Bible Dictionaries
New

Holman Bible Dictionary

Different from one of the same which existed before; made fresh. Scripture expresses God's concern for persons and the larger creation in the broad categories of a new act and a new relationship.

God's New Act Scripture often calls to mind past acts such as the creation and Exodus which reveal God's care for God's world and people. Though rooted in God's acts in history, biblical faith does not relegate God to the distant past. Time and again, writers of Scripture called God's people to anticipate God's new intervention in their lives. Isaiah 43:14-21 promised Babylonian exiles that God was now “doing a new thing” which paralleled God's acts saving Israel from Egyptian slavery. God again acted in a new way in Jesus Christ who offered a new teaching with authority ( Mark 1:27 ) and whose ministry could be compared to new wine bursting old expectations of God's involvement in human salvation (Mark 2:22 ).

New Relationships God acted in the past to establish relationships, notably with the descendants of Abraham and the people of Israel at Sinai. Jeremiah anticipated God's establishing a new covenant with God's all-too-often faithless people, a covenant in which God would make knowledge of the law a matter of the heart (Jeremiah 31:31-34; Hebrews 8:8-13 ). Luke 22:20 points to Christ's sacrificial death as the basis for this new covenant. In Christ the believer experiences newness of life ( Romans 6:4; 2 Corinthians 5:17 ). This renewed life is characterized by new relationships with God and others (Ephesians 2:15-16; Colossians 3:10-11 ). See New Birth .