Can We Start Over... (Love Letter 5)

Yes. This love letter announces nothing less than new creation, Genesis 1 continued into this moment with you:

"Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love;

according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against you, you alone, have I sinned, and done what is evil in your sight,

so that you are justified in your sentence and blameless when you pass judgment."

Any hope is not found intrinsically in the pixy dust of wishful thinking or starry-eyed belief...

"Indeed, I was born guilty, a sinner when my mother conceived me. You desire truth in the inward being; therefore teach me wisdom in my secret heart. Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow. Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones that you have crushed rejoice. Hide your face from my sins, and blot out all my iniquities."

The words we taste in confession are not shallow, the resurrection force of God reaches every atom of existence, from our spiritual connection with him to our physical being:

Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me. Do not cast me away from your presence, and do not take your holy spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and sustain in me a willing spirit.

All of this only because our Creator, the triune God, sent himself, known as Jesus, into our world:

No one elects himself to this honored position. He’s called to it by God, as Aaron was. Neither did Christ presume to set himself up as high priest, but was set apart by the One who said to him, “You’re my Son; today I celebrate you!” ...

While he lived on earth, anticipating death, Jesus cried out in pain and wept in sorrow as he offered up priestly prayers to God. Because he honored God, God answered him. Though he was God’s Son, he learned trusting-obedience by what he suffered, just as we do. Then, having arrived at the full stature of his maturity and having been announced by God as high priest..., he became the source of eternal salvation to all who believingly obey him.

Now Jesus, who holds the keys to the cosmos, can unlock the trap of "the way things are" and begin creating again!

This is the brand-new covenant that I will make with Israel when the time comes. I will put my law within them—write it on their hearts!—and be their God. And they will be my people. They will no longer go around setting up schools to teach each other about God. They’ll know me firsthand, the dull and the bright, the smart and the slow. I’ll wipe the slate clean for each of them. I’ll forget they ever sinned!” God’s Decree.

Your Creator and your Priest, creating and cleansing, Jesus is remaking and renewing our crisis-riddled world by restoring relationships in every fiber of being: "I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people, all things to myself.” ... Listen carefully: Unless a grain of wheat is buried in the ground, dead to the world, it is never any more than a grain of wheat. But if it is buried, it sprouts and reproduces itself many times over. In the same way, anyone who holds on to life just as it is destroys that life. But if you let it go, reckless in your love, you’ll have it forever, real and eternal.​" His love letter is more than a fresh start, it is a new life with him.