A little bit of paradise

He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” – Revelation 21:5

Gazing out my open study window, I hear birds chirping and hear and see the wind gently blowing in the trees. Bales of hay dot my neighbor’s newly mowed field, and large, white cumulus clouds stand out in contrast to the brilliant blue sky.

I’m enjoying a little bit of paradise — except for the almost incessant noise of the traffic that runs past our property and the slight ache in my back. I use the word paradise lightly because though our world was once completely good, it no longer is. When humanity sinned, we were expelled from the garden of Eden and the ground was “cursed” (see Gen. 3). Since then the Earth and everything in it has been in “bondage to decay.” Suffering, disease, and our deaths are all a result of humankind’s fall into sin (Rom. 8:18-23).

Yet God is making everything new. One day His dwelling place will be among His people in a renewed and restored creation – “a new heaven and a new earth” – where “there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away” (Rev. 21:1-4). Until that day we can enjoy the bright splashes and sometimes wide expanses of breathtaking beauty we see around us in this world, which is just a small foretaste of the “paradise” that will be. – Alyson Kieda

Dear Lord, thank You that in this world that can seem ugly with sin and decay You allow us to see glimpses of beauty.

Read: Romans 8:18-23; Revelation 21:1-5

God is making all things new.

Bible in a Year: Psalms 146-147 and 1 Corinthians 15:1-28