Monday of Easter Week 1 – Devotion

Text: Isaiah 65:17–25

We often wonder, deep in the silence of our minds: Can things ever really change? Our lives can feel like a cycle of trying and failing, of hoping and hurting. Whether it’s in our country’s social unraveling or our own personal regrets, the question nags at us: is genuine renewal even possible, or are we forever bound to the old wounds of the past? Isaiah’s vision of a new heaven and new earth answers with a resounding hope. Written to a weary people returning from exile, this passage is not a small patch sewn onto a torn garment. It is a declaration that God is not interested in mere repair—He promises re-creation. The prophet speaks of a world where sorrow is forgotten, where children live full lives, where labor is no longer in vain, and even the wolf and the lamb dwell in peace. It is a vision of everything our hearts ache for.

This promise was not fully realized in Isaiah’s day. Jerusalem would be rebuilt, yes—but the deeper hope was still to come. Centuries later, the apostle John would quote Isaiah in Revelation 21 as he described the final, glorious renewal brought by Jesus Christ. And the resurrection of Jesus is the turning point. He is the firstborn from the dead, the beginning of new creation. In Him, all things hold together, and in Him, all things will be made new. Isaiah 65 is not a distant fairy tale—it is the Christian’s certain future, guaranteed by the risen Lord. And not only is it coming, it has already begun in us. “If anyone is in Christ,” Paul writes, “he is a new creation” (2 Corinthians 5:17). We are people of the future, living in the present.
If this is true, then we need not be overcome by despair. When we face seasons of grief, systemic brokenness, or the ache of dreams deferred, we can live with confident hope. Not naïve optimism, but a deep conviction that the world’s pain is not the final word. Jesus has broken the cycle. His resurrection tells us that sin, death, and futility have been dealt a mortal wound—and one day they will be no more. For those in Christ, the future is joy.

And so we live now as signs of that future. The way we care for the poor, steward the earth, labor at our jobs, and love our neighbors—all of this becomes an echo of the age to come. It is not a desperate attempt to fix what only God can heal. It is a Spirit-empowered response to what Jesus has already done. He has fulfilled the law’s demands. We now act not to earn His favor, but because we already have it. That’s what grace does: it frees us to love.

Transform Our Hearts Through Prayer
Risen Lord, You are the beginning of the new creation, the guarantee that sorrow and sin will not have the last word. Let us believe Your promise even when the world feels unchanged. Help us walk in hope, to work and love and serve as those who know what’s coming. Holy Spirit, stir in us the joy of the age to come. Make us agents of resurrection in the everyday. And when we falter, remind us: we are Yours, and You are making all things new. Amen.