John 2:1-11

Introduction
In my first appointment as a minister I followed a man who
would not drink tea or coffee – and yes, he was a Methodist, not a Mormon. In
my last appointment I worked alongside an Anglican minister who not only did
not drink either tea or coffee, he only drank cold water. Imagine my
astonishment once when he came to my manse and was willing to drink squash.
Robinson’s Fruits Of The Forest Barley Water, if I remember correctly.

Either to succeed the first minister or work in the same
church as the second minister meant that when people asked me what I would like
to drink, they had to broach the ‘tea or coffee’ question in hushed tones, much
like Methodists used to be asked whether they drank alcohol.

All of which leads to our Gospel account of Jesus turning
water into wine. I have heard it sincerely argued that Jesus must have turned
the water into non-alcoholic wine. That would be very convenient, but it has no
basis in fact. Having said that,

‘[W]ine in the ancient world was
diluted with water to between one-third and one-tenth of its fermented
strength, i.e. something less strong
than American beer. Undiluted wine, about the strength of wine today, was
viewed as ‘strong drink’, and earned much more disapprobation.’
[D A Carson, The Gospel According To John,
p 169.]

Against the fact of weaker wine should be set the fact that
it was a hot climate and you would not need such strong alcohol for there to be
an effect on the human body.

But we can’t just use this story to argue for or against
teetotalism. Just to deal with that quickly, it is often argued that because
alcohol is abused in our society all Christians should abstain from it.
However, not only did Jesus not abstain, there are other things that are
misused in our culture and we biblically would not expect all Christians to go
without. Often these are good aspects of God’s creation that are to be received
with thanksgiving. The obvious example is sex. It is reduced to an animal
passion and a commodity in our world, but it is also part of God’s design for
marriage. So I would conclude that the misuse of alcohol is a reason for some Christians to abstain as a witness
that you do not need it in order to live a happy and fulfilled life, but it is
not an argument for every Christian to do so.

At the same time, that is not an argument for licence. For
those of us whose conscience allows us to drink, then we need to remember that
the fruit of the Spirit includes self-control. When I was a young Christian in
my twenties I found nothing more embarrassing than having to drive drunken
Christians home from parties.

However, as I said, this story is not there to be the
grounds for a debate about Christian faith and alcohol. John has a specific
reason for including it. He says in verse 11 that this is the first of Jesus’ signs that revealed his glory. John has
seven ‘signs’.

Now if they are not just miracles but signs, then they point
somewhere. They point to Jesus. And so like any sign, we need to ask what they
mean. We also need to know their purpose. And we need to think about our
response. We do this with road signs. We see the number ‘30’ in a circle. We
know its meaning: do not exceed thirty miles per hour. We know its purpose: road
safety. And we know what our response should be: obey it. Perhaps at Broomfield are very
conscious of this, with the speed camera outside the church building!

We can apply the same three areas of exploration to the
miraculous signs of Jesus: what do they mean? What is their purpose? And how
should we respond?

1. Meaning
Why does Jesus turn the water into wine? Is it to help the
poor bridegroom out of a socially embarrassing corner? Is it to help the chief
steward? Is Jesus connected with one or other of the families (and hence the
invitation that includes him and his mother)? If so, perhaps this constitutes
his wedding present to the couple. It’s a very generous one if it is: between
one hundred and twenty and one hundred and eighty gallons of wine. One thing is
for sure, you’d be happy to have Jesus as a guest at your party on this
evidence!

But there has to be more. In John’s Gospel it usually pays
to get beyond the surface meaning. Not without cause has it been dubbed ‘the
spiritual Gospel’. And I believe the clue comes in the water jars that were
used. John tells us they were ‘for the Jewish rites of purification’ (verse 6).
They may have been on hand for the ritual washing of utensils and of guests’
hands [Carson,
p 173]. But the water of Jewish purification is transformed by Jesus into the
new wine. It is a sign of the Gospel.

In other words, this miracle points us away from the
observation of outwardly-observed rules to the inner transformation brought by
Christ through the Cross, Resurrection and gift of the Holy Spirit. And
although Jesus tells his mother that ‘[his] hour has not yet come’ (verse 4) –
that is, the hour of the Cross – the wine instead of water points to all that
he would accomplish at his appointed hour of redemptive suffering.

Or put it another way: one thing John omits from his Gospel
is the institution of the Lord’s Supper. There is no account of Jesus telling
his disciples that the Passover bread is his body and the wine is his blood.
But in this story, while the wine is not his blood, the wine of the miracle
foretells his blood. Here, so early in his Gospel John is dropping hints of the
Cross. He will give half his Gospel to Holy Week, the Cross and the
Resurrection. But here, near the beginning, this first sign has the meaning of
pointing to his ‘hour’ of destiny and the transformation it will bring.

