What's new about the new covenant?

Pentecost 21 year C 07 Sermon
Jeremiah 31:24 ff New Covenant
Words of comfort... from the prophet Jeremiah... for the exiles... in Babylon...

‘I’ll make a new covenant... and with this new covenant... I’ll put my law in their minds...
and write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they will be my people. They will all know me, from the least to the greatest, because I’ll forgive them and remember their sins no more.’ [pause]

Like the Babylonian exiles... we learned last week that we’re all strangers in a strange land...that every last one of us sitting here in this church... understands the experience of exile... either because we’ve left our homes in other places... or our home here... has been changed... beyond recognition...by a flood of strangers.

And like the exiles in Babylon...
in spite of our dislocation...we’re called to seek the wellbeing of this place... and be the faithful people of God... where we are... because he is our God and we are his people...the people of his covenant...

14 years ago tomorrow...I entered into a sacred covenant with a man who’s sitting right in the back of this church. Sacred... because we made promises to each other before God... and covenant... because it sealed our relationship to each other... with vows...
vows to be faithful to one another... to have and to hold... in sickness and in health... forsaking all others...
until death would part us.

But how do you know... I have such a covenant with Reg...how can you tell my identity as his wife?

Well...some aspects of my identity are concrete... there’s a ring...we both have one...worn on this particular finger...I‘ve taken Weeks as part of my name...we come and go from the same house...
so we must live together...

But there’s something else isn’t there.

When you observe my behaviour closely... you’ll see I’m concerned for his health and wellbeing...and his safety. I stand up for him if I think he’s being treated unfairly...I support him...I know what he likes and what he doesn’t like and I want him to be happy....

And in spite of all the attractive men in the world...
In the most intimate sense of knowing...
I know only him. I’m faithful to him. And in all these things... he is faithful to me.

But the biblical record... tells us the exiles who were carried off to Babylon... had been unfaithful... betraying the covenant God had made with them
at Sinai...and when they looked back...
they could see they’d flirted with idols...they knew they’d fooled around with the ways of other gods...

They’d taken their identity and status as God’s partners in the covenant... for granted...
And what was worse...they no longer knew God intimately...And "Knowing God" was at the heart of the covenant...

‘defending the cause of the poor and needy... isn’t that what it means to know me?" God had declared to them in outrage.

But their hearts and their minds were on other things than working for God’s cause...they had no time for the stranger and the most vulnerable in their midst ...no interest in showing mercy and forgiveness or walking humbly with God.

They had stopped living... as God’s partners in the covenant... [pause]

God had initiated a sacred covenant with them...
to be a light to the world... to be his partners in bringing about his way of Shalom...for the blessing of all nations. They would have land and safety and their descendants would stretch to the end so of the earth, but for that to happen... they had to be faithful to God’s way of love...

Time and time again after each indiscretion...
there’s a renewal of vows... renewing the relationship between God and God’s people.

And the promise "I will be your God"... together with "and you will be my people" echoes again and again throughout the Hebrew Scriptures...at God's initiative and sustained by God’s unilateral and costly faithfulness.

At the heart of the covenant...the gift of God's own self...freely given yet betrayed again and again.

‘like a woman unfaithful to her husband, so you have been unfaithful to me, O house of Israel,’ declares the LORD.

In fact, for the most part the Old Testament is a story of broken promises on Israel’s part...

So a renewed covenant was always on the cards...
and those words from the prophet Jeremiah were great comfort... for the despairing exiles in Babylon...but with this new covenant...they’re going to have to think outside the square... of promised land and ethnic purity...they’re going to have to live among foreigners... and even marry them...and God is commanding it.

Instead of the chosen people in the Promised Land... they have to learn how to be the people of God...in any land... away from the Temple and its rituals and regulations... the will of God would have to be engraved... on their hearts.

And so...far from being abandoned in some kind of catastrophic divorce...God is going to prove faithful regardless...God is going to forgive them...and God promises that future generations won’t suffer because of their sins. Future generations will have to own their own sins.

"The days are coming," declares the LORD, "when I’ll plant my people all over the show. Just as I watched over them... to uproot and tear down and overthrow, destroy and bring disaster...so I’ll watch over them to build and to plant.

I’ll make a new covenant not like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt...........
because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them," Slide words
With this new covenant I’ll put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they will be my people.

they will all know me, from the least to the greatest, declares the LORD. because I’ll forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.

