A New Life

In Charles Dickens' novel, Great Expectations, a young orphan named Pip is given an opportunity to change his poverty into prestige and fortune by the works of Miss Havisham. Throughout Pip’s journey to “high society,” he experiences a lot of twists and turns that leaves him basically where he started.

Life is full of “unexpected” twists that might leave us scratching our heads or wondering what went wrong. Consider the life of Job, the man from Uz. He had an amazingly blessed life and was a Godly man, but he found himself completely broken and confused. In fact, that type of story is very common throughout the stories in the Bible; it even happened to Jesus!

He told His followers in Matthew 17:22-23, “The Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men. They will kill him, and on the third day He will be raised to life.” Multiple times Jesus foretold what awaited Him in Jerusalem, a fact that wouldn’t be appreciated by those who heard Him until after His resurrection. In time, His expectation of being the true King would be reality. Although we still await the final unveiling of His kingship in the fullest way, we still press on knowing that “He has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time…” (1 Peter 1:3-9)

He was willing to lay everything down so that we could have “new life.” During this time of year, many reflect on their life and determine what needs to change inside of them, or around them, to help them embrace the reality of a changed life. For some these “new year's resolutions” might simply be a change to a physical element of their life. Many others choose to make no changes at all. But Jesus did what He did on the cross so that amazing, eternal, important changes could be made to our own lives so that the glory of God might be seen in us.

Paul reminds us in Titus 2:11-14, “For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people. It teaches us to say 'No' to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, while we wait for the blessed hope—the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for Himself a people that are His very own, eager to do what is good.”