This is the sense in which you want Jesus at your party. In
this miracle he gives advance notice of the great party of all time, the
messianic banquet, where the blood of the Cross leads to the wine of the
kingdom via the forgiveness of sins, the conquest of evil, the gift of new life
and the power of the Spirit.

Some years ago Tony
Campolo wrote a book whose title encapsulates this: The
Kingdom Of God Is A Party. You’d expect wine and a party. For the
Christian, without wishing to sound irreverent at all, the blood of the Cross,
which leads us to the new wine of the kingdom, is grounds for a party. The
Cross is not meant to turn Christians into miseries – we do a pretty good job
of that without any help, thank you – it is the reason for humble celebration.

2. Purpose
As a child I used to read weekly a magazine called ‘Tell Me
Why’. It satisfied my curiosity with the world and explained all sorts of
fascinating scientific facts to children. I am now the father of a not-yet
four-year-old daughter whose favourite question is ‘Why?’ She can ask ‘Why?’
with what seems like infinite regression in an argument. My brain hurts by the
end of the conversation and I resort to the usual parental ‘Because I say so’
answer more times than I care to admit.

Thankfully the ‘Why?’ question about this sign is answered
for us by John. It comes in his comment at the end of the story:

Jesus did this, the first of his signs,
in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.
(verse 11)

‘The first of his signs’; he ‘revealed his glory’; ‘and his
disciples believed in him.’

The first of his signs – first not just in the sense of
chronological order, but perhaps even the primary sign, the one that shows God
is bringing about a new creation.

And a sign that reveals his glory. His glory would most
clearly be revealed on the Cross, but the glory of his grace and truth were
seeping out before then. Not everyone saw it that way. Just because he
performed a sign such as this that revealed his glory didn’t mean that everyone
received it that way. When he fed the five thousand (John 6) the crowd didn’t
take it as a reason to become his disciples; they were happy to have their
stomachs filled and think that he was the one who would do exactly what they
wanted as the hoped for political and military messiah. They saw the sign, but
not his glory.

And perhaps it was like this at the wedding. We do not read
of the bride and groom or any of their guests wanting to follow him as a result
of turning water into wine. They are happy to have their physical needs met,
too. It’s enough to take what Jesus gives.

But Jesus’ disciples see not only the sign, they glimpse his
glory too, and they believe in him. This is the purpose of the sign – that
people have the opportunity to perceive the glory of Jesus and believe in him.

In other words, Jesus didn’t simply do this to make the
party go with a swing and get the bridegroom out of social shame and
embarrassment, much as he clearly was one who enjoyed socialising to the point
that in contrast to John the Baptist his critics called him ‘a glutton and a
drunkard’. Whatever needs his signs met out of compassion, Jesus had a further
agenda. His glory was seeping out through the cracks of the sign for those who
had eyes to see, and if you caught even some squint of his blazing glory then
you would put your faith in him. You would entrust your life to him.

And that is the challenge for us and for others: where have
we seen Jesus do something wonderful? Do we just want whatever is in it for
ourselves or are we prepared to be dazzled by his glory? And if we are, will we
put our lives in his hands and follow him? 
The sign asks us not just what we want from Jesus but challenges us
about what Jesus wants from us.

Which leads us to the third point:

3. Response
A few decades ago there was a South African Pentecostal
minister called David du Plessis who did a lot of costly ecumenical work to
bridge the gaps between his Christian traditions and others who had ostracised
the Pentecostals, and whom the Pentecostals equally had scorned.

On one occasion he was with a group of Roman Catholics. They
had found a lot in common, but then someone said there must be some things they
disagreed on. What did he think about the Virgin Mary?

“I obey her,” he replied.

That wasn’t quite the reply they were expecting, not from a
member of a hardline Protestant tradition.

“What do you mean, you obey her? How can you say that?”
asked the Catholics.

“John chapter two, the wedding at Cana,”
said du Plessis. Mary told the servants, ‘Do whatever he tells you.’ So I obey
Mary: I do whatever her Son tells me.”

And there is the response of believing faith to which we are
called: do whatever he tells you. When Jesus’ signs mean we can celebrate his
work and respond to what we see of his glory by putting our faith in him, what
that boils down to is obedient faith:
do whatever he tells you.

