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.