All things new...

The book of Revelation describes that Jesus is making all things new...not all new things...my mind naturally surveys the world outside and says huh? But as I think about it, I begin to realize that the things Jesus values and makes new are not the things we necessarily value and want replaced.

I especially think about the holidays at this time of the year and the painful process that a lot of divorced and separated families go thru as holy-days are divided and isolated, parted out and packaged in dysfunction, only to leave a residue of emptiness.

I have distinct memories of feeling like a third wheel, burying emotional loneliness and missing my kids all at the same time while surrounded by loving covenant family...its an odd shape our heart takes when pain and love collide.

But now...

Now...I am somehow different, I feel a substance and a life that over-powers the murky cloud of isolation that being a divorced single brings...now somehow my soul sings in the fog and it is a real song, not a simple whistling past the graveyard kind of tune.

It is because my heart has been made new, which I now realize is "more-better" than having a new heart, that is why I sing...

Can you imagine getting a brand new heart and having to break it in?

The first time you're left alone...brand new, the first kiss and heart-break, brand new, the first loss of something dear, brand new, all of those myriad emotions and trauma's brand new...

Jesus knows better...in His wisdom He knows that an old broken heart made new is much more beautiful than a new heart broken in...

An old heart made new knows the value of making His praise bigger than the problem...

An old heart made new knows that tenacious love is stronger than death...

An old heart made new knows the value of a gentle word and a a face of faith...

An old heart made new truly understands that a faithful friend can see past the chasm of despair and will walk quietly beside you until the Morningstar appears.

I am beginning to see how truly rich I have become by the making of an old heart new...rather than simply replacing a broken one.

There is an amusing event in Luke 1 where Zacharias ask Gabriel "How will I know this?"...Gabriel had appeared to bring him a word that old old prayers, buried in brokeness and completely unavailable because of an old heart were about to be fulfulled...and Gabriel does an amazing thing, he tells Zacharias, "You will be unable to speak until the promise is fulfilled..."

At one time I thought this was the way God was, he would smack you down if you did not believe, but I now understnd that it is Gods grace that made Zacharias mute, see the bible says "life and death are in the power of the tongue"...and Zacharias was speaking from an old heart that had not been made new yet...God was simply keeping Zacharias from destroying with his mouth what he had prayed about for years before and lost hope in...

It reminds me of that scene in "You've got mail" where Tom hanks leans over to Meg Ryan as she starts to say something mean and places his fingers on her lips and says..."let me help you not to say something you'll just torture yourself about for years to come..."

See God is actually helping Zacharias because his heart is still old and he will say something bad if the angel doesn't shut him up...that is the danger of keeping an old heart old...so he goes mute until the promise is delivered.

And once the old heart is made new the mouth follows...Zacharias "spake and praised God" once his heart was changed...

It is impossible for others to know the pain of a lonely heart, I will not pretend to know anything except what I have experienced...but I can assure you as someone who has had both an old unbelieving heart, and an old heart made new...new is better...and old made new is better still...

Behold He makes ALL things new...