Do we know where specifically Jesus is challenging us to
that response to his work right now? I think I know where it is for me. A
couple of weeks ago I got a phone call from someone who is not a churchgoer
with a particular problem that needed a minister. Naturally I can’t talk
publicly about the nature of the person’s circumstances, but it is enough to
say that it was a situation that was way outside my fourteen years’ experience
as a minister, and it was something that I felt really uncomfortable about
getting involved with. I wanted to bail out. I certainly don’t believe in being
a hero who goes in out of his depth or beyond his gifting.

But rather than let me bail out God has rather directed me
to other ministers with experience in this area who are coming alongside me in
helping this person. Every phone call, every email and every visit are times
when I have to be dragged almost kicking and screaming still to play my part in
helping this person. All sorts of irrational fears come into my consciousness
from my warped imagination. When different friends give conflicting advice that
becomes another reason I want to say, ‘Enough!’ and hand this over to someone
else.

But Jesus keeps asking me to take one more step. And however
reluctantly, I keep doing so. Not so much giant strides as pigeon steps.
Somewhere in this I believe Jesus will do something beautiful for the person
who called me. I’d like to think something good will come out of it for me,
too. But that cannot be my primary concern. I am called to obedience because
Jesus has done wonderful things for me, and because he also does wonderful
things when we obey him. You know, water into wine or something similar.

So where has our experience of Christ led us? To the filling
of our stomachs or a woozy feeling in our heads, because we’ve taken what he’s
given us and no more? Or have our eyes seen his glory? And if so, have we
responded with obedient faith? And not only have
we responded, are we responding even
now and doing whatever he tells us?

Technorati Tags: Methodist, abstinence, teetotalism, wine, D+A+Carson, Jesus, Gospel, Cross, Resurrection, Holy+Spirit, Tony+Campolo, glory, faith, Pentecostal, David+du+Plessis, Roman+Catholicism, Virgin+Mary, obedience

John 2:1-11

Introduction
In my first appointment as a minister I followed a man who
would not drink tea or coffee – and yes, he was a Methodist, not a Mormon. In
my last appointment I worked alongside an Anglican minister who not only did
not drink either tea or coffee, he only drank cold water. Imagine my
astonishment once when he came to my manse and was willing to drink squash.
Robinson’s Fruits Of The Forest Barley Water, if I remember correctly.

Either to succeed the first minister or work in the same
church as the second minister meant that when people asked me what I would like
to drink, they had to broach the ‘tea or coffee’ question in hushed tones, much
like Methodists used to be asked whether they drank alcohol.

All of which leads to our Gospel account of Jesus turning
water into wine. I have heard it sincerely argued that Jesus must have turned
the water into non-alcoholic wine. That would be very convenient, but it has no
basis in fact. Having said that,

‘[W]ine in the ancient world was
diluted with water to between one-third and one-tenth of its fermented
strength, i.e. something less strong
than American beer. Undiluted wine, about the strength of wine today, was
viewed as ‘strong drink’, and earned much more disapprobation.’
[D A Carson, The Gospel According To John,
p 169.]

Against the fact of weaker wine should be set the fact that
it was a hot climate and you would not need such strong alcohol for there to be
an effect on the human body.

But we can’t just use this story to argue for or against
teetotalism. Just to deal with that quickly, it is often argued that because
alcohol is abused in our society all Christians should abstain from it.
However, not only did Jesus not abstain, there are other things that are
misused in our culture and we biblically would not expect all Christians to go
without. Often these are good aspects of God’s creation that are to be received
with thanksgiving. The obvious example is sex. It is reduced to an animal
passion and a commodity in our world, but it is also part of God’s design for
marriage. So I would conclude that the misuse of alcohol is a reason for some Christians to abstain as a witness
that you do not need it in order to live a happy and fulfilled life, but it is
not an argument for every Christian to do so.

At the same time, that is not an argument for licence. For
those of us whose conscience allows us to drink, then we need to remember that
the fruit of the Spirit includes self-control. When I was a young Christian in
my twenties I found nothing more embarrassing than having to drive drunken
Christians home from parties.

However, as I said, this story is not there to be the
grounds for a debate about Christian faith and alcohol. John has a specific
reason for including it. He says in verse 11 that this is the first of Jesus’ signs that revealed his glory. John has
seven ‘signs’.

Now if they are not just miracles but signs, then they point
somewhere. They point to Jesus. And so like any sign, we need to ask what they
mean. We also need to know their purpose. And we need to think about our
response. We do this with road signs. We see the number ‘30’ in a circle. We
know its meaning: do not exceed thirty miles per hour. We know its purpose: road
safety. And we know what our response should be: obey it. Perhaps at Broomfield are very
conscious of this, with the speed camera outside the church building!

