Newness

Newness

I am posting my notes on Pastor Mike’s teaching this morning. These are MY notes. Not a transcript. Not his notes. Any misquotes, mistakes, or mystifications are my fault (or something like that). All verses are from NASB 1995.

Matthew 9:16-17
16 “But no one puts a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment; for the patch pulls away from the garment, and a worse tear results.
17 “Nor do people put new wine into old wineskins; otherwise the wineskins burst, and the wine pours out and the wineskins are ruined; but they put new wine into fresh wineskins, and both are preserved.”

Newness is not an age-related issue, but a state of the heart. Who is interested in new things?

Jesus chose 12 disciples from among those who were not normally noted for religious devotion. He taught them new things. He had great conflict with those who knew the old things. They had already figured out how God wanted things to be.

Our lives can be new everyday, or it can be the same old thing. Whose choice is this? Ours or God’s?

Isaiah 42:10a
10 Sing to the Lord a new song,
Sing His praise from the end of the earth!

Here, and many places elsewhere, God encourages us to sing a new song. The words may be old, but the heart and the attitude towards them may be new. Or they may be a new song, with new words.

Psalm 51:10
10 Create in me a clean heart, O God,
And renew a steadfast spirit within me.

How do you renew your spirit?

What lives in our hearts?
The Holy Spirit
Thoughts. Evil thoughts are old, part of the old man. Good thoughts renew. Our mind needs to be changed.
Faith - seeing our faith increase brings newness.

Psalm 103:5
5 Who satisfies your years with good things,
So that your youth is renewed like the eagle.

Renewed youth, vitality, energy.

What tires us? What makes us old? Discouragement, emotional and mental. We need a renewed heart and a renewed spirit.

Colossians 3:8-16
8 But now you also, put them all aside: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive speech from your mouth.
9 Do not lie to one another, since you laid aside the old self with its evil practices,
10 and have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him—
11 a renewal in which there is no distinction between Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and freeman, but Christ is all, and in all.
12 So, as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience;
13 bearing with one another, and forgiving each other, whoever has a complaint against anyone; just as the Lord forgave you, so also should you.
14 Beyond all these things put on love, which is the perfect bond of unity.
15 Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body; and be thankful.
16 Let the word of Christ richly dwell within you, with all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with thankfulness in your hearts to God.

The new self. What is involved? Knowledge, the heart, the mind, and effort. There are lot of action verbs and action in the passage. “Put on.” “Be renewed.”

Newness does not just mean a “mighty rushing wind out the east.” We need to “put on” newness ourselves. We need to make the effort.

“Receiving/receive” is a common word in scripture. It is an active word. [Note: Tom likes to illustrate this by taking out his wallet and handing it to someone. They have to “receive” it or it falls to the floor.] We need to actively receive, reach out, take, putting something on, allowing ourselves to be open [to newness, or whatever].

The wineskins must be flexible enough to receive new wine.

Colossians 3:8-12
12 So, as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience;

“Put on” newness.

Romans 12:1,2
1 Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.
2 And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.

God is in the business of transformation. It is not destructive. It is going from one thing to another. New things change and transform us. Renewal is not a bad thing.

Last week was about compassion. Jesus was not only new, He was transforming. The things that He taught transformed others. Look at the disciples, how they changed from the way the were when He called them to they way they were in the book of Acts.

These is a link between newness and renewal on one hand and compassion on the other.

The disciples were not only transformed, themselves, from sinner to saints. But they were also radically transformed, vocationally, from fishermen to fishers of men.

One of the transforming or renewing factors that affected the disciples was compassion. Compassion moved Jesus. It became a motivating factor in the lives of the disciples.

It motivated them to transform occupationally from fishermen to fishers of men.

Some additional verses on newness:

2 Corinthians 4:11-18
2 Corinthians 5:14-21
Ephesians 4:20-24
Titus 3:1-7.