All Creation Will Be Restored

BY Tabitha McDuffee

I became pregnant with my son five months into the COVID-19 pandemic. I can’t count how many times since seeing those two pink lines I have wondered, “How could we bring a fragile, vulnerable baby into a world as broken as this?” But those of us who became parents in the last two years are not unique in this experience.

In Isaiah’s day, mothers wondered if the children they birthed were “destined for disaster” (Isaiah 65:23). They saw chaos, decay, and sinfulness all around them, but Isaiah prophesied about a new heavens and earth to come. After the fall of the first creation, redemption through Jesus Christ would usher in a completely new creation.

We can find comfort and hope in this promised restoration, this culmination of the gospel.

One day mothers will not bury their infants, children will not be “destined for disaster,” evil and destruction will be distant memories on God’s holy mountain (v.25). God will mend every broken thing and overturn every injustice. He will “wipe away every tear” we cry and “death will be no more” (Revelation 21:4).

And we get to play a small role in what is commonly called the “already, not yet” of this reality. Jesus’s life, death, and resurrection inaugurated God’s kingdom on earth, though we wait for Jesus to reign in complete power and glory when He returns. But today, in Christ, we get to give the world a glimpse of what restoration will be like.

When I hold my sweet boy in my lap and read to him, that’s just a touch of restoration. When you ask a friend to forgive you for a quickly spoken, insensitive word—a whisper of restoration. When you buy a meal for a person experiencing homelessness—a foretaste of restoration. When your child chooses to join the kid at school who eats his lunch alone every day—a glimpse of restoration.

As we celebrate and anticipate the future new creation that Jesus’s death and resurrection secure for us, let’s not forget that we don’t have to wait to live in that newness of life. “I am making everything new!” (v.5), John hears Jesus say in his Revelation visions. Not, “I will make everything new,” but “I am making everything new!” Right now Jesus is restoring the world, and until He comes back to complete that restoration in its fullness, we get to be His ambassadors on earth. Because we know complete restoration is coming, we should be people who confidently live with “holy conduct and godliness” (2Peter 3:11).

So, where in our lives is God whispering restoration to us? And how is He calling us to whisper it to others?