We can apply the same three areas of exploration to the
miraculous signs of Jesus: what do they mean? What is their purpose? And how
should we respond?

1. Meaning
Why does Jesus turn the water into wine? Is it to help the
poor bridegroom out of a socially embarrassing corner? Is it to help the chief
steward? Is Jesus connected with one or other of the families (and hence the
invitation that includes him and his mother)? If so, perhaps this constitutes
his wedding present to the couple. It’s a very generous one if it is: between
one hundred and twenty and one hundred and eighty gallons of wine. One thing is
for sure, you’d be happy to have Jesus as a guest at your party on this
evidence!

But there has to be more. In John’s Gospel it usually pays
to get beyond the surface meaning. Not without cause has it been dubbed ‘the
spiritual Gospel’. And I believe the clue comes in the water jars that were
used. John tells us they were ‘for the Jewish rites of purification’ (verse 6).
They may have been on hand for the ritual washing of utensils and of guests’
hands [Carson,
p 173]. But the water of Jewish purification is transformed by Jesus into the
new wine. It is a sign of the Gospel.

In other words, this miracle points us away from the
observation of outwardly-observed rules to the inner transformation brought by
Christ through the Cross, Resurrection and gift of the Holy Spirit. And
although Jesus tells his mother that ‘[his] hour has not yet come’ (verse 4) –
that is, the hour of the Cross – the wine instead of water points to all that
he would accomplish at his appointed hour of redemptive suffering.

Or put it another way: one thing John omits from his Gospel
is the institution of the Lord’s Supper. There is no account of Jesus telling
his disciples that the Passover bread is his body and the wine is his blood.
But in this story, while the wine is not his blood, the wine of the miracle
foretells his blood. Here, so early in his Gospel John is dropping hints of the
Cross. He will give half his Gospel to Holy Week, the Cross and the
Resurrection. But here, near the beginning, this first sign has the meaning of
pointing to his ‘hour’ of destiny and the transformation it will bring.

This is the sense in which you want Jesus at your party. In
this miracle he gives advance notice of the great party of all time, the
messianic banquet, where the blood of the Cross leads to the wine of the
kingdom via the forgiveness of sins, the conquest of evil, the gift of new life
and the power of the Spirit.

Some years ago Tony
Campolo wrote a book whose title encapsulates this: The
Kingdom Of God Is A Party. You’d expect wine and a party. For the
Christian, without wishing to sound irreverent at all, the blood of the Cross,
which leads us to the new wine of the kingdom, is grounds for a party. The
Cross is not meant to turn Christians into miseries – we do a pretty good job
of that without any help, thank you – it is the reason for humble celebration.

2. Purpose
As a child I used to read weekly a magazine called ‘Tell Me
Why’. It satisfied my curiosity with the world and explained all sorts of
fascinating scientific facts to children. I am now the father of a not-yet
four-year-old daughter whose favourite question is ‘Why?’ She can ask ‘Why?’
with what seems like infinite regression in an argument. My brain hurts by the
end of the conversation and I resort to the usual parental ‘Because I say so’
answer more times than I care to admit.

Thankfully the ‘Why?’ question about this sign is answered
for us by John. It comes in his comment at the end of the story:

Jesus did this, the first of his signs,
in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.
(verse 11)

‘The first of his signs’; he ‘revealed his glory’; ‘and his
disciples believed in him.’

The first of his signs – first not just in the sense of
chronological order, but perhaps even the primary sign, the one that shows God
is bringing about a new creation.

And a sign that reveals his glory. His glory would most
clearly be revealed on the Cross, but the glory of his grace and truth were
seeping out before then. Not everyone saw it that way. Just because he
performed a sign such as this that revealed his glory didn’t mean that everyone
received it that way. When he fed the five thousand (John 6) the crowd didn’t
take it as a reason to become his disciples; they were happy to have their
stomachs filled and think that he was the one who would do exactly what they
wanted as the hoped for political and military messiah. They saw the sign, but
not his glory.

And perhaps it was like this at the wedding. We do not read
of the bride and groom or any of their guests wanting to follow him as a result
of turning water into wine. They are happy to have their physical needs met,
too. It’s enough to take what Jesus gives.

But Jesus’ disciples see not only the sign, they glimpse his
glory too, and they believe in him. This is the purpose of the sign – that
people have the opportunity to perceive the glory of Jesus and believe in him.

