{"id":58408,"date":"2010-01-24T21:09:00","date_gmt":"2010-01-25T03:09:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/?p=58408"},"modified":"2023-01-24T21:12:18","modified_gmt":"2023-01-25T03:12:18","slug":"older-and-improved","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/older-and-improved\/","title":{"rendered":"Older and Improved?"},"content":{"rendered":"\nby Shane Williams<br>\nin&nbsp;<em>The Lilbourn Light<\/em>, Vol. 10, No. 7, Nov. 2009.\n<p>We&#8217;ve all heard television commercials that tell us about a product that&#8217;s &#8220;new and improved.&#8221; This is in contrast to an older and therefore inferior product. At least that is what they are hoping will cause you to buy the &#8220;new&#8221; item. No matter how hard you and I try none of us can hold back the natural process of aging. We can exercise, eat right, take vitamins, and put on moisturizing lotions, but guess what&#8230;we still get older. That indisputable truth is found in II Corinthians 4:16, where Paul says: &#8220;<em>Our outward man is perishing.<\/em>&#8220;<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/oldAge.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"250\" height=\"163\">As bad as that sounds, though, there is good news in all of this. At the same time, our bodies rush with determination toward destruction, we can enjoy a youthful strength in our walk with God. Through the constant renewal of our &#8220;<em>Inward man<\/em>&#8221; (II Corinthians 4:16), we grow more and more prepared to be with God. &#8220;<em>Even though our outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day.<\/em>&#8220;<\/p>\n<p>Spiritual age does not have the same effect as physical age. Instead of slowing down as we walk longer with God, we should be enjoying a little more spring in our step. The longer we have fellowship with Him, the better off we should be. We may be getting older on the outside but we can be &#8220;older and improved&#8221; inwardly.<\/p>\n<p>We should be growing spiritually. The difficulties we bear are helping us store up heavenly glory, not weighing us down. It is true &#8212; if you&#8217;re walking with Christ, you&#8217;re not just getting older, you&#8217;re getting better.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>&#8220;<em>For we know that if the earthly tent which is our house is torn down, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens<\/em>&#8221; (II Corinthians 5:1).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Shane Williams in&nbsp;The Lilbourn Light, Vol. 10, No. 7, Nov. 2009. We&#8217;ve all heard television commercials that tell us about a product that&#8217;s &#8220;new and improved.&#8221; This is in contrast to an older and therefore inferior product. At least that is what they are hoping will cause you to buy the &#8220;new&#8221; item. No&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[27],"tags":[775,776],"class_list":["post-58408","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article","tag-elderly","tag-old-age"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":58316,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/new-and-improved-religion\/","url_meta":{"origin":58408,"position":0},"title":"New and Improved Religion","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"January 23, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"by Carey Scott It is amazing that just about every product that has ever been sold has evolved into a more new and improved product. The marketing firms have convinced the manufacturers that unless they have new and improved printed on their products; they will not sell as many. But\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Article&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":30297,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/im-afraid-of-growing-old-and-dying\/","url_meta":{"origin":58408,"position":1},"title":"I&#8217;m afraid of growing old and dying","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"November 22, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I'm going through a time right now of fear and turmoil.\u00a0 Fear of growing older and dying.\u00a0 It's a paralyzing fear that I can't seem to shake.\u00a0 I\u00a0 know it has to be a lack of faith. I don't want to fear.\u00a0 I want to trust in what God\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Answer&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":33401,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/becoming-wise-men\/","url_meta":{"origin":58408,"position":2},"title":"Becoming Wise Men","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"March 17, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"by Steven Harper When Job had suffered some great losses due to the devil's personal attack on him,\u00a0we are told\u00a0\"when Job's three friends heard of all this evil that had come upon him, they came each from his own place, Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Article&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":92445,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/how-do-we-keep-our-younger-children-from-imitating-their-older-rebelious-sibling\/","url_meta":{"origin":58408,"position":3},"title":"How do we keep our younger children from imitating their older rebelious sibling?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"December 5, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I wanted to write in with a quick update regarding \"How do we deal with a rebellious teenage daughter?\": Our daughter was less than enthusiastic about this idea at first. We decided to make it a small group of teens, and she was mortified at the idea of us\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Answer&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":29183,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/jamaica-patois-wisdom-elders\/","url_meta":{"origin":58408,"position":4},"title":"Jamaica Patois Wisdom &#8211; Elders","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"December 29, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"by Jefferson David Tant The Jamaican Patois dialect is colorful, unique, and humorous. It is my desire to share some of the philosophy shown in this mix of colorful phrases that are witty as well as thought-provoking. I hope the readers both profit and enjoy. In my quarter-century plus of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Article&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":89632,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/parenting-battles\/","url_meta":{"origin":58408,"position":5},"title":"Parenting Battles","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"August 23, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"by Randall Caselman A game reserve in Africa was experiencing difficulties with young bull elephants. They were going on rampages, killing other wildlife and just generally being destructive in the park. They were even killing endangered rhinos, and no one knew why. As a result, several of the young bulls\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Adolescence&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Adolescence","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/parenting\/adolescence\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/young-elephant-201x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58408","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58408"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58408\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58408"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58408"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58408"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}