Sometimes, when there are good things happening in one part of your life – things start falling apart in another. It’s almost as though when God is birthing something new, there are birth pangs.

I don't know if you've noticed but whenever we have changes in our lives, even good changes, they can often feel uncomfortable. I guess that’s because, basically, we're creatures of habit, we become comfortable with situations and relationships even when they're far from ideal.

So often we want desperately for something to change, something that’s causing us grief, maybe we cry out, "God, God, help me." So God does and He starts to make things happen and then we go, "Oh, no God, I didn't mean that, no, not that way." Change brings uncertainty, it's kind of like labour pains, a woman in labour knows something wonderful is about to happen but boy those birth pains can still hurt, at least that's what they tell me.

It's true, even good change is stressful. Marriage, the whole marriage ceremony and everything that goes with it is stressful and exhausting for a couple and then they enter into marriage and they have to adjust to one another and there's change and there's tension. She does things this way, he does things that way.

Jacqui, bless her, when we got married, she started thinking that should could go out and buy my clothes for me. I said, "What are you doing?" Having kids, that’s a huge adjustment, our 26 year old and 24 year old boys are wonderful young men but as anyone who's had kids knows, there are plenty of birth pangs along the way to them becoming wonderful young men, there are tensions and strains and hurts.

When you get a new job at work, you're learning new things, meeting new people, trying to remember their names, it's stressful and the hardest thing is when we have to change our attitudes and our behaviours, when we have to sacrifice something we want in order for the good new thing to come into being. Moving house is exhausting and it's not just that, when we get there, there are new territories, new places to put things, adjustments, a settling in period. No matter what the change is, how much we want it, how desperate we are for it; there are always, always labour pains.

This week on A Different Perspective we're looking at the God of new beginnings. Life can be same old, same old, same old drudgery can't it? And then there's circumstances and people and relationships and money situations that make it difficult, that really put us under pressure, we feel like those things, like nothing will ever change. People in difficult marriages, people in difficult work situations, people in difficult financial situations, those circumstances look so big that we end up believing that nothing will ever change.

The job I used to have, I'd enjoyed it but the people and the politics, what should I do? Should I stay there and make a difference? Should I trust God that He's in there? Or is it my time to go? The woman who listens to this program who rang me and said, "Look, I'm bringing up a teenager, they're so difficult, this kid is driving me completely nuts. God what are you doing?" Marriages, mortgages, credit cards, work loads, situations, do I stay and grit it out or do I change? Come on God, where are you? If you're the God of new beginnings how do I deal with this?

The apostle Paul wrote this, he said:

If anyone is in Christ Jesus they are a new creation. Old things have passed away and behold all things are new.

If anyone is in Christ Jesus they ARE a new creation. Old things have passed away and behold all things are new.

It's a powerful thing to know that we can believe in God to work in our lives to create new beginnings. Sometimes it's a new job, other times you stay in the same job but He gives us a new heart or He deals with someone who is being difficult or He opens doors that have been closed or He helps us to work through frustrations but during all of those things there are going to be birth pangs.

Paul the apostle writes this, he said:

I consider that our present sufferings aren't worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed to us. The creation waits in eager expectation for the Sons of God to be revealed because the creation was subjected to frustration, not by it's own choice but by the will of the one subjected it in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from it's bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pangs of child birth right up to the present time.

In other words Paul is saying, "look, one day we're going to stand before God and it will be fantastic. We believe in God, we believe in Jesus, it will be just awesome. I consider our present sufferings aren't worth comparing to that sort of thing." But he is saying, "right now the whole creation has been groaning, as in the pangs of child birth, right up to the present time."

Paul, in a sense, is saying, "it's the nature of the beast that this creation is groaning but one day we'll stand before God and all that will be gone but right now we have birth pangs." Birth pangs are the most awesome thing of all, being with God, the eternal life. Right now it can get so bad that sometimes we don't even know how to pray but even there God knows and the Holy Spirit does it for us, this is what he says:

In the same way the Spirit helps us in our weakness we don't even know what we ought to pray for but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groans and words that we just can't express.

The point is that in the world we live in, when God is doing something good, birth pangs, they're normal. We think, "God, you're a God of new beginnings and you need to do something good in my life and I want it to happen right now." And we go, "okay, where is it? Now is good God." And then, before it gets better, it gets worse.

Maybe you're a woman who is praying for her husband, you're having a difficult relationship with your husband and you start believing that God is a God of new beginnings and God can do things in your husband that you can't do and you start praying and all of a sudden the relationship, instead of getting better, it gets worse. Can I tell you? It happens time and time and time again because there is a devil out there and he doesn't want God to do good things in your life and he will attack. He's the one who brings those birth pangs and I just want to encourage you to say, "It happens all the time.

When we're going through birth pangs because of what we've been praying for and asking for, I immediately go, "God is up to something good because my experience tells me that at some point, the new thing, the good thing, the wonderful thing that God is bringing to birth in my life is going to come and the only way it's going to come is by these birth pangs, these things happening in my life."

Sometimes the birth pangs go on for years and that’s not unusual but can I tell you? As I look back over the last 15 years of my life, the time I've been walking with God, so many things have happened. So many new beginnings in so many areas of my life but they all took time, they all had some frustrations and adjustments and pain with them. It's the way things are but as we trust God, those new beginnings do come in all sorts of different areas of our lives.

When you just want to give up hope because you've been asking God and all you're getting is grief, I just want to encourage you, just see those birth pangs for what they are. They are the heralds of the goodness that God is about to bring. Why is it like that? I don't know but my experience tells me it just is, it happens time and time and time again and I just felt to share that with you today because I know, someone is listening today and you just needed to hear that, you just needed Gods encouragement to keep going.

Hang in there, God is a God of new beginnings. If anyone believes in Jesus they are a new creation. Old things are past away and look, wake up, all things are new. Your God is a God of new beginnings and I just encourage you to put your faith in Him.