In other words, Jesus didn’t simply do this to make the
party go with a swing and get the bridegroom out of social shame and
embarrassment, much as he clearly was one who enjoyed socialising to the point
that in contrast to John the Baptist his critics called him ‘a glutton and a
drunkard’. Whatever needs his signs met out of compassion, Jesus had a further
agenda. His glory was seeping out through the cracks of the sign for those who
had eyes to see, and if you caught even some squint of his blazing glory then
you would put your faith in him. You would entrust your life to him.

And that is the challenge for us and for others: where have
we seen Jesus do something wonderful? Do we just want whatever is in it for
ourselves or are we prepared to be dazzled by his glory? And if we are, will we
put our lives in his hands and follow him? 
The sign asks us not just what we want from Jesus but challenges us
about what Jesus wants from us.

Which leads us to the third point:

3. Response
A few decades ago there was a South African Pentecostal
minister called David du Plessis who did a lot of costly ecumenical work to
bridge the gaps between his Christian traditions and others who had ostracised
the Pentecostals, and whom the Pentecostals equally had scorned.

On one occasion he was with a group of Roman Catholics. They
had found a lot in common, but then someone said there must be some things they
disagreed on. What did he think about the Virgin Mary?

“I obey her,” he replied.

That wasn’t quite the reply they were expecting, not from a
member of a hardline Protestant tradition.

“What do you mean, you obey her? How can you say that?”
asked the Catholics.

“John chapter two, the wedding at Cana,”
said du Plessis. Mary told the servants, ‘Do whatever he tells you.’ So I obey
Mary: I do whatever her Son tells me.”

And there is the response of believing faith to which we are
called: do whatever he tells you. When Jesus’ signs mean we can celebrate his
work and respond to what we see of his glory by putting our faith in him, what
that boils down to is obedient faith:
do whatever he tells you.

Do we know where specifically Jesus is challenging us to
that response to his work right now? I think I know where it is for me. A
couple of weeks ago I got a phone call from someone who is not a churchgoer
with a particular problem that needed a minister. Naturally I can’t talk
publicly about the nature of the person’s circumstances, but it is enough to
say that it was a situation that was way outside my fourteen years’ experience
as a minister, and it was something that I felt really uncomfortable about
getting involved with. I wanted to bail out. I certainly don’t believe in being
a hero who goes in out of his depth or beyond his gifting.

But rather than let me bail out God has rather directed me
to other ministers with experience in this area who are coming alongside me in
helping this person. Every phone call, every email and every visit are times
when I have to be dragged almost kicking and screaming still to play my part in
helping this person. All sorts of irrational fears come into my consciousness
from my warped imagination. When different friends give conflicting advice that
becomes another reason I want to say, ‘Enough!’ and hand this over to someone
else.

But Jesus keeps asking me to take one more step. And however
reluctantly, I keep doing so. Not so much giant strides as pigeon steps.
Somewhere in this I believe Jesus will do something beautiful for the person
who called me. I’d like to think something good will come out of it for me,
too. But that cannot be my primary concern. I am called to obedience because
Jesus has done wonderful things for me, and because he also does wonderful
things when we obey him. You know, water into wine or something similar.

So where has our experience of Christ led us? To the filling
of our stomachs or a woozy feeling in our heads, because we’ve taken what he’s
given us and no more? Or have our eyes seen his glory? And if so, have we
responded with obedient faith? And not only have
we responded, are we responding even
now and doing whatever he tells us?

Technorati Tags: Methodist, abstinence, teetotalism, wine, D+A+Carson, Jesus, Gospel, Cross, Resurrection, Holy+Spirit, Tony+Campolo, glory, faith, Pentecostal, David+du+Plessis, Roman+Catholicism, Virgin+Mary, obedience

Jeremiah 31:31-34

Introduction
It’s New Year and the same companies that encouraged self-indulgence before Christmas now want us to make New Year Resolutions. So Boots, who told us Christmas was all about making ourselves look gorgeous, have now re-launched their ‘Change One Thing’ campaign. Knowing that sixty per cent of those who make resolutions break them within a fortnight because their targets are too ambitious or too complicated, Change One Thing encourages a simple and manageable improvement to people’s lives. They encourage you to ‘pledge, plan and persist’.

If we think of the Methodist Covenant Service as in any way being like a spiritual New Year’s Resolution then we may think that it calls us not to one simple and manageable target but sets the goal so high we know we are going to miss it. It’s only a matter of time.

