3. God's world as it shall he. — The first thing is that God is to come down and dwell in it. His tabernacle is with men, and He will dwell with them. The next thing is that He will recognize, and be recognized by, His people. They shall be His people, and
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God Himself shall be with them and be their God. And the third thing is that death and sorrow and pain shall be no more. And how is it that these three things are brought to pass ? They are brought to pass through " the blood of the Lamb." There has been a sacrifice made for sin and uncleanness, and the sacrifice has taken away sin. When Christ said, "It is finished," He made an end of sin, and opened the way for God to dwell among men, open^ the way for their reconciliation and fellow- ship, for the removal of all the things that follow in the path of sin.
^ I have seen a stream sink down into the tiniest volume, and I have seen it trailing through the mud in disgrace ; and then, far away on the mountain range, clouds gathered and burst, and it was not many hours before the stream came down with the first wave six feet high, and the banks were full of sweet, clean, rejoic- ing water before the evening. So did Christ come in to this poor human race, and behold the veins have swollen again, not with unclean blood. We can stand and say to the tempted man, Christ died on the cross to conquer sin, and He sits on God's right hand to administer the effects of His victory. And we can tell the chief of sinners through Christ he can be made a new creation.^
T[ Thou sayest : " Behold, I make all things new " : Good Lord, renew us to fresh powers of loving Thee in the joy of Thine un- veiled Presence. Yet to each of us be Thou the Same, and be each soul to Thee the same : say Thou, " It is I/' and give each of us grace to answer, It is I. Amen.
New creatures; the Creator still the Same
For ever and for ever: therefore we
Win hope from God's unsearchable decree And glorify His still unchanging Name. We too are still the same: and still our claim,
Our trust, our stay, is Jesus, none but He:
He still the Same regards us, and still we Mount toward Him in old love's accustomed flame. We know Thy wounded Hands: and Thou dost know
Our praying hands, our hands that clasp and cling To hold Thee fast and not to let Thee go.
All else be new then, Lord, as Thou hast said:
Since it is Thou, we dare not be afraid. Our King of old and still our Self-same King.2 » John Watson. ^ Christina G. Rossetti, The Face of the Deep, 487.
REVELATION xxi.
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iii. Newness not Novelty,
It is not a new world ; it is the old world made new. It is not creation ; it is redemption. God has not destroyed the world, to begin again ; He has renewed the inhabitants of the old world in the spirit of their minds.
There are two words in the original which are necessarily translated alike — *' new " — in our versions. Of these two adjec- tives, one signifies new in relation to time {nog)^ the other new in relation to quality (xaivog) — the first temporal novelty, the second newness intellectual or spiritual. The first indicates that which is young, recent in time ; the other not only that which succeeds something else in time, but that which in idea springs out of it, and not only succeeds but supersedes it.
So this word, " I make all things new," is not the announce- ment of a perfectly new thing ; it does not proclaim an act at that moment done ; it is not an exercise, as it were, of instantaneous Omnipotence. This is the completing and the perfecting, rather, of the work of the long ages, the seal of a mighty progression, the top-stone of the great temple, the finishing of the work of the Sabbath of God from the periods of the First Creation.
^ To make things new is not the same as to make new things. To make new things is the work of the hand ; to make things new is the work of the heart. Whenever one sits upon the throne of the heart, all things are made new. They are made so without changing a line, without altering a feature. Enthrone in your heart an object of love, and you have renewed the universe. You have given an added note to every bird, a fresh joy to every brook, a fairer tint to every flower.^
^ We now come to the year which was, to her, the epoch, the turning-point of her career. On the night of March 7th, 1838, came the moment of moments. "I got up, that morning, one creature," she herself often said ; " I went to bed another creature. I had found my power ! " And, all through her life, she kept the 7th of March, with a religious solemnity ; she would ask to have herself remembered on it with prayers ; she treated it as a second birthday. And rightly; for, on that day, she woke to herself; she became artistically alive ; she felt the inspiration, and won the sway, which she now knew it was given her, to have and to hold.2