‘New and Improved’ – how often have you seen that claim on products, only to struggle to tell the difference with the ‘old’?!
We live in a world where we’re bombarded with ‘new stuff we need to have’ every day.
We’re told that if we don’t have the latest phone / shoes / car / breakfast cereal we’ll somehow be missing out on a new experience, and will be much worse off for it. Sometimes these things are really new and innovative, but more often it’s just something old in a new package.
And when we take a step back and look, do any of these things change the fundamental human experience? Without wanting to be too morbid, none of these things change the simple fact that we’re all going to get older and ultimately will die.
God told Adam
“By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”
Genesis 3 v 19
That was true for Adam, and it’s true for us too. We might have more ‘stuff’ to distract us and possibly prolong life a little, but ultimately we have the same end. Solomon, the wise King of Israel, said
“What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun.”
Ecclesiastes 1 v 9
God’s Plan
But the Bible gives us an amazing insight into something genuinely new and improved that God has planned for the world, and for you and me if we choose to listen. It tells us about Jesus returning to the earth to set up God’s kingdom, when things really will be better.
In Revelation 21:4 we read that at that time God will
“wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away.”
Now that’s really new and improved, and you’ll be missing out if you don’t look into God’s offer of life in his new world order. After all, as the Bible says,
“no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him”
1 Corinthians 2 v 9