So it would be tempting to change our Covenant Service prayer and make it the religious equivalent of Change One Thing. But we don’t. We leave the bar high. Doesn’t that make what we are going to do today a counsel of despair or an exercise in hypocrisy? Not if we look at what God promises first in his covenant with us. And for that I want to take us to the traditional reading from Jeremiah. We’ll explore the nature of God’s covenant with us. Because our covenant is but a response to all he does for us. What is in his covenant? How does it help us to make or renew our commitment to him? And in particular, how is the New Covenant better than the Old Covenant? Because one thing is for sure: Israel broke the Old Covenant much like we break New Year Resolutions. If we can see the differences we may be able to see our way forward with God in faithfulness and holiness.

1. Redemption

The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt—a covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, says the Lord.

(verses 31-32)

The problem with the Old Covenant wasn’t with God. It was with God’s people. God didn’t break the Old Covenant. His people did. And it’s a tragedy, because of what the Old Covenant gave them. And the New Covenant cannot be inferior: it is better. It includes all the best that God gave in the Old Covenant and more.

In particular, the Old Covenant began with redemption. He ‘took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt’ (verse 32). Before anything else, God saved his people from the oppression of Egypt. The commands of his covenant were only ever given after they had been delivered. So the Ten Commandments are given at Sinai, after their salvation at the Red Sea. God’s commands are only ever to be obeyed in response to and gratitude for what he has done for us.

So even now, when God makes a New Covenant with his people, it will still at the bottom line include redemption – being set free. Whereas before it involved liberation from Egypt it would now include being set free from Babylon and in due course under Jesus Christ would involve redemption from sin.

And so that is where the New Covenant begins for us. It begins with the liberating news that Jesus Christ in his death on the Cross offers the forgiveness of sins to all who trust their lives to him. It is the good news that God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself. It is what Matt Redman has recently dubbed ‘Beautiful News’. He says,

We live in a culture marked by bad news. You only need flick through the news channels for a few moments to be faced with all kinds of negative or alarming news. The wonderful thing about the gospel of Jesus Christ is that it’s an altogether different kind of message. It’s ‘beautiful news’, refreshing to the soul and full hope, joy and peace.

Beautiful news – redemption – is the beginning of God’s covenant relationship with us. It is what he offers to us in Christ before we ever do anything for him. Our covenant responsibility is to respond to this love and grace with grateful hearts who love to do the will of the One who has redeemed us at immense personal cost.

The danger is in the wrong kind of response, and I can think of two. One would be just to take redemption for granted and go on living the same selfish lives. That in essence is how Israel broke the Old Covenant. It is a response that does not truly receive what God has done for us.

The other danger would be to respond but in the feeble strength of our own human efforts. And that is where we need to move from Old Covenant to New Covenant. That is where New Covenant is better than Old. So if we move on to the second and third themes of God’s work in the Covenant that I want to reflect on I hope we’ll see how it’s possible to live in response to his gracious salvation.

2. Renewal

But 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.

(verse 33)

The law of God within us, written on our hearts by God. What a contrast with the Old Covenant where the law of God was written externally on tablets of stone. Now the word is within. God is at work within his people. No longer is he working outside his people to bring salvation and declare his law; he is bringing his transforming power to work within his people.

And for this reason I call this aspect of the New Covenant ‘renewal’. In New Testament terms this is the work of the Holy Spirit. God not only redeems us in Christ and shows us the lifestyle that would please him as a response; he does more. His Spirit takes his word and puts it within us, making it part of us. It is no longer an external standard to be attained; it is part of what God is making us to be as he restores his image in us and makes us more like Christ.

Yes, here is the work of the Holy Spirit. That great twentieth century American saint A W Tozer used to say that the Spirit-filled life was not a deluxe form of Christianity for first-class Christian; it was the birthright of every Christian. Covenant Sunday is a day to remember that. Today is a day to say, ‘Come, Holy Spirit.’ Today is not a day to look back on past glories of previous spiritual mountain-top experiences and bask in sepia-tinted nostalgic light. Today is an occasion to take stock of where we are spiritually now. Whether we have known great past spiritual triumphs or whether we have never truly known the Spirit-filled life, on Covenant Sunday we all cry, ‘Come, Holy Spirit, fill us with your presence as the Father promises in the New Covenant. Come fill us, because without you we cannot adequately respond to God’s gracious work of salvation in Christ. Come fill us, because we long to show our gratitude for the love of God with lives overflowing with divine love.’

Some find this offensive. It may offend their pride, but that is what the Gospel does. It offends our pride. Everything we do of worth in the Christian life is given to us by God. It is not from our own hand.

