Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 3467
“He who sat upon the throne said, Behold I make all things new.” Revelation 21:5.
Men generally venerate antiquity. It were hard to say which has the stronger power over the human mind— antiquity or novelty. While men will frequently dote upon the old, they are most easily dazzled by the new. Anything new has at least one attraction. Restless spirits consider that the new must be better than the old. Though often disappointed, they are still ready to be caught by the same bait and, like the Athenians of Mars Hill, spend their time in nothing else but either to tell or to hear some new thing. And as for ourselves, dear Friends, as we sometimes mournfully think of the flight of time, we are known to cheerfully look out upon the new epochs as they begin to dawn upon us. If our calendar suggests some dismal memories in the past, our calculation predicts some happier prospects in the future! And it will sometimes happen that we leave so much anxiety, adversity and chastisement behind us, that it is a relief to hope that the tide has turned, and that a course of comfort, prosperity and mercy lies before us. One weeps over the past and the lost. I suppose the best of men must do so at times. I am sure those of us who are not the best, feel often constrained to pour out some such a lamentation as this—
“Much of our time has run to waste— Our sins, how great the sum! Lord, give us pardon for the past And strength for days to come.”
I do not know but it is sometimes as well, when one has been plunged in sorrow, or feels ashamed of his past life— after having regretted that which is bygone and repented of it, and over it—to feel as if he breathed another atmosphere and had started on a fresh career. Having thrown away the old sword, he is now about to see what he can do with the new. Having put off an old garment, he is desirous to walk more worthily of his vocation with fresh ones that are provided for him. Perhaps the thought of freshness, the fact of new times having dawned on our path, may be a little help to those of us who are dull and heavy. And we may be stirred up to action, or, if not to action, it may awaken earnest hope that the infusion of a new start into our lives, new vigor instead of the old lethargy, new love instead of the old luke-warmness, new zeal instead of the old death-likeness—new, pertinacious, persevering industry for Christ instead of the old idleness, may result. God grant that it may be so!
Looking at the text in this light, I think it speaks to everyone here present. Would you begin anew, lo, there is One who can help you to do so! From the Throne of God where sits the once Crucified but now Glorified Savior, there comes a whisper of hope to each and every soul who would be made new and would begin life anew. “Behold I make all things new.” In trying to bring out the thoughts contained in this exclamation from the Throne—from the Emperor of the Universe, from the court of the King of Kings—we shall first speak, very briefly, of the new creation. Secondly, we should bid you adore the great Regenerator And, in the third place, we shall ask you to behold with attention, the fact before you, with a view of receiving benefit from it Observe the text speaks of—
I. A New Creation
“I make.” That is a Divine Word. “I make all things.” That, also, is Divine. “I make all things new.” That seems to reach the third stage, wherein the thrice holy God appears glorious in the highest degree! “I make all things new.” This our Lord Jesus Christ has done upon the greatest scale! We must view His purpose. It is the purpose and intention of the Lord Jesus to make this world entirely new. You recollect how it was made at first—pure and perfect. It sang with its
sister spheres the song ofjoy and reverence. It was a fair world, full of everything that was lovely, beautiful, happy, holy. And if we might be permitted to dream for a moment of what it would have been if it had continued as God created it, one might fancy what a blessed world it would be at this moment! Had it possessed a teeming population like its present one, and if, one by one, those godly ones had been caught away, like Elijah, without knowing death, to be succeeded by pious descendants—oh, what a blessed world it would have been! A world where every man would have been a priest and every house a temple, and every garment a vestment, and every meal a sacrifice, and every place holiness to the Lord, for the Tabernacle of God would have been among them and God, Himself, would have dwelt among them! What songs would have hailed the rising of the sun—the birds of paradise caroling on every hill and in every dale their Maker’s praise! What songs would have ushered in the stillness of the night! Yes, and angels, hovering over this fair world, would oft have heard the strain of joy breaking the silence of midnight, as glad and pure hearts beheld the eyes of the Creator beaming down upon them from the stars which stud the vault of Heaven!