Covenant Of The Heart; Sacred Signature
Sermon
Sermons On The First Readings
Series I, Cycle B
Marriage is a covenant. The marriage service speaks to the new couple with the words, "You are entering a covenantal relationship so profound that it will affect your entire life, your whole being."
A covenant is a type of promise that has multi-layered consequences and considerations. The breaking of a simple promise may or may not have significant implications. A salesperson may promise to phone or show up on a particular time and date, and if he doesn't, it may simply mean that someone else gets the sale. When a covenant is broken there are usually life altering, massive implications.
When a person hears that his/her spouse has been unfaithful, his/her universe often erupts like a gigantic volcano. Re-covenanting that relationship may or may not happen. A painful divorce may occur.
Four hundred years ago, people like John Calvin and Martin Luther believed that the Roman Catholic Church had broken its covenantal responsibility of being the dispensers of the Good News of the Gospel of Jesus Christ by means of false doctrines and blatant corruption. The Protestant Reformation was a massive shift in the journey of the church of Jesus Christ. Much work has been done by many Roman Catholics and Protestants to heal this rupture of the covenant. It is not too many years since Lutherans and Roman Catholics have finally spoken on theology together, healing a 400-year estrangement. Some of us may remember a number of years ago, when the Pope and the Archbishop of Canterbury walked together down the nave of Canterbury Cathedral and knelt together at the high altar and prayed the Lord's Prayer together.
Prior to the time of Jeremiah, the Jewish people had been living under the power and belief that they had several secure covenants holding them in a special place in God's world.
Each rainbow would remind them of the covenant with Noah that God would never destroy the world with another flood. The Jewish people had the covenant with Abraham establishing them as God's chosen people. They had the special covenant with Moses in leading them to the Promised Land and the Ark of the Covenant residing in God's temple in the heavenly city, Jerusalem. Nothing could stop them from being God's chosen people, secure in God's covenants with them.
The prophet Jeremiah spoke powerfully to the people that they were not keeping up their end of the agreement! A covenant is an agreement between two parties and each party has to keep his end of the deal. According to Jeremiah, the people were not keeping up their religious and political responsibilities, and he forecast doom and gloom for them.
In fact, we probably have the book of Jeremiah in the Bible today because his prophecies came true in the fall of Jerusalem and destruction of the Temple in 587 B.C.E.! The curtain had fallen for the last time on the kingdom of Judah. Not every prophecy from every prophet comes true. Jeremiah was a kind of Moses character to the ancient people, and after most of the cream of the Jewish society was taken into exile in Babylon, Jeremiah stayed behind to help those who remained.
We have to remember that this was a cataclysmic ordeal to the kingdom of Judah. The Jewish people suffered a destruction in 587 B.C.E. by the Babylonians that was not repaired until 1948 in the creation of the state of Israel! Try to get your head around the fact that in 587 they not only lost their country, but they also lost their "favored nation status" by God. And they effectively lost God, too. Or they thought that they lost God; they thought that God had abandoned them.
This covenant that we read today is highly significant because this was given by the same prophet to whom they failed to listen, who turned out to be correct in a big way!
In the book of Jeremiah, chapters 30, 31, and 33 are known as "the book of consolation." In spite of the destruction of the kingdom of Judah, in spite of the destruction of the sacred temple of God with the loss of the precious Ark of the Covenant, and in spite of the exile of the people, out of the pain of destruction we find the prophet giving the people a new covenant from God.
When a man of Mosaic stature and power issues new words from God, the people are all ears:
"... this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says 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. No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, 'Know the Lord,' for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord; for I will forgive their inequity, and remember their sins no more."
The new covenant is one of a deeper kind. This covenant goes from the heart of God directly to the hearts of the people, "from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord."
The implications are liberating. No longer is our relationship to God limited to our political well-being. No longer is the presence of God limited to the ark in a particular building, like a temple. No longer is God simply limited to our intelligence, thoughts, wisdom, and understanding.
