
“and my servant whom I have chosen,
that you may know and believe me
and understand that I am he.
Before me no god was formed,
nor shall there be any after me.
I, I am the Lord,
and besides me there is no savior.
I declared and saved and proclaimed,
when there was no strange god among you;
and you are my witnesses,” declares the Lord, “and I am God.
Also henceforth I am he;
there is none who can deliver from my hand;
I work, and who can turn it back?”Thus says the Lord,
your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel:
“For your sake I send to Babylon
and bring them all down as fugitives,
even the Chaldeans, in the ships in which they rejoice.
I am the Lord, your Holy One,
the Creator of Israel, your King.” (Isaiah 43:8-15)
In this passage, God calls us to imagine a great courtroom scene where all the nations are gathered. On one side is God, with His people, and on the other are the nations, with their idols.
God issues challenges that He knows the idols can't answer. So He says for them to bring out their witnesses: can they speak backward to your past? Can they save you from your present exile? Can they tell the future?
Obviously, they can't, and as we hear these questions, we see another reason we miss what God could be doing: We follow our idols instead of our God and then believe that our failures disqualify us.
The error here stems not from the head but from the heart. Israel, and we also sometimes find our affections wandering. When they do, they attach to something good, elevating it to the ultimate thing we can't live without. This is an idol; it takes an aspect of the creation and gives it worship and authority due to our creator.
On the surface, they look different over time; we don't bow down to physical idols representing gods, but the source behind them remains. We find idols in our search for love and happiness, our quest for power and success, and our desires for things and status.
Even though we continually pursue our idols, we find ourselves like Israel in this passage: struck with the reality that our idols don't have the power to save. So, when we fail, we become guilty for pursuing them instead of God. When left to their own devices and fueled by the enemy's lies, our failures in the Christian life convince us that God can't do something new in us because we've messed things up too much.
But what does this passage show us?
God calls the idols to bring their witness, and God brings His witnesses, the people of God! In their blindness and deafness, God tells them that they are His witnesses and servants, all for the purpose that we would know, believe, and understand Him.
But wait, how can they be witnesses? What have they done or achieved for God? Haven't they failed too much?
Israel's story is nothing but failure. They are blind, deaf, and scattered in exile. Weak in comparison to the mighty nations of Egypt and Babylon. They're more broken and flawed than they would ever want to admit, yet God tells them that their worthiness comes not from their efforts but because they are loved, and God is in control of a plan that will use them for His glory to cover the whole earth.
His plan doesn't come to fruition despite their failures, but their failures will be the very thing that causes them to know God deeper and points others towards his glory & goodness.
Your failures from the previous year, some of the lifelong things, are not something that keeps you from God but could be the thing that propels your witness so that you know, believe, and understand Him more deeply. He is not displeased with you in your failures but works in them to lead you back to His all-sufficient grace.
3) Cling to the Past
Thus says the Lord,
who makes a way in the sea,
a path in the mighty waters,
who brings forth chariot and horse,
army and warrior;
they lie down, they cannot rise,
they are extinguished, quenched like a wick:
“Remember not the former things,
nor consider the things of old.
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.
The wild beasts will honor me,
the jackals and the ostriches,
for I give water in the wilderness,
rivers in the desert,
to give drink to my chosen people,
the people whom I formed for myself
that they might declare my praise. (Isaiah 43:16-21)
Here God tells them that while they're in exile to remember the exodus. Remember how I made a way through the Sea, brought out Pharaoh to meet his defeat, all so that you would see my love for you, and the nations would glorify me by your witness. This pattern of redemption & salvation is not a one-time event but part of the Big Story that all stories point toward.
But in this, we find our final reason: We cling to the past and refuse to allow God to move us forward.
Why did God bring up the exodus but tell them not to remember it or consider it? God is making a distinction here between His character and methods. He calls them to remember our God's eternal, unchanging nature but not to limit him to only acting in the same way.
When the people of God hear this from Isaiah, they are in exile, oppressed by the mighty nation of Babylon. Their hope is for another exodus. They're clinging to the past, but God tells them: I'm doing a new thing, and I don't want you to miss it!
This is where our story deviates from Isaiah's.
The Israelites watched & waited with eager expectation for a new thing to spring forth. They stayed in exile for centuries. They waited in times of God speaking through prophets and in times of silence. Some missed it while waiting for God to use his same methods again.
But God was doing something new. They were waiting for the new thing we celebrated in late December: the birth of Christ the Lord, the world's savior.
The Lord, the Holy One and Creator of Israel, the redeemer and savior, saw our deafness and blindness. He saw how prone we were to wander away from God and toward idols. He knew we are more broken and flawed than we would ever want to admit. But he didn't leave us there.
Our Immanuel came to show who He is and who we are. He came in the fragility of human flesh, so we will never forget He is with us in our trials. In the greatest trial of human history, where we all stood guilty in our pursuit of idols, He declared that it wasn't Egypt that was given as a ransom or people in exchange for us but on the cross. He was cast out of the city and from the fellowship of Heaven so His creation would be brought into the family of God as sons and daughters.
The New Way Gospel
This is the good news: by turning from our brokenness and believing this is true, we can have eternal life and life to the fullest. We become witnesses that model a new way of living, a lifestyle shaped and formed by the gospel, and that witness is impossible to miss.
The new way of the gospel empowers a witness that is impossible to miss.
Now, you might say, how could we miss this? But for most of us, hasn't the pace of our lives already moved us towards that?
New Year's Day comes, and we make resolutions for self-improvement, lists of goals to achieve, and dreams of betterment for the coming year. We put away our Christmas decorations, and implicitly, we put away the new way of the gospel. We make an idol out of our resolutions, believing that they are the way out of our brokenness, that in one of them is the path to power, success, or love. The reality is we already have our new way.
When the new way of the gospel is at the core of our identity, we are freed to approach our resolutions, goals, and dreams in a new way. We can ask ourselves: What new things is God up to? What could He be calling me towards? How might he be working amid my trials?
We can have freedom in our relationships to move past transactional connections and approach each other with grace. We can open ourselves to new pathways of discipleship and mission that aren't looking to recreate a method from the past but reflect God's unchanging character of redemption in new ways. This is an empowered witness, one that no one will miss.
TL;DR
Many of us enter a new year with hopes that God will do something new in our lives this year.
What causes us to miss the new things God wants to do in our lives?
When we have incorrect thoughts about who God is and who we are in our trials.
When we follow our idols instead of our God and then believe that our failures disqualify us.
When we cling to the past and refuse to allow God to move us forward.
We can have life: eternal and life to the fullest now. We become witnesses that model a new way of living.
The new way of the gospel empowers a witness that is impossible to miss.
Related Reading
How to Hear God’s Voice & Follow His Will by Rev. Paul Lawler
How Do I Find My Mission In Life by Grant Caldwell
What’s My Purpose? by Bro. Chris Carter
