God's Fresh Start (Revelation 21:1-8) Series

At one point or another, most of us have felt the need for a fresh start in life. One Friday night, we finished our work, and looked at our paycheck, and decided that it wasn't worth it. We were tired of difficult bosses, or rude customers, or just the work itself. We looked at our job, and decided that it'd be easier to start over somewhere else, than try to fix things where we were.

Many of us, when we were still dating, looked at our girlfriends or boyfriends at some point, and told ourselves that they weren't worth it. At first, all we could see was the good, and the attractive. And then, when we got to know them, we started seeing more and more flaws. The relationship became more and more difficult, and we decided it'd be better to start over with someone else.

Even once we are married, my guess is that many of us have struggled with this at some point. You wake up one day, and look over at your spouse sleeping, and you think, "What a mistake." You find yourself wondering if it'd be better to start over with someone else. You want a fresh start.

Or even with church. Sometimes, we struggle to get along with each other. We talk to each other in ways that we're embarrassed by, when we think about them later. In the heat of the moment, we made a big deal about things that were small things. We realize we were immature, and didn't show each other grace. When that happens, it's much easier to leave, and start over at the church down the street, than to seek forgiveness, and reconciliation, and patch things up.

Life is often hard. It often doesn't work out, nearly as well as we'd hoped. And we find ourselves longing for a new life-- a better life. We want a fresh start.

At the same time, we know it's hard to make a truly fresh start. Quit a job, and you'll probably find that the new job isn't as amazing as you'd hoped. Break up with a girlfriend or boyfriend, and there's no guarantee you'll find someone better. Divorce your spouse, even though, as a rule, God hates divorce except in cases like unfaithfulness, or abuse. Go through with it, and you'll probably find your life is harder, and more complicated, on the other side. And when you break up with someone, whether it's dating or marriage, you'll usually find that you gave someone a piece of your heart. Maybe, you broke promises. You betrayed trust. You don't usually come out any relationship whole.

So, there are times when we want a fresh start. But it's rare, when we truly get to start something over. A truly clean break, is a hard to find. Running, often doesn't fix our problems. Most of the time, our attempts at a fresh start are messy. We leave a train wreck of broken relationships and promises behind.

So life is often hard. There's no easy solution. There's no easy escape. And this is true for everyone. The world is a tough place. But for Christians, it's especially true. We've seen in Revelation, that the church will often suffer. Christians will be hunted. They'll be boycotted, and jailed, and killed. Wealth and power flow out, toward Babylon. We maybe have a few small luxuries we allow ourselves, but the true luxury belongs to others.

In Genesis 1, at the end of God's creating the world, He gives the world to people. He gives them authority and dominion over it, to rule over it. But what ends up happening, is that the world only belongs to a few. And those few, as a rule, are those who have been empowered by satan to do his bidding on earth. Satan gives his authority, and throne, and power, to nations, to turn them into evil superpowers. The centers of those superpowers, are Babylons. The Babylons are the center of luxury, and pleasure, and power. And if you don't join Babylon, you're left out.

What we've seen, up to this point in Revelation, is God will one day fix all of this. God will topple his enemies, and ours, one after another. In chapter 18, we hear about the fall of Babylon. In chapter 19, the two beasts are thrown into the lake of fire, and all the kings of the earth were killed by King of Kings. In chapter 20, satan is thrown into the lake of fire. If we find a comfortable chair, and just read from chapter 17 to 20 in one sitting, what we will see is a promise from God, that He will one day wipe out everyone who opposes him. Everyone who destroys the earth (Revelation 11:18), will be gone. Everyone who opposes God, and fights his people, will be gone.