Title: God of the New Creation
God of new creation
(Isa 65:17-25), November 14, 25th week after Pentecost
new heavens and new earth
In today's sermon text, Isaiah proclaims the Word of God with the following solemn words: “Behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former will not be remembered or come to mind” (Isaiah 65:17). “And I saw a new heaven and a new earth, and the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.” The reason the Old Testament and the New Testament speak of the same concept is that both Bibles are based on the same apocalyptic literature. Apocalyptic literature is a concept derived from the unique Jewish understanding of the world. It is the idea that the present world will be destroyed and a new world will come through God's transcendent power. These thoughts did not suddenly fall from the sky. There are good reasons for coming to this idea. Such a situation existed in the time of Isaiah and also in the age of Revelation. What is it?
The above explanation does not completely resolve the relationship between creation and fall. The complete answer will be given at the end of history, but we in history now have no choice but to find a historical, tentative answer. Isaiah gives such a historic answer, and so does the writer of Revelation. Both of them have had some experience in history. That experience forced me to speak of God's new creation. Isaiah is specifically addressing Jerusalem. God is creating Jerusalem as a pleasant city.
See verse 19. They say that weeping and crying will never be heard again. It is clear why Isaiah says this. If you now read Isaiah's description of the world of the new creation backwards, you can see what kind of history he experienced. The Jerusalem he experienced was full of weeping and crying. The elderly and children are dying.(20) Hunger and looting are rampant.(22) All labor is in vain.(23) The total destruction of the lives of all the inhabitants of Jerusalem is the background of these verses. The event is the fall of Jerusalem. In 587 BC Jerusalem was devastated by the Babylonian Empire. The royal family and leaders of Israel were taken captive to Babylon. It is not necessary to explain here how war destroys the lives of the people. A minimal human life is impossible. Something similar happens in the jungle where predators prey on herbivores.
Isaiah's historical experience
The period of Isaiah's prophetic activity is said to be between 537 and 521 BC, when the Jewish leaders, who had been taken captive to Babylon by the decree of King Cyrus of Persia, returned to their homeland to rebuild the temple in Jerusalem and build a new Jewish kingdom. The dream was inflated, but nothing was really new. After the work of Isaiah, the efforts of many prophets and priests led to the dedication of the Temple in Jerusalem in 515 B.C.E. It was hoped that it would solve all the problems, but nothing fundamentally changed. Isaiah preached the word of God right before the dedication of the temple. He instilled in the Jewish people a dream that Jerusalem would be renewed. That's the verse above. He prophesied that a world would come where there would be no weeping or crying, no hunger or plunder, and the just fruit of labor.
Isaiah describes the new heavens and the new earth in a typical apocalyptic way: “The wolf and the lamb shall eat together, and the lion shall eat straw like the ox, and the serpent shall feed on dust, and there shall be no harm or bruise on my holy mountain” (Isaiah 65:25). There will be no sound or cry. A world like this cannot be experienced here. Come and put the lamb in one fence. The wolf soon eats the lamb. It's actually impossible for these two to get along together. Now it is. But that doesn't necessarily mean it will happen later. Isaiah has a vision of a new heaven and a new earth. In the present sky and present earth, the strong eat the weak. However, in the new heavens and the new earth, they can get along with each other because they move with completely different powers of life. If you do not have this dream, you are not a believer. If he does not wait for such a world, he is not a believer in God.
Resurrection is a new creation
More than 500 years after the prophecy of Isaiah, Jesus came into the world. Jesus proclaimed the kingdom of God. The kingdom of God is the world of new creation. Look at Jesus' parable of the kingdom of God. He said that the owner of the vineyard who gave denarii per day equally to those who worked one hour a day or ten hours a day in the vineyard is like the kingdom of God. In the world we experience today, this doesn't happen. New creation is essential. Jesus' parable of the kingdom of God shares spiritual breath with Isaiah's prophecy that the wolf and the lamb eat together.
Then, the question is whether there is not much difference between Jesus and prophets like Isaiah. Jews think so. Even Muslims consider Jesus to be a great prophet. We acknowledge that Jesus stands in the prophetic tradition, but we know and believe that he is qualitatively different from them. Jesus did not simply announce the creation of a new heaven and a new earth, but he created a new heaven and a new earth. The Gospels testify to us just that. Jesus is said to have participated in the first creation. Does this sound complicated? The resurrection of Jesus is proof of that. Resurrection is a creative event. Resurrection is not the improvement of the old life, but the transformation into a completely new life. Jesus is not the prophet who announces the gospel of the new creation to people, but the Messiah who is the subject of the new creation. In this respect, Isaiah can be said to be the prophet who testified about the resurrection of Jesus without knowing it himself. It means that the prophecy of Isaiah was fulfilled in the resurrection of Jesus.