A New Covenant
Easter is my favorite holiday.
If you know me, you know I have a lot of "favorite" things that don't always stay my favorites. Last week I think I listed my top three favorite things as yoga pants, flowers, and some guy I had just met. Granted, it was getting late and I was loopy from too much Hebrew studying, but my point is that I am a little fickle and indecisive about favorites. Ok, that's not true. The problem is I'm afraid of commitment.
But I'm serious about Easter. I have committed. It's my favorite.
And it's because I love the depth of contrast in the story.
Good Friday is one of those days where most people feel obligated to be sad, or go to church, or pray, or whatever they do when something terrible has happened. For me, Good Friday is permission to feel despair. Despair about the calamity we find ourselves in. Despair that like those first Century Jews who crucified the Messiah, we so often repay Jesus' love with rejection. Despair that our Lord was killed at our insistence. Despair that we did not and cannot hold up our end of the contract.
At Fellowship, we have a responsive reading on Good Friday in which we confess to God our unfaithfulness, our greed, our sinfulness, and our hatred.
Blessed are the poor in spirit...but we have been rich in pride.
We allow ourselves to ponder the grief of our own fallenness, because in doing so we feel the weight of Christ's suffering.
Blessed are the meek...but we are rebellious by nature.
We admit out loud what we already know in our hearts, what we know but often refuse to face.
Blessed are the peacemakers...but we have not sought reconciliation.
And it is powerful, because sitting there in the dark, facing the big wooden cross in the center of the room, we despair of ourselves. Very rarely in church do we sit in a chair, look at a cross, confess all the dark and filthy and unhealed parts of ourselves, listen to the crucifixion story, take communion, and walk out. For good reason! Despair is not our testimony. It is not central to what we profess. But it is, however, very very crucial to understanding Easter morning.
After our confession reading, and after hearing my pastors read the end of John, I felt very sad that I cannot hold up my end of the bargain. I was thinking back to God's covenant with Moses and his dealings with Israel, about how they continually failed to live up to the covenant conditions. I was thinking about the failings of the Christian church over time, and today, and the failings in my own heart. It's tragic. There is nothing to do but despair.
And yet, Easter disagrees.
Even before his death and resurrection, Jesus told his disciples something new was coming, that he wasn't giving up on them.
Luke 22:20 --
In the same way, after the supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you..."
This is a new covenant, he said, ensured by my blood, which will be written in you and not on stone!
Jeremiah 31:31-34 --
“Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the Lord. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”
As I stood there taking communion, Jesus spoke those words from Jeremiah in my mind. I heard him remind me that I need not continue any longer in my despair. He said he made a new covenant which I cannot break, one that is etched on my heart, and not on stone. He forgave my iniquity, he remembers my sin no more.
He said his Kingdom is in human hearts, and it's coming to earth one person at a time. Like in Luke 13, he reminded me of what the Kingdom looks like: a woman who was freed, straightened up to walk again. And it struck me that Jesus did not tell that woman she was changed. He did not tell her she was corrected, or indicate the problem was her. He said, "You are set free from your infirmity!" He told her, "You are free to be yourself now! It was the chains around your neck that were crippling you. Now you are free! Now you are you."
Because Jesus thinks very highly of us. I don't think he is telling us we are the problem. I think he is telling us all our sin, our bondage, our darkness is the problem, and it is killing us, but his blood can free us. Free us to be ourselves. Free us to live in our God-image, our Imago Dei.
And on Easter morning, as we sing and shout for the glory of our risen Lord, we can accept that freedom. Yes, we crucified him, and yes, we are broken. But we are being made new! And he is risen! And now, now we have hope. Now we are free to be ourselves. Now we are free to live in our God-image.
He is risen indeed.
If you know me, you know I have a lot of "favorite" things that don't always stay my favorites. Last week I think I listed my top three favorite things as yoga pants, flowers, and some guy I had just met. Granted, it was getting late and I was loopy from too much Hebrew studying, but my point is that I am a little fickle and indecisive about favorites. Ok, that's not true. The problem is I'm afraid of commitment.
But I'm serious about Easter. I have committed. It's my favorite.
And it's because I love the depth of contrast in the story.
Good Friday is one of those days where most people feel obligated to be sad, or go to church, or pray, or whatever they do when something terrible has happened. For me, Good Friday is permission to feel despair. Despair about the calamity we find ourselves in. Despair that like those first Century Jews who crucified the Messiah, we so often repay Jesus' love with rejection. Despair that our Lord was killed at our insistence. Despair that we did not and cannot hold up our end of the contract.
At Fellowship, we have a responsive reading on Good Friday in which we confess to God our unfaithfulness, our greed, our sinfulness, and our hatred.
Blessed are the poor in spirit...but we have been rich in pride.
We allow ourselves to ponder the grief of our own fallenness, because in doing so we feel the weight of Christ's suffering.
Blessed are the meek...but we are rebellious by nature.
We admit out loud what we already know in our hearts, what we know but often refuse to face.
Blessed are the peacemakers...but we have not sought reconciliation.
And it is powerful, because sitting there in the dark, facing the big wooden cross in the center of the room, we despair of ourselves. Very rarely in church do we sit in a chair, look at a cross, confess all the dark and filthy and unhealed parts of ourselves, listen to the crucifixion story, take communion, and walk out. For good reason! Despair is not our testimony. It is not central to what we profess. But it is, however, very very crucial to understanding Easter morning.
After our confession reading, and after hearing my pastors read the end of John, I felt very sad that I cannot hold up my end of the bargain. I was thinking back to God's covenant with Moses and his dealings with Israel, about how they continually failed to live up to the covenant conditions. I was thinking about the failings of the Christian church over time, and today, and the failings in my own heart. It's tragic. There is nothing to do but despair.
And yet, Easter disagrees.
Even before his death and resurrection, Jesus told his disciples something new was coming, that he wasn't giving up on them.
Luke 22:20 --
In the same way, after the supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you..."
This is a new covenant, he said, ensured by my blood, which will be written in you and not on stone!
Jeremiah 31:31-34 --
“Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the Lord. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”
As I stood there taking communion, Jesus spoke those words from Jeremiah in my mind. I heard him remind me that I need not continue any longer in my despair. He said he made a new covenant which I cannot break, one that is etched on my heart, and not on stone. He forgave my iniquity, he remembers my sin no more.
He said his Kingdom is in human hearts, and it's coming to earth one person at a time. Like in Luke 13, he reminded me of what the Kingdom looks like: a woman who was freed, straightened up to walk again. And it struck me that Jesus did not tell that woman she was changed. He did not tell her she was corrected, or indicate the problem was her. He said, "You are set free from your infirmity!" He told her, "You are free to be yourself now! It was the chains around your neck that were crippling you. Now you are free! Now you are you."
Because Jesus thinks very highly of us. I don't think he is telling us we are the problem. I think he is telling us all our sin, our bondage, our darkness is the problem, and it is killing us, but his blood can free us. Free us to be ourselves. Free us to live in our God-image, our Imago Dei.
And on Easter morning, as we sing and shout for the glory of our risen Lord, we can accept that freedom. Yes, we crucified him, and yes, we are broken. But we are being made new! And he is risen! And now, now we have hope. Now we are free to be ourselves. Now we are free to live in our God-image.
He is risen indeed.
Wow. Thank you for posting this. I don't get to worship at a church this Easter, or to be with family and remember, but I am remembering now.
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