What ‘new’ do you see in 2023?

Our world has incredible capability of infiltrating our lives and behaviour patterns, in subtle and not so subtle ways.  The patterns is dished up to us on demand and in everything wee see and do. Even when we are doing what we want to do, we can still be distracted. Have you ever been distracted from watching netflix or reading books in the reading space in the State Library of Victoria!  Or distracted while being in the presence of others?  I often fall into the trap of multitasking on my phone – and not being fully present or engaged with those I am with. Much of the pattern of this world says in some measure - you are just another cog in someone else’s machine.  And yet Creator God, the maker of the heavens and the earth, never multitasks with us!  Genesis 2:19 gives us an incredible picture:

Now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the wild animals and all the birds in the sky.  He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name.

I find myself moved by the truth that the Lord God Almighty is interested in His creation – He is interested in me!  Being fully aware that He is with me transforms the way I live.

Our Lord is eternal and timeless, He always was and always is.  And yet by being the same yesterday, today and forever, the Lord God makes His eternal reality present in our time and space!  In Genesis 2, the Lord’s desire was to see the face of the man in that moment of naming, and hear the voice as the name was given.  The Lord in interested in what we create.  What we think.  What we do.

In 2023, the Lord still desires to be near us, to see us name and co-create with Him, in His presence!  I believe that to every generation, and to every person, the Lord God from Genesis 2 is the same today, and will be for all time.  He has never stopped desiring to be present and close to us.  Close enough to ask each of us – what do you see?

Around 700 years before the first Christmas Day, a prophet called Isaiah gave the following utterance:

For I am about to do something new. See, I have already begun!
Do you not see it?  (Is 43:19)

Can you hear the Lord saying to us in 2023 – what do you see?  The Lord in interested in what you see!

Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?

Can you see the Lord with you, desiring to hear what you perceive?  The Lord is interested in what you perceive and believe

The issue here is that it is even possible for us to be distracted from the new things that are happening, even those new things we have chosen to do! The Lord would say to us afresh in 2023 – to be present, and to see it!

Be alert, be present. I'm about to do something brand-new. It's bursting out! Don't you see it? There it is!

What ‘new thing’ do you see in 2023?  Don’t just make your own resolution this year because God has already created it!  He is already at work in the new.  In this new year, I pray you hear the voice of our Lord and the question He asks each of us: What will you ‘name’ in 2023?

May 2023 be a wonderful year of naming the new.  The ‘new’ for you, your family and we, the Church!