Others are offended, because an earlier spiritual experience is not enough. This was the criticism brought against the nineteenth century revivalist D L Moody, when he preached once on Ephesians 5:18, which says, ‘Be filled with the Spirit.’ Moody correctly pointed out that the original Greek implies a translation of ‘Continue to be filled with the Spirit.’

One vicar objected to Moody’s teaching. ‘Why do I need to be filled with the Spirit again when I received the Holy Spirit at conversion?’ he complained.

‘Because,’ said Moody, ‘I leak.’

And we leak, too. Covenant Sunday may well be an occasion when we are conscious of the leakage, and that we have not lived up to our promises of last year. This may be at the forefront of our minds as we come in confession. But the Spirit is promised in the New Covenant. The Spirit is promised so that we can make a pleasing offering to God. So let us ask for more of the Holy Spirit with confidence that the Father will delight in our prayer and answer.

3. Relationship

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 iniquity, and remember their sin no more.

(verse 34)

In some Christian circles there is a lot of cheesy talk about the Gospel meaning that people can have ‘a personal relationship with Jesus Christ’. It can sound like the Beautiful News is reduced to a cosmic mateyness. But however crassly it can be presented it remains at the heart of the Gospel: the New Covenant invites us into a personal relationship with the Almighty. ‘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,’ says our text. All within the Covenant shall know the Lord.

What we are called into is not religion – a set of rules and rituals with a belief in the existence of God. We are called into a relationship. God is so intent on breaking down the barriers that he ‘will forgive [our] iniquity, and remember [our] sin no more.’ His Son went to the Cross that we might know him personally. He sent his Spirit so that we might live to please him and reflect Christ.

No, the New Covenant brings us into personal relationship with God where we know him. It is why each of us can approach him in prayer, thanks to the Cross. It is no longer true that prayer is the preserve of specialists. All have an audience with the King, thanks to Christ’s work. It is not simply that we talk to the Father but that he talks to us. We hear his word and respond. Preachers and Bible teachers may help in understanding that word, but there is no papacy of scholars who are the only ones truly to understand the divine message. It is open to all who put their faith in Christ and become his disciples.

How does that enable us to respond with greater fidelity to the challenges of entering into a covenant with God? Like this: it is a personal relationship because it is about love. Our response – as well as being enabled by the renewing power of the Holy Spirit – is also the response of relationship. It is the reply of love answering love.

So it isn’t the following of rules. It isn’t cold, deadly obligation. It’s an affair of the heart. A heart set free by divine redemption and renewed in the image of Christ by the Holy Spirit wants to express love, gratitude and devotion to the One who brought about redemption.

And that’s what we’re about today. What God has done in Christ is so immense, so universe-shattering that we are not interested in tired old New Year Resolutions. Our answer is the reply of Covenant to his Covenant. And he who has redeemed us makes it possible for us to do so. This is the New Covenant.

Technorati Tags: Jeremiah, Boots, ChangeOneThing, Methodist, CovenantService, NewCovenant, OldCovenant, Covenant, NewYearResolution, redemption, MattRedman, renewal, HolySpirit, AWTozer, DLMoody, relationship

Jeremiah 31:31-34

Introduction
It’s New Year and the same companies that encouraged self-indulgence before Christmas now want us to make New Year Resolutions. So Boots, who told us Christmas was all about making ourselves look gorgeous, have now re-launched their ‘Change One Thing’ campaign. Knowing that sixty per cent of those who make resolutions break them within a fortnight because their targets are too ambitious or too complicated, Change One Thing encourages a simple and manageable improvement to people’s lives. They encourage you to ‘pledge, plan and persist’.

If we think of the Methodist Covenant Service as in any way being like a spiritual New Year’s Resolution then we may think that it calls us not to one simple and manageable target but sets the goal so high we know we are going to miss it. It’s only a matter of time.

So it would be tempting to change our Covenant Service prayer and make it the religious equivalent of Change One Thing. But we don’t. We leave the bar high. Doesn’t that make what we are going to do today a counsel of despair or an exercise in hypocrisy? Not if we look at what God promises first in his covenant with us. And for that I want to take us to the traditional reading from Jeremiah. We’ll explore the nature of God’s covenant with us. Because our covenant is but a response to all he does for us. What is in his covenant? How does it help us to make or renew our commitment to him? And in particular, how is the New Covenant better than the Old Covenant? Because one thing is for sure: Israel broke the Old Covenant much like we break New Year Resolutions. If we can see the differences we may be able to see our way forward with God in faithfulness and holiness.

1. Redemption

The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt—a covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, says the Lord.

