“Behold, I create new heavens and a new earth: and the former shall not be remembered, nor come into mind. But be ye glad and rejoice for ever in that which I create: for, behold, I create Jerusalem a rejoicing, and her people a joy. And I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and joy in my people.”—Isaiah 65:17-19.
This passage, like the rest of Isaiah’s closing chapters, will have completest fulfillment in the latter days when Christ shall come, when the whole company of his elect ones shall have been gathered out from the world, when the whole creation shall have been renewed, when new heavens and a new earth shall be the product of the Savior’s power, when, for ever and for ever, perfected saints of God shall behold his face, and joy and rejoice in him. I hope and believe that the following verses will actually describe the condition of the redeemed during the reign of Christ upon the earth: “There shall be no more thence an infant of days, nor an old man that hath not filled his days: for the child shall die an hundred years old. They shall build houses, and inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, and eat the fruit of them. They shall not build, and another inhabit; they shall not plant, and another eat: for as the days of a tree are the days of my people, and mine elect shall long enjoy the work of their hands. They shall not labor in vain, nor bring forth for trouble; for they are the seed of the blessed of the Lord, and their offspring with them. And it shall come to pass, that before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear. The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, and the lion shall eat straw like the bullock: and dust shall be the serpent’s meat. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain, saith the Lord.”
But the work which is spoken of in the text is begun already among us. There is to be a literal new creation, but that new creation has commenced already; and I think, therefore, that even now we ought to manifest a part of the joy. If we are called upon to be glad and rejoice in the completion of the work, let us rejoice even in the commencement of it. The Lord himself will joy and rejoice, and we who are in sympathy with him are exhorted and even commanded to be glad; let us not be slack in this heavenly duty.
Do you know what this work of creation is, which is here thrice promised in the words, “I create.. I create.. I create”? It is evidently a second creation, which is altogether to eclipse the first, and put it out of mind. Shall I tell the story?
The first creation was so fair that, when the Lord looked upon it, with man as its climax and crown, he said, “It is very good;” but it failed in man who should have been its glory. Man sinned; and in his sin he was so connected with the whole of the earth, that he dragged it down with him. The slime of the serpent passed over everything. The taint of sin marred the whole of God’s work in this lower world. The creation was made subject to vanity, and it groaneth in pain together until now. But the Infinitely Blessed would not be defeated, and in infinite condescension he determined that he would make a new creation which should rise upon the ruins of the first. He resolved that under a second Adam something more than Paradise should be restored to the universe. He purposed that he would undo, through Jesus Christ, the Seed of the woman, all the mischief that had been wrought by the serpent. He has commenced to undo this mischief, and to work this now creation, and so commenced that he will never withdraw his hand till the work is done. He has commenced it thus—by putting new hearts into as many as he has called by his Spirit, regenerating them, and making them to become new creatures in Christ Jesus. These the apostle tells us are a kind of firstfruits of this now creation. We are the commencement of the future ingathering. Our new-born spirits are the first ripe ears of corn out of a wonderful harvest that will come by-and-by. The saints’ spirits are, first of all, new-created; but their bodily parts remain in the old creation. Hence we suffer pain, for though the Spirit is life because of righteousness, “the body is dead because of sin.” By-and-by their bodies shall be new-created, when, from beds of dust and silent clay, they shall upleap into immortal beauty. The resurrection will be to the body what regeneration is to the soul. When body and soul are thus created anew, the whole earth around them, in which they shall dwell, shall be, at the same time, renewed also; and so God shall make the spirits, the minds, the bodies, and the bodies of men, all now. These bodies, quickened by his Spirit who dwelleth in us, and united to souls purified and refined, shall tread upon an earth delivered from the curse, and shall be canopied beneath new heavens. Have they not new desires? Should not all above them be new? They shall tread a new earth for they have new ways.
Inasmuch as this ought to be the subject of joy, and the text invites us to it, I come to press upon you the sweet duty of present delight. Oh, when happiness is made a precept, when joy is made a command, I cannot but hope that God’s people, to whom I am now speaking, will answer to the call! Has joy become a duty? Then we will be joyous. Has gladness become a precept? Then we will gladly enough obey, and our heart shall dance for joy. I will read the text again, and then we will consider what sort of joy it is which is to arise out of the work of divine grace in the new creation. “Behold, I create new heavens and a new earth: and the former shall not be remembered, nor come into mind. But be ye glad and rejoice for ever in that which I create: for, behold, I create Jerusalem a rejoicing, and her people a joy. And I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and joy in my people.
“This article originally appeared here at Bible Bulletin Board.”
