Ever New

To long for what “was” is not hope, for hope is always looking forward. Nostalgia is the dangerous belief that what “was” is that to which we ought to return and where we need to remain, which assumes that God is not leading us anywhere new. Why is this idea dangerous? Because once we become nostalgic, how is God to show us anything new? We are only looking to the past.

The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. Jeremiah 31:31

A person might argue that what Jeremiah is talking about has already happened, and because it is now in the past, we should be looking backward to that “new” thing. We should be nostalgic for the new covenant.

However, I think we easily make a faulty assumption about the nature of the new things of God. We might think that when God does something new it is a point in time, a particular event, and quickly passes from being “new” to being in the past.

I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them and I in them. John 17:26

John tells his church that Jesus promised that he will make the name of God known, even though he clearly says that Jesus also had made it known. How can it be that what Jesus had done is also what he will continue to do?

The answer is that this is an on-going work, and therefore ever new. The newness never goes away. We are talking about relationship and covenant with an infinite God, and we, as finite creatures, will find this to be an ever new experience.

Jesus is bringing the new covenant Jeremiah spoke about, one which would be written on the hearts of the people (Jeremiah 31:33). Not only is relationship with God an infinite reality, the work cannot be fully and finally completed, not because God is somehow incapable, but because we are imperfect receptors.

Is God doing something new in our day? Should we be nostalgic for the past as if all has been done and we must be keepers of the past?

We can say with certainty that Jesus is doing new work in our hearts each day, making his Father known, leading and teaching us. John says that this ever new work involves God’s love being in us. The love and mercy of the Lord are “new every morning” (Lamentations 3:22-23).

We are thankful for whatever we have received for the new that it was when we received it, but must recognize that the newness continues each day.

We are forward-looking always, eager to receive whatever is coming down from the Father of lights (James 1:17), through Christ our Lord, in the on-going remembering work of the Spirit (John 14:26).