New Is New

Thrift store shopping is in!  Perhaps it’s partly because of the economy but not just that – there’s real treasures found in thrift stores.  These stores seems to be popping up everywhere due to their popularity.  I’m not sure I’m a good thrift-store shopper, however, since one time I bought back my own stuff!

What a wonderful promise in Lamentations 3: “It is of the LORD’s mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness.” (V.22-23) The Hebrew word for new is “chadash,” which means “a new thing.”  When God said “new,” He meant … new!  What an amazing contrast to newness by world standards.  Imagine you go to your best friend’s house every day to borrow a cup of sugar; it won’t take long before even a best friend becomes irritated, and begins to wonder why doesn’t she go buy my own bag of sugar!  She may kindly smile and hand you the sugar but [let’s face it] her patience grows thin!  Not so with God: even though I fail Him every day [many times a day] and go to His Throne of Grace for forgiveness [sometimes for the same mistakes], He is ever-merciful, abundantly compassionate.  Why so?  Because He remembers I am dust (Psalm 103:14), and knows I am weak and frail.  He has put within me a need for Him, a dependence on the “multitude of His mercies.” (V.32)   I love how Jeremiah ends Verse 23, “Great is thy faithfulness.”  Occasionally, you’ll find new things at a thrift store, but we ALWAYS find “new mercies” with Almighty God and … New is New!