Jeremiah 31:31-34; 2 Corinthians 5:14-21
January 30, 2022
- Being a New Creation in a new year
There are 247 different ways that I could preach from this text today, but I am going to use a completely different one from any of those: how would you like to be remembered?
Alfred Nobel became a very wealthy man in the 19th century if for no other reason than he invented dynamite. His gift to the world literally exploded our ability to destroy and kill, but he made a pretty profit since dynamite was so useful in so many ways. Interestingly, later in his life when his brother died, the person writing the obituary got the two brothers confused, so Alfred woke up to read his own obituary instead of his brother’s. The paper corrected the error, but Alfred got a glimpse into how people would remember him as a maker of weapons and dealer in destruction. In the midst of all of this, the cause of peace had begun to work on him in greater and greater ways. He had a good, longtime friend who was a prolific advocate in the peace movement and made a big impression on him. When Alfred died, he did something radical. He left most of his fortune to establish an award that would recognize human achievements that made the world a better place – including one prize for the very cause of peace itself. Yes, that Alfred Nobel is the same Nobel who gave us the Nobel prizes, and his good friend, Bertha Von Suttner who so inspired him, was actually the fourth recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. Alfred would have been very pleased with that and even more with how his life has made a difference in the world in inspiring and recognizing excellence.
It is a good practice to occasionally consider how we might be remembered in the world and how we are contributing to leaving the world better than we found it. Believe it or not (but I suspect you do), there are plenty of people out there who do not care how they leave the world or what kind of legacy they might offer. They have no regard for others but are living largely for themselves. They have very small hearts because they never saw a need to be people of love. Their net of compassion is so small that it has no reach.
One answer to that is this passage from Jeremiah which is magnificent because it drives a message of hope into the awareness of a broken people. That people who had failed and failed and failed to be God’s faithful covenant people were going to receive a whole new covenant that would remake the whole idea of living in relationship with God. God’s binding agreement, God’s living contract, God’s intentional relationship, God’s new covenant with them would be imprinted on their hearts. This is the rule of love would be within them and a part of them. For centuries, the people had been living under the old covenant, the covenant of the law, and they all fell short. We would be the same. Paul in Romans assures us of the fact that “all have fallen short” and “we were all dead in our sins” when Christ came for us. But God gave us a new covenant, a new start, a new way to live. Christ is that new covenant for us all.
By NOT considering what impression or impact we make on this world, we run the risk of forgetting we are first and foremost a people ruled by love. You see, our first, natural instinct is to secure for ourselves, to protect what we have, to see to our own success. People left to themselves do not tend to care for the other, for the little, or for the weak. This way of thinking has led to dark days here in this town and in every town at some point. This way of thinking has led to the rejection of our neighbor and the shared and equal humanity of all of God’s children. Our legacy must be greater as a people and as a church. Thanks be to God that we are not bound to the old ways but are freed to new ways in Christ. God has written on all of our hearts. This is obvious to those who will open their hearts. Our hearts are freed to love because God in Christ loves us and gives us more grace than we could ever know what to do with. We have overflowing grace that we then share with others. What God has done for us God has also done for us all. With this promise, it is our time to shine with what is new, even in the old.
Speaking of new, I expect that the names Minoru Saito, Yuichiro Miura, Weifeng Yuan, Ethel Davey, and Nola Ochs are new to you:
Minoru Saito became the oldest person to sail solo and non-stop around the world in 2011 at age 77.
Yuichiro Miura is the oldest person to reach the summit of Mount Everest which he did at age 80.
Weifeng Yuan, in Richmond, Canada, has helped thousands of people in his community become healthier over the past 25 years. Yuan was still going strong at 98 years old with the Richmond Wellness Club which he founded in 1992 and through which he teaches 100-200 people every day.
Ethel Davey at one hundred still volunteers at her local thrift store two days a week in St. Albans, in Britain, as a way to help her community. She started volunteering there at age 78 and hasn’t missed a shift in over twenty years.
Nola Ochs became the world’s oldest person to receive a bachelor’s degree at the age of 95. Oh, and then she got a master’s degree at the age of 98, and when she was 100, she was working on a second master’s and was a graduate teaching assistant.
I bet you HAVE heard of John Glenn who in 1998 became the world’s oldest astronaut when he went to space as part of Space Shuttle mission STS-95 at age 77. Last year, William Shattner became the oldest person in space at the age of 90.
I am not even getting into athletes who are still competing into their 90s and 100s.
There is something to this life that gives us possibility after possibility to be better, to grow in good ways, and especially to become more compassionate and aware of others as children of God. There is something to this life that says we do not have to live in old ways that devalue others and serve ourselves. There is something out here that is new for us all because we are all also new at any age.
If you have ever used the word “reconciled,” I wonder what kind of meaning you gave it. I don’t think English gives it the kind of weight that Paul does. You see, Paul was a broken man. When he realized that his whole life was devoted to something wrong, it crushed him. He saw how far he was from God’s truth, but he also felt God’s embrace. No one should have been condemned or punished as he – the greater persecutor of the church. He hunted down followers of Jesus and contributed to their deaths, but God still loved him and wanted him and held him tight in Jesus. Paul understood what “reconciled” means. This is a heart-wrenching word that admits guilt but fights through that guilt to be restored. It is a life-shifting word for that which refuses to die but pushes to be healed. It is a world-flipping word for taking the worst of human relationships, the evil and broken parts, and bringing new life between us. There is nothing easy or simple about the word “reconciled” when it comes out of Paul’s mouth. He was reconciled to God in Christ, and his brokenness was made whole, again.
And what’s more is that he then has the boldness to claim that we are all ministers of this reconciliation. To be reconciled is to have a failed marriage but find space to come back together. To be reconciled us to hate your brother but to find space to be family, again. To be reconciled is to live your life with hate in your heart for people who are different but to find space to see past the appearance to the love of the heart. When we face reconciliation, we admit our part in the wrong, and we find new life. Yes, we confront our sin. Don’t ever say that we don’t talk about sin. We are awash in it. It taints everything about us, but God’s grace is even greater. As much guilt as we carry, God’s cross carries more. In Christ, we are not only freed from the sin and brokenness and evil of this world, but we are even made new.
Please do not read over that line lightly. To be a new creation is one of the most powerful statements in the whole Bible. All who are in Christ are new. We are God’s living purpose. The Creator who made us is making us, again. We are always new.
That’s why I invited you from the very beginning to dream into that newness. Whatever it is that still lurks in that closet of your soul does not own you. Whatever fears that gnaw away at your confidence do not own you. Whatever history or baggage or guilt that weighs your heart does not own you. We who are in Christ are new creations. We are truly new, and as a people who comes to God in honesty, we can come to our neighbor who knows the pain of this world with us. We can find better between us.
This will shape how we will be remembered in this life. And it is our choice. I for one want to be remembered as someone who found Christ in the other, in the ones we try to forget. I want to be someone who worked to help the church be a better picture of God’s love, and who found beauty in life with God. We all have the same opportunity today because we are all new creatures, new creations, new people in our Lord. May God bless us all.
To God be the glory. Amen.