Finding Jesus in the Bible…So We Can Follow Him in Life
Bible Reading Plans
- Plan One: New Testament Only
- Plan Two: New Testament + Psalms
- Plan Three: New Testament + History
- Plan Four: The Entire Bible – Year 1 of 3, Year 2 of 3, Year 3 of 3
Don’t know which plan? Go to A Christ-Centered Bible Reading Plan: Quick Start.
Extras
Verse of the Day, Audio Capsule, and Video Minute
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(Today’s Reading)
The Implications of the Second Coming as Accomplished Fact
(Book Installment 44)
The Scope of the Second Coming
Chapter 3 – Themes of the Second Coming
The New Creation
The theme of the new creation fits right alongside the theme of the kingdom of God. Both themes indicate the massive scale of change taking place at the Second Coming of Christ. Yet those people focused only on the physical side of life miss this entirely. The only new heavens and new earth they can imagine are ones that can be tracked by science. But you know – either because you’ve read The Biblical Case for the Second Coming as Accomplished Fact or because you’ve reached the same conclusions it presents through other means – that the spiritual side of life is far more important than the physical side. As the Scriptures say:
John 6:63 “It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing…”
2 Corinthians 4:18 …we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.
The first explicit mention of a new heavens and new earth in the Scriptures came from Isaiah (8th century BC), and this hope was kept alive all the way through to the book of Revelation (1st century AD).
Isaiah 65:17 “For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth;
And the former things will not be remembered or come to mind.
Revelation 21:1 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth passed away, and there is no longer any sea.
(Remember from my previous books what the absence of the sea means.)
For the Lord, this transition from the old cosmos to the new one was no more difficult than a change of clothes.
Psalm 102:25 “Of old You founded the earth,
And the heavens are the work of Your hands.
Psalm 102:26 “Even they will perish, but You endure;
And all of them will wear out like a garment;
Like clothing You will change them and they will be changed.
The purpose of the new creation was restoration – that is, to give the universe a re-boot, a fresh start. As Peter said in the early chapters of Acts:
Acts 3:18 “…the things which God announced beforehand by the mouth of all the prophets, that His Christ would suffer, He has thus fulfilled.
Acts 3:19 “Therefore repent and return, so that your sins may be wiped away, in order that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord;
Acts 3:20 and that He may send Jesus, the Christ appointed for you,
Acts 3:21 whom heaven must receive until the period of restoration of all things about which God spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from ancient time.
Think of it as Creation 2.0 – with Jesus as the new Adam. Paul wrote twice of Adam foreshadowing Jesus.
Romans 5:14 Nevertheless death reigned from Adam until Moses, even over those who had not sinned in the likeness of the offense of Adam, who is a type of Him who was to come.
1 Corinthians 15:45 So also it is written, “The first MAN, Adam, BECAME A LIVING SOUL.” The last Adam became a life-giving spirit.
Summing up, the massive scale of change taking place at the Second Coming of Christ (aka the coming of the kingdom of God) was so great it that it required a new creation!
Mark 2:22 “No one puts new wine into old wineskins; otherwise the wine will burst the skins, and the wine is lost and the skins as well; but one puts new wine into fresh wineskins.”
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