Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.
2 Corinthians 5:17
I like the snow. I know, that’s not a popular opinion to hold but it is true. I really do like and enjoy it. We have had a very snowy winter in Pennsylvania thus far and not just a snowy winter, but a rather icy winter too! While I may be a fan of snow, I draw the line at ice. You can more or less drive in the snow but ice—not so much.
We had an ice storm a few weeks ago and it threw everything off. Schools closed, the interstate had restrictions on travel, and I had to cancel a whole day of work because everything was coated in ice and I mean everything! Power lines, trees, cars, our walkways were all coated in a thick layer of glittering ice. Then we got snow—about eight inches on top of the ice.
Getting inches of snow on top of ice does not make for the easiest snow removal but you know what it does make the best for? Pictures! The ice acted as an adhesive for all the snow and the snow and ice clung to the branches of the trees, bushes, and everything else. As the sun came up, everything was glittering, shining, and silver-coated; the trees were so beautiful that you could scarcely take your eyes off of them. The whole landscape looked like it had been kissed by God’s glory.
The snow and ice in the trees hung around for a few days and the winter landscape in Pennsylvania never looked so beautiful, at least not in a while. I was marveling at the beauty of it as I was driving a few days after the storm. The snow really does make everything look better! There is an old building in need of major repair not too far from my house, but when I came around the bend and saw it covered in snow, I couldn’t tell that the building wasn’t in the best of conditions. The snow had covered, at least superficially, the building’s stains and imperfections.
The Pharisees of Jesus’s day were like the snow-covered building. They acted holy but their hearts were not pure. Jesus came to purify our hearts—not to give us a superficial covering. When we act like our good deeds will save us, we are acting like the Pharisees. What did Jesus say about the Pharisees? In Matthew 23:27Jesus says they are like whitewashed tombs—beautiful on the outside but full of decay inside. We are like a crypt—before we learned how to embalm! Would you want to venture into one of those?
That is what we are in God’s sight but for Jesus. When we truly turn our lives over to Him we are no longer like the stinking tomb in the eyes of our Father but a new creation (II Corinthians 5:17). We are covered in the blood of Jesus and as beautiful as the world after a snow and ice storm.
God loved us so much that He sent His Son, not only sent but demoted His Son to this world—to a lowly station—so that we might believe in Him and thereby live with Him eternally. He could have left us to be like the rotting tombs but He didn’t. He cared and loved us too much to leave us to that destiny. Jesus willingly came to earth so that through Him the world could be kissed by God’s glory. When we accept Him and put Him on the throne of our hearts and live according to His commands, we reflect His glory to all.