According to the prophet Jeremiah, the Lord God is connecting heart to heart with each one of us, to the point that even the admonition to "know the Lord" is irrelevant! The love from the heart of God is the only love that could send us Jesus. The love that is written on our hearts is one that goes with us anywhere, anytime. The love that is written on our hearts is the only kind of love that can sustain us. It is a love that is totally inclusive and all-embracing to every single one of us, no matter what.
It is a love that dares to forgive our inequity and does not even remember our sins. It is a love that challenges us in all of our understandings, both of ourselves and our relationships. It is a love that seeks to give and heal in a time of national and personal trauma in Jeremiah's time, a love that we need for the devastation and trauma of our own times and lives.
We human beings have many ways to pass on our faith: we have Bibles, we have churches and massive cathedrals, we have the faith of the people, we have clergy, we have crosses, we have sermons, testimonials, and books, we have councils, assemblies, presbyteries, and conventions, and we have bishops, archbishops and popes. But they all pale beside the words of the prophet from God telling us that God's love is individually written on our hearts, from the least of us to the greatest of us.
God has written on the heart of each of us, "My child, I love you."
But there is a question we must answer. Are we willing -- are we willing to go there?
We are willing to go to many places. We are willing to travel around the world, we are willing to visit friends, we are willing to go on holidays, and we are willing to go places for other people. We are willing to go into marriage. We are willing to go to the mall, to bars, to hockey games, baseball games, football games, basketball games, to crack houses, funeral homes, and brothels. But, are we willing to go on the sacred journey inward to the place of God, the holy place where God has written his love, the place where that love is inscribed on our hearts, "I will put my law within them," God said?
Are you willing to go to the place of total equality with all of your brothers and sisters, the place of forgiveness, the place of love, the place lovingly touched by the Creator, the place of God? To the place where love is written and signed with your name on it; signed, sealed, and delivered by the sacrament of baptism? Are you willing to accept what God has written on your hearts? Are you willing to embrace the love put "within" you by God?
This prophet, the one speaking to you now, is telling you, the journey inward, the journey to the center of yourself, the journey towards God -- the bottom line is: that journey is the only one worth taking. Amen.
A covenant is a type of promise that has multi-layered consequences and considerations. The breaking of a simple promise may or may not have significant implications. A salesperson may promise to phone or show up on a particular time and date, and if he doesn't, it may simply mean that someone else gets the sale. When a covenant is broken there are usually life altering, massive implications.
When a person hears that his/her spouse has been unfaithful, his/her universe often erupts like a gigantic volcano. Re-covenanting that relationship may or may not happen. A painful divorce may occur.
Four hundred years ago, people like John Calvin and Martin Luther believed that the Roman Catholic Church had broken its covenantal responsibility of being the dispensers of the Good News of the Gospel of Jesus Christ by means of false doctrines and blatant corruption. The Protestant Reformation was a massive shift in the journey of the church of Jesus Christ. Much work has been done by many Roman Catholics and Protestants to heal this rupture of the covenant. It is not too many years since Lutherans and Roman Catholics have finally spoken on theology together, healing a 400-year estrangement. Some of us may remember a number of years ago, when the Pope and the Archbishop of Canterbury walked together down the nave of Canterbury Cathedral and knelt together at the high altar and prayed the Lord's Prayer together.
Prior to the time of Jeremiah, the Jewish people had been living under the power and belief that they had several secure covenants holding them in a special place in God's world.
Each rainbow would remind them of the covenant with Noah that God would never destroy the world with another flood. The Jewish people had the covenant with Abraham establishing them as God's chosen people. They had the special covenant with Moses in leading them to the Promised Land and the Ark of the Covenant residing in God's temple in the heavenly city, Jerusalem. Nothing could stop them from being God's chosen people, secure in God's covenants with them.
The prophet Jeremiah spoke powerfully to the people that they were not keeping up their end of the agreement! A covenant is an agreement between two parties and each party has to keep his end of the deal. According to Jeremiah, the people were not keeping up their religious and political responsibilities, and he forecast doom and gloom for them.
