A New Creation - Born Again // God is a God of New Beginnings, Part 2

If God is God then I guess He can do anything – right? Even deal with the most difficult issue or circumstance in our life – right? Question is though – if God really is God – do you actually believe that He can do that in your life?

It's just great to be with you again today. Let me ask you, do you ever look around at other people and compare yourself with them? The people at work, the people you know socially? It's so easy to look at others and think, 'Well, they've got a fantastic life. Look at me, look at my marriage or my job or my loneliness or my body or my self esteem.'

I love looking at the wonder of God's creation, you know why? Because it reminds me that God is a God of new beginnings. I have a hunch, just a hunch mind you, that if we spent as much energy wrapping our hearts around that little gem as we do comparing ourselves with other people, we'd have just the most amazing life. What do you think?

I don't do this very often on this program but I just want to read something that I've always found really powerful. It's the first chapter of the Bible, the first chapter of Genesis and stick with me because it's just such a great read. God is a God of new beginnings and Genesis, chapter 1, is the very first new beginning in all of time, in all of history. Something awesomely, something wonderfully new, have a look:

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty and darkness was over the surface of the deep and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters and God said, "Let there be light," and there was. And God saw that the light was good and He separated the light from the darkness and God called the light, 'day' and the darkness He called 'night' and there was evening and there was morning on the first day.

And God said, "Let there be an expanse between the waters to separate water from water." So God made an expanse and He separated the water under the expanse from the water above it and so it was, God called the expanse 'the sky' and there was evening and there was morning on the second day.

And then God said, "Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place and let the dry ground appear." And it was so. God called the dry ground 'land' and the gathered waters He called 'the seas' and God saw that it was good and then God said, "Let the land produce vegetation, seed bearing plants and trees of the land that bear fruit with seed in it according to their various kinds." And it was so, the land produced vegetation, plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds and God saw that it was good and there was evening and there was morning on the third day.

And God said, "Let there be lights in the great expanse of the sky to separate the day from the night and let them serve as signs to mark the seasons and the days and the years and let there be lights in the expanse of sky to give light on the earth." And so it was, God made two great lights, the greater light to go in the day and the lesser light to go in the night. He also made the stars and God set them in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth and to govern the day and the night and to separate light from darkness and God saw it was good, and there was evening and there was morning on the fourth day.

And God said, "Let the water team with living creatures, let the birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the sky." And so God created the great creatures of the sea and every living and moving thing with which the water teams according to their kinds and every winged bird according to it's kind and God saw that it was good and God blessed them and said, "Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the waters and the seas and let the birds increase on the earth." And there was evening and there was morning on the fifth day.”

And God said, "Let the land produce living creatures according to their kinds. Livestock, creatures that move along the ground, wild animals each according to it's kind." And it was so, God made the wild animals according to their kinds, the livestock according to their kinds, all the creatures that live along the ground and God saw that it was good and then God said, "Let us make man. Let us make man in our image, in our likeness and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, over all the creatures that move along the ground.

And so God created man in His own image in the image of God He created him, male and female, He created them and then God blessed them and said, "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and rule over all the fish in the sea and the birds of the air, over every living creature. I give you every seed bearing plant, everything is yours." And God saw what He made and it was very good.

It's a great story and right at the beginning there was nothing, God created all this stuff from nothing, things that we take for granted. From darkness He produced light, from chaos He created order, not some boring, boxed up order, no not that.

Variety and seasons and oceans and countries and years and days and crazy things that fly and things that swim and things that live on the ground, He put life into the creation. On top of all of that He put you and me, in His image, in the middle of the creation and He said, "It's all yours".

Now what does that tell you about God? God is so creative, He produces this universe teaming with life and variety and abundance, an expanse so great we can't even see it or comprehend it and so complex we can't understand it and on top of that He gives it to us. God is a God of new beginnings; radical, huge, intricate, wondrous, surprising, powerful.

I love to look at God’s creation, I love to watch the shows on TV about the galaxies or about the animals or the volcanoes or the weather. God is a God of outrageously new beginnings and you might say to me, "Berni, what's that mean to me here and now?"

That's a really good question, 'cause our circumstances, the things that trap us they seem so huge and so powerful. If there's a difficulty between husband and wife in a marriage it's like being in prison, they can look at each other and think, 'no-one can ever change this.'

Maybe you're someone with a deep sense of fear or inadequacy and it just plagues you all your life and you think, "no-one can ever change me." Maybe you're like me, you've made the same mistakes over and over and over again and you think, "I know I keep making this mistake but no-one can ever change me. I can't fix it."

You know what happens? We think that those circumstances are so powerful that we live our lives believing that nothing and no-body can ever or will ever change them, right? Wrong. God is a God of new beginnings, so powerful, so vast, so beautiful, and so abundant that words can't begin to describe them. What do we think? Do we think He can create all of that but He can't help us?

The apostle Paul wrote it this way, he said:

If anyone has a relationship with Jesus then they are a new creation. Old things have passed away and behold all things are new.

Wow. We're going to unpack that in the next couple of days on the program but God’s heart is to make you and me a new creation, to throw the old stuff out and say, "We are new and fresh and we have a life."

Father, I pray for anyone who is struggling with the past today, anyone who is struggling with their circumstances today. Anyone who is struggling with their relationships today because your promise Lord God, is that you are a God of new beginnings and when we look at your creation we look at the works of your hand, we see the power and the wonder and the magnitude and the beauty.

Lord, We see You and Father we invite you into our lives, especially in those parts of our lives where we need a new beginning. Father, you are the God of new beginnings, come into our lives and give us those new beginnings, in Jesus name we pray. Amen.

Can I ask you? Do you need a new beginning in your life? Well let me encourage you; believe in the God who sent His Son, the God of new beginnings.