(verses 31-32)

The problem with the Old Covenant wasn’t with God. It was with God’s people. God didn’t break the Old Covenant. His people did. And it’s a tragedy, because of what the Old Covenant gave them. And the New Covenant cannot be inferior: it is better. It includes all the best that God gave in the Old Covenant and more.

In particular, the Old Covenant began with redemption. He ‘took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt’ (verse 32). Before anything else, God saved his people from the oppression of Egypt. The commands of his covenant were only ever given after they had been delivered. So the Ten Commandments are given at Sinai, after their salvation at the Red Sea. God’s commands are only ever to be obeyed in response to and gratitude for what he has done for us.

So even now, when God makes a New Covenant with his people, it will still at the bottom line include redemption – being set free. Whereas before it involved liberation from Egypt it would now include being set free from Babylon and in due course under Jesus Christ would involve redemption from sin.

And so that is where the New Covenant begins for us. It begins with the liberating news that Jesus Christ in his death on the Cross offers the forgiveness of sins to all who trust their lives to him. It is the good news that God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself. It is what Matt Redman has recently dubbed ‘Beautiful News’. He says,

We live in a culture marked by bad news. You only need flick through the news channels for a few moments to be faced with all kinds of negative or alarming news. The wonderful thing about the gospel of Jesus Christ is that it’s an altogether different kind of message. It’s ‘beautiful news’, refreshing to the soul and full hope, joy and peace.

Beautiful news – redemption – is the beginning of God’s covenant relationship with us. It is what he offers to us in Christ before we ever do anything for him. Our covenant responsibility is to respond to this love and grace with grateful hearts who love to do the will of the One who has redeemed us at immense personal cost.

The danger is in the wrong kind of response, and I can think of two. One would be just to take redemption for granted and go on living the same selfish lives. That in essence is how Israel broke the Old Covenant. It is a response that does not truly receive what God has done for us.

The other danger would be to respond but in the feeble strength of our own human efforts. And that is where we need to move from Old Covenant to New Covenant. That is where New Covenant is better than Old. So if we move on to the second and third themes of God’s work in the Covenant that I want to reflect on I hope we’ll see how it’s possible to live in response to his gracious salvation.

2. Renewal

But 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.

(verse 33)

The law of God within us, written on our hearts by God. What a contrast with the Old Covenant where the law of God was written externally on tablets of stone. Now the word is within. God is at work within his people. No longer is he working outside his people to bring salvation and declare his law; he is bringing his transforming power to work within his people.

And for this reason I call this aspect of the New Covenant ‘renewal’. In New Testament terms this is the work of the Holy Spirit. God not only redeems us in Christ and shows us the lifestyle that would please him as a response; he does more. His Spirit takes his word and puts it within us, making it part of us. It is no longer an external standard to be attained; it is part of what God is making us to be as he restores his image in us and makes us more like Christ.

Yes, here is the work of the Holy Spirit. That great twentieth century American saint A W Tozer used to say that the Spirit-filled life was not a deluxe form of Christianity for first-class Christian; it was the birthright of every Christian. Covenant Sunday is a day to remember that. Today is a day to say, ‘Come, Holy Spirit.’ Today is not a day to look back on past glories of previous spiritual mountain-top experiences and bask in sepia-tinted nostalgic light. Today is an occasion to take stock of where we are spiritually now. Whether we have known great past spiritual triumphs or whether we have never truly known the Spirit-filled life, on Covenant Sunday we all cry, ‘Come, Holy Spirit, fill us with your presence as the Father promises in the New Covenant. Come fill us, because without you we cannot adequately respond to God’s gracious work of salvation in Christ. Come fill us, because we long to show our gratitude for the love of God with lives overflowing with divine love.’

Some find this offensive. It may offend their pride, but that is what the Gospel does. It offends our pride. Everything we do of worth in the Christian life is given to us by God. It is not from our own hand.

Others are offended, because an earlier spiritual experience is not enough. This was the criticism brought against the nineteenth century revivalist D L Moody, when he preached once on Ephesians 5:18, which says, ‘Be filled with the Spirit.’ Moody correctly pointed out that the original Greek implies a translation of ‘Continue to be filled with the Spirit.’

One vicar objected to Moody’s teaching. ‘Why do I need to be filled with the Spirit again when I received the Holy Spirit at conversion?’ he complained.

‘Because,’ said Moody, ‘I leak.’

And we leak, too. Covenant Sunday may well be an occasion when we are conscious of the leakage, and that we have not lived up to our promises of last year. This may be at