In fact, we probably have the book of Jeremiah in the Bible today because his prophecies came true in the fall of Jerusalem and destruction of the Temple in 587 B.C.E.! The curtain had fallen for the last time on the kingdom of Judah. Not every prophecy from every prophet comes true. Jeremiah was a kind of Moses character to the ancient people, and after most of the cream of the Jewish society was taken into exile in Babylon, Jeremiah stayed behind to help those who remained.
We have to remember that this was a cataclysmic ordeal to the kingdom of Judah. The Jewish people suffered a destruction in 587 B.C.E. by the Babylonians that was not repaired until 1948 in the creation of the state of Israel! Try to get your head around the fact that in 587 they not only lost their country, but they also lost their "favored nation status" by God. And they effectively lost God, too. Or they thought that they lost God; they thought that God had abandoned them.
This covenant that we read today is highly significant because this was given by the same prophet to whom they failed to listen, who turned out to be correct in a big way!
In the book of Jeremiah, chapters 30, 31, and 33 are known as "the book of consolation." In spite of the destruction of the kingdom of Judah, in spite of the destruction of the sacred temple of God with the loss of the precious Ark of the Covenant, and in spite of the exile of the people, out of the pain of destruction we find the prophet giving the people a new covenant from God.
When a man of Mosaic stature and power issues new words from God, the people are all ears:
"... this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says 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. No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, 'Know the Lord,' for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord; for I will forgive their inequity, and remember their sins no more."
The new covenant is one of a deeper kind. This covenant goes from the heart of God directly to the hearts of the people, "from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord."
The implications are liberating. No longer is our relationship to God limited to our political well-being. No longer is the presence of God limited to the ark in a particular building, like a temple. No longer is God simply limited to our intelligence, thoughts, wisdom, and understanding.
According to the prophet Jeremiah, the Lord God is connecting heart to heart with each one of us, to the point that even the admonition to "know the Lord" is irrelevant! The love from the heart of God is the only love that could send us Jesus. The love that is written on our hearts is one that goes with us anywhere, anytime. The love that is written on our hearts is the only kind of love that can sustain us. It is a love that is totally inclusive and all-embracing to every single one of us, no matter what.
It is a love that dares to forgive our inequity and does not even remember our sins. It is a love that challenges us in all of our understandings, both of ourselves and our relationships. It is a love that seeks to give and heal in a time of national and personal trauma in Jeremiah's time, a love that we need for the devastation and trauma of our own times and lives.
We human beings have many ways to pass on our faith: we have Bibles, we have churches and massive cathedrals, we have the faith of the people, we have clergy, we have crosses, we have sermons, testimonials, and books, we have councils, assemblies, presbyteries, and conventions, and we have bishops, archbishops and popes. But they all pale beside the words of the prophet from God telling us that God's love is individually written on our hearts, from the least of us to the greatest of us.
God has written on the heart of each of us, "My child, I love you."
But there is a question we must answer. Are we willing -- are we willing to go there?
We are willing to go to many places. We are willing to travel around the world, we are willing to visit friends, we are willing to go on holidays, and we are willing to go places for other people. We are willing to go into marriage. We are willing to go to the mall, to bars, to hockey games, baseball games, football games, basketball games, to crack houses, funeral homes, and brothels. But, are we willing to go on the sacred journey inward to the place of God, the holy place where God has written his love, the place where that love is inscribed on our hearts, "I will put my law within them," God said?
Are you willing to go to the place of total equality with all of your brothers and sisters, the place of forgiveness, the place of love, the place lovingly touched by the Creator, the place of God? To the place where love is written and signed with your name on it; signed, sealed, and delivered by the sacrament of baptism? Are you willing to accept what God has written on your hearts? Are you willing to embrace the love put "within" you by God?
This prophet, the one speaking to you now, is telling you, the journey inward, the journey to the center of yourself, the journey towards God -- the bottom line is: that journey is the only one worth taking. Amen.