After disaster and exile... being God’s people only makes sense... from the perspective of a new covenant...one they carry with them in their hearts... one that isn’t limited to golden arcs... or land and buildings... or restricted to ethnic labels...or wealth and religious privilege. [pause]

The covenant stood...and God hadn’t changed...
the way of God...the way to peace and prosperity was still love...what had changed... was the exiles understanding... of how the sacred covenant would be fulfilled...

not tied to territory...but... in all the earth...
not cast on tablets of stone...
but written on their very hearts.

God always had... and always would...
continue to be faithful.... God always had...
and always would... relentlessly pursue a people... who would also be faithful...

And God would move... ever closer... to humanity... until in Jesus... the divine union... would find its ultimate... and most costly... fulfillment. [pause]

The night before he died... John’s gospel tells us... Jesus comforts his disciples... with the exact words every bridegroom would say... to his bride at their engagement party...

in my Father's house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back... and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.’

With this symbolic language...their Passover meal has become the wedding feast of the lamb
and when Jesus offers them the cup... he seals his relationship with them... and with all humanity.

This cup... is the new covenant in my blood...
which is poured out... for you. [pause]

When we drink from that cup... we are pledging ourselves to God as a people...when we live lives of faithfulness to that promise... we’re fulfilling the covenant... as a people.

And all I ask... Jesus tells us...
is to write this one new commandment...
on our hearts...

Love one another. [pause]
As I have loved you, so you must love one another.
By this they’ll know you’re my disciples,
if you love one another.

There’s only one way to know if the new covenant is written on the hearts of a people...
When you observe them...when you listen to them and watch them carefully... you’ll notice the signs... they’re prepared to show others the same grace and forgiveness... the same compassion the same concern the same mercy...the same love...
they have been shown. In response to that grace... a covenant people have pledged their very lives.

Jeremiah’s letter to the exiles

Pentecost 20 year C Sermon

Everything’s changed. Nothing is familiar.
You’re surrounded by strangers... with weird clothes and bizarre customs and...... speaking a strange language you can hardly understand...

You look out your window... and try to get your bearings...but it’s all so different...the sharp pang of longing for the way things used to be...
almost brings you to tears. [pause]

And everything that’s happened... has happened against your will. You worry about lost traditions...everything you’ve worked so hard for going down the drain...slipping away... out of control...your fearful... that everything you believe in...is just going to wither away and die...

Even the music...and the sacred ritual’s... Even the understanding of God...seems alien to you in this place. How on earth can you be expected to worship God in this environment...

Does that sound familiar to anyone?
In one way or another... at some time in your lives... every person here... has experienced this sense of being a stranger... an alien... an exile. Some of us know exactly what it feels like...
to be uprooted from our beloved homeland...
to be strangers in a strange land.
Today in our church family we have people from Korea, England, the United States, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Scotland, Australia, Canada...

people who’ve had to say good-by... to family and friends... people who’ve said farewell...
to familiar customs and... their favourite foods.

Still others may have come here from a big Kiwi city... or the farm... to a strange place... where everything’s on Wanaka time...and done the Wanaka way ...
rather than the comfortable familiar way they know.

But there are others of us... who sometimes feel like exiles in our own community... even in our own church. People who’ve had to say good-by to friends and family who moved away or died. People who used to know everybody in town... and now feel they’re surrounded by strangers.

People who grew up here... were even born here beneath these beautiful mountains and shining lakes...people who can not longer see the old familiar landmarks... because of all the building and development that’s happened.

And in church... there are people who feel like strangers in a strange land...some used to know all the hymns by heart...and grieve for the music they’ve loved... and the songs that helped them worship.
Still others... ache to hear guitars and drums and singing as they arrive at church...
singing that lasts ...until they sense a soaking of the Holy Spirit.

Most of us know what it’s like... to experience exile even in our own families...even from our friends...

I’d like to try an experiment in community right now... Would those of you who were brought up here... please walk back to where Stan and Elsie are sitting? Would those of you who immigrated from another country... please go to the kids corner.

And those who’ve shifted from a big city in New Zealand...go right over here. And what about coming off a distant farm...over here.

Every one of you... knows what it means...or will know what it means... to feel like a stranger in strange land ...particularly those who grew up here and for whom so much has changed. Ok you can all sit down

Now, if I were a false prophet... and wanted to be popular...I’d tell you to pray and to wait... for an intervention from God... to bring you back to the comfort and familiarity you once knew.

