See, I am doing a new thing!
Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.
Isaiah 43:16-21 NIV
I grew up in a church that had theatre seats for pews that would pop you in the rear if you didn’t get up quick enough. Our family was at church every time the doors were open – at least it seemed that way as a kid. And worship was long and boring: the sermon lasted forever, and the long prayer seemed as long as the sermon. My brothers and I had to keep quiet and sit still; acting up was not tolerated, no matter how afflicted with ADHD we were. If one of us boys were caught acting up in church, our dad’s long arm found his way to our knees where a pinch around our kneecap straightened us up quickly. Ahhh, those were the good old days.
Perhaps for some of you church was a part of life. You grew up in an environment that showed you God and how much God loves you. You learned the Bible stories and how God wants you to live. You met Jesus and learned he died and rose again to save you. Somewhere along the way you accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior. Now you live for him. Others didn’t grow up in church. But somehow the Holy Spirit touched your life and you now have found real blessing with God’s people in church.
For all of us, it is far too easy to say, “Ahhh, this is comfortable. I like it just the way it is. Please don’t change a thing. Thank you very much.” We like to be comfortable. We like knowing what to expect. We like routine. When it comes to church, we have a certain idea about what church is and how church is supposed to function. Figuratively, those easy chairs with “big gulp” holders and footrests sound pretty good.
If recent experience has taught us anything, it has taught us that “comfortable” is not reality, even in the church. The covid pandemic totally overturned the easy chair. Returning to “normal” hasn’t happened, and it won’t. we’ve had to totally rethink church. I believe that’s a good thing. Added to this is the controversy that has been with the UMC for some time regarding LGBTQ+ persons and their inclusion in the life of the church but has now reached a fervor in some places resulting in conflict and disaffiliations. And if that were not enough, the Michigan Conference has discerned the need to reduce the number of districts from nine to seven creating even more upheaval and stress. I’ve come to agree with Lucy Swindoll (sister of well-known teacher/preacher Chuck Swindoll) that normal is just a setting on the dryer, and even that may not be true anymore.
But here’s the thing: God never intended for the church to exist in a relaxed, “business as usual” mode. God wants to bless the church but is hindered in doing so when the church is too comfortable. God is doing a new thing and wants us to see it, to know it, because God wants us to be a part of it. It is when God does new things that the church is blessed and is the means of God’s blessing in the hearts and lives of others. That’s why we cannot become content with “business as usual.”
“Business as usual” in the church robs us of the holy. It takes our focus off our relationship with Jesus and others and onto the stuff of religion. When that happens, we keep on doing the same thing over and over expecting different results. I believe that’s the definition of insanity. “Business as usual,” also robs us because God cannot bless the church, and God wants to, unless we are willing to let go of what is comfortable and accept what God wants to give. I truly believe God accepts you as you are but is unwilling to leave you that way. You cannot encounter the living Lord Jesus and stay the same. John Wesley taught, and we continue to teach, that life with Christ is an ongoing transformation of your life. We are being brought on to perfection. The same is true for the church. The church is to be in a constant state of being perfected, of transforming, in order that it might be able to carry out the purposes it has been given to fulfill; namely, to make Disciples of Jesus. The minute we become content with the way things are is the minute we stop being perfected and the minute we stop fulfilling our purpose and carrying out our mission.
God has something better for us; “I am doing a new thing.” In fact, God is always doing a new thing. I have not found anywhere in the Bible God doing the exact same thing twice in a row. Nothing in creation is exactly the same. Every snowflake is different. Every leaf of any kind of plant is different. Every person is different – even “identical twins” are not exactly the same. Jesus never performed similar miracles in the same way. God is always doing a new thing. The message of Salvation and God’s love for us will never change, but how it is heard and experienced will always be and must always be new. So, we should expect and constantly look for God’s new thing.
How do we ready ourselves for God’s new thing? I suggest we do three things.
- Forget the former things. This has reference to what God has done. And God has done some pretty awesome acts in the past. God says, “Forget the former things,” not to stop remembering and celebrating, but to keep what God has done in the past from hindering what God wants to do in the future. We limit what God will do if we base it only on what God has done before. The fact is, what God is doing and has in mind to do is even more spectacular than what’s already been done.
- Do not dwell on the past. This references our involvement in what God has already done. It would be so easy for us to say, “Yes, I believe God is doing, or will do, or can do a new thing. However, based on my record, if God wants me to be a part of what he is doing, I’ll just mess it up.” God isn’t concerned with whether we get it right or not, but with whether we will be a part of what He is doing. And if God is doing it, can we ever mess it up so bad that God can’t fix it? That’s why Paul confidently said, “forgetting what is behind and straining towards what is ahead,I press on towards the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenwards in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:13-14). To look back at what we were or have done is to deny who we are, what God has done, and what God can do.
Notice also what God says, “I AM doing a new thing. Now it springs up.” God is not the God of the past. Nor is he the God of the future. When Moses asked God what name he should give to the people God replied, “Say to the people, I Am has sent you” (Exodus 3:14). When we dwell on the past we are not where God is, for God is I AM, now.
- Look for, see what God is doing. This may be the most difficult part; so much gets in the way, including our own ideas and desires for what God ought to do. I truly believe that God is doing, and invites us to be a part of, a new thing. But I confess that I only see the cracks in the ground, I don’t see it springing up. But the way that God couches the question, “Do you not perceive it?” causes me to envision God smiling and saying, “You will, just keep looking.”
The Bible tells us that God’s new thing will most likely take us out of our comfort zones and into the world of the unknown. Abraham was called to a place he did not know, nor did he know the way. The people of Israel were called out of the familiar of slavery in Egypt to the Promised Land to become a nation – they had never been a nation before. Disciples were called away from the familiarity of their occupations as fishermen, tax collectors, and such to go with Jesus and, ultimately, to birth a church and become missionaries of Jesus Christ.
God IS doing a new thing. The obvious question we need to answer is this: Will we settle for the status quo in our church, or will we reach out for what God can do and is doing supernaturally in and through us? The Lord is eager to make spiritual changes among us and shower us with his blessing. He wants us, the church, to experience the greatness of his power and the depth of his love in a new way. All God needs of us is a willingness to be a part of something new and a heart that believes that with God all things are possible.
With you on this journey toward a new thing,
DS John