New and Improved: Sermon Revelation 21:1-4 and 22:1-5

Dear God, take our minds and think through them; take our hands and feet and work through them; take our lips and speak through them, take our hearts and set them on fire for you. Amen

The title for my sermon this afternoon is New and Improved. New and improved we see that phrase everywhere we go, on billboards, on TV commercials, we hear it on the radio, if you do a Google search for the phrase new and improved it will bring up 218 million websites. Advertising specialists know that the words new and improved usually peaks our interest. Stores might remodel their interiors and facades to attract new cliental and companies might reformulate their products to give sales a boost. In fact sometimes all it takes is to make the container new and improved while leaving what goes in the container the same. We want to have new and improved bodies with countless diet fads and cosmetic concoctions that promise to bring out the new and improved you. Churches have followed the advertising world by remodeling church buildings, offering new contemporary services with a more relaxed dress code, and sometimes replacing the old pastor with someone new and improved. They do this in the hopes of drawing new visitors who will become new members who might become new tithers. I think all of us from one time or another have been drawn in with the claim of new and improved.

Our Scripture lesson this afternoon has to do with things becoming new and improved. After all the strange images that John the Revelator sees and after he sees the destruction of all things evil even the Devil himself, he then sees God making the world new and improved. John says that he sees a new heaven and a new earth and a new holy city of Jerusalem coming down to earth, the first earth and heaven have passed away and so things are new and improved. This was an important image for John to see and to write about because the world that John lived in was in desperate need of renewal. Tradition holds that John sees his visions on the island of Patmos and he is there because he has been exiled. He and most of the people who would later be called the Early Christian Church found themselves persecuted on all sides most acutely by the Roman government who wanted to snuff out this small group of believers. Congregations gathered in secret with joy, yes, but also with fear in the back of their minds, fear that they might be caught and punished. These people longed for Christ to fulfill his promise to return and for the world they lived in to become new and improved. So John has his visions and he writes them down so that the people might have hope in the midst of despair, these verses that we read today are filled with hope and with joy.

We hear those verses today sometimes in a funeral sermon when we are mourning the loss of a loved one when we cling to the hope that one day we will see them again. We are given hope in the midst of grief. We hear these verses when we deal with a long term illness that causes pain and agony and we cling to the hope that one day we will receive our new and improved bodies that are pain and disease free and we no longer have to worry about HMOs or Medicare prescription plans. We won’t need to worry about whether or not we will be dropped from TennCare or not because we will all be new and improved.

We need that hope today; we need the hope that God will redeem this world because we live in a world in need of redemption. I say redemption because the Scriptures say that God will make “all things new” not “all new things” this indicates redemption and not replacement. We wait and hope for the day when God will dry our tears because we have mourned so long at the brokenness of our world. We wait for the everlasting food from the Tree of Life because 30,000 children will die today not from war or disease but from hunger. We await for the day when the leaves from the Tree of Life will heal the nations because nation as risen up against nation for too long, there have been too many preventive strikes, too many shock and awe campaigns. We wait for the day when all pain and sickness will be taken away because 30 million Africans suffer from AIDS with thousands more infected with HIV each day. We wait for God’s new and improved earth.

However, there is a danger in waiting. There is a danger when all we do is wait. Some of us wait for this redemption these renewal and improvement without taking action. Some might say well God is going to renew the earth so why should we worry about conservation. We should use as much of the earth’s natural resources as we want because God will just renew our supply. We don’t need to worry about supplying money and medical supplies to Africa or Asia because God will redeem it all anyway. We should not worry about poisoning the earth with chemicals and toxic wastes because after all it will all be replaced anyway. Jesus is coming soon and the earth will be renewed so drink up and party hard because God will foot the bill and send in the heavenly custodial crew. Instead of this type of thinking we should ask ourselves will the Tree of Life grow in soil that is poisoned by chemical run-offs? Will the River of Life be clean as crystal with mercury and pesticides flowing in it?

The other extreme is just as dangerous. This extreme stems from being overwhelmed at the problems in the world. We see so many problems poverty, AIDS epidemics, pollution, violence and wars ravaging so many places in the world and we think there is nothing that can be done about this, where would we even start? We might start to think that Africa, Asia, Iraq, Central America, they are all so far away from Nashville that I can’t do anything, I can’t make a difference. We might feel that only God and God’s power can heal this broken world and only God can make things new and improved. There is a song today by a singer named John Mayer called “Waiting on the World to Change” and he sings “I’ll keep on waiting, waiting on the world to change”.

But Jesus has never been about waiting, he has always been about doing. Jesus was always on the move, doing and working not sitting and waiting. When Jesus spoke to Mary after his resurrection he said don’t hang around here hugging on me, but GO! And proclaim the good news of what you’ve seen. He told Peter sitting on the beach if you truly love me, you won’t sit around here on your hands, but GO! and feed my sheep. When Jesus had ascended into heaven and the disciples stood there with mouths gaping, staring at the sky, the angel asked them Men of Galilee why you standing there are staring at the sky, Jesus will come back the same way you saw him leave, but until then you’ve got work to do. Jesus told then to GO OUT to every nation and make disciples in my name.

Not it is up to us. We have to take the responsibility of being children of God, we cannot wait on the world to change, but we have to take the initiative and change the world. It might be overwhelming, it might seem impossible, but remember that Jesus said that he would be with us unto the ends of the Earth. Whatever we do God is with us and with God’s help there is nothing that we cannot accomplish. “I can do all things through him who strengthens me.”

And one day the earth and heavens shall be redeemed and renewed. One day a new holy city of Jerusalem will come to the earth. One day all death and pain and sadness will be removed from the earth, all the old things will pass away and the newness of God will come upon the earth. Nation will not rise against nation, but turn swords into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks. One day the river of life will flow with water so clear you can see all the way down the bottom, I can’t wait to jump it. One day the Tree of Life will bear enough fruit for all of God’s children and all people will live in joy and peace. One day there will be no Sun because the very glory of God will illuminate the entire world and we will live in presence of God, the presence of love, the presence of peace, the presence of Christ. ONE DAY IT WILL COME TO PASS. But until then, what part will you play in the redemption of God’s creation, what part will you play in the redemption of God’s people, the responsibility is ours, so what will you do?

Let us pray…

Grant, O Lord,

that what has been said with our lips we may believe in our hearts,

and that what we believe in our hearts we may practice in our lives;

through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.