But instead... I’m going to show you what God’s remedy is... for those who find themselves in exile? And how God brings salvation and deliverance...
in unexpected ways...So let’s go back to our unhappy captive standing so sadly at their window.

Suddenly your musings are shattered... by a sharp knock at the door...You look up as a shaft of light pierces the gloom around you...two messengers thrust a letter into your hands
and disappear down the stairs...

You’re heart pounds when you see where it’s from...
You can’t wait to read it...but you want to savour the moment...so you make a cup of tea and cut a piece of cake. And take the letter back to the good light of the window.

You open the letter slowly... almost ceremoniously... and read...its from that old prophet Jeremiah

This is what the LORD Almighty,
the God of Israel says… to all those…
I carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon:

"Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce.
Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters. Increase in number there; do not decrease.

Word slide
Also, seek the shalom… the peace and prosperity and the wholeness…
of the place… to which I’ve carried you into exile. Pray to the LORD for that placet, because if it prospers, you too will prosper."

Blank title slide
You're… not… going… back… anytime soon despite what the false prophets are telling you."

It’s Babylon...not Wanaka...And its six hundred years before Jesus was born... Nebuchadnezzar's army ransacks Jerusalem...and destroys the Temple...

Somewhere around ten thousand people… are taken captive and forced to relocate… to the city of Babylon, the capital of the Chaldean empire.

Only the most prominent citizens…people with political, religious and financial clout… professionals, priests, artisans, and the wealthy… were taken to Babylon…everyone who’d been part of the royal Jewish Temple establishment.

The peasants were allowed to stay behind… to work the land…and the prophet Jeremiah… outcast from the Temple had stayed behind with them.

And just when those who’d been dragged off
against their will… just when they so desperately... needed hope and comfort...just when they were praying for God to intervene...

the prophet Jeremiah...sends them an oracle from God... ‘Immediate deliverance is out of the question...they’d better get used to Babylon.
Don’t just sit around waiting for me to rescue you...
When I put you there in the first place...
so build...and plant...and increase... where you are...

Pray and work for the peace and wellbeing of the whole community...including and especially people that are not like you.

Exile is not the end...and nothing can stop God’s purpose of Shalom from being accomplished...even your so-called enemies...

God’s story isn't over after all...
and God’s family...isn't yet complete...

You see...to those who thought they were the chosen people... their captivity their deportation to Babylon was crushing... because God had promised to protect them God had promised to use them for his purposes. Judah was meant to be the promise land.

This crisis of faith... plunged the exiles into the most profound despair...we can hear it echoed in Psalm one thirty seven.

By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept ...when we remembered Zion. How can we sing the LORD’s song in a strange land?

But they obeyed... God’s command to build and plant and increase…and pray for the wellbeing of Babylon… and as the city of their enemy flourished...they flourished...

The exile caused the Jews in Babylon…
to reshape their view of reality…to advance their understanding of how and where and with whom God would work out his purposes of Shalom..

In fact they were so successful... after the seventy prophesied years of exile had passed...the majority decided to stay on. And so with two thriving centres…
in Babylon and Jerusalem…the Jewish people
were far better equipped… to survive the conquests…
of the Persians, and the Greeks and Romans.

And to get them there...it seems God used their enemies... to keep them there...their prayers for deliverance... were answered by a resounding...
‘not yet’...not till they worked... for the peace and prosperity of the whole community... to which God had brought them.

Long after the Persian King Cyrus conquered Babylon … and allowed the exiles to return to Jerusalem... a young rabbi would continue to reshape the Jewish world view… Jesus of Nazareth would teach a Gospel of shalom …peace compassion and mercy… intended for all humankind. And Jesus would announce this good news… over and against the deeply rooted…
Jewish belief… that God would soon intervene…
to cast out their Roman enemy.

Love your enemies... Jesus taught his disciples...
do good to them...Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful. …give...and it will be given to you.

A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.

Two thousand years later...here at the ends of the earth... what is an angry, lonely, doubting and fearful exile… to do with this story?

Well it seems to me…the lesson is clear…
no matter how uncomfortable we feel about change…no matter how strange the people around us seem to be…
we have a call from God to build and plant and increase wherever we find ourselves. We have a calling to pray and work…for the shalom…the wellbeing…of the whole community we’re in. Who knows…our definition of salvation might change…and we might just want to stay.

Why?

Because God’s story isn't over... God’s shalom is still needed... and God’s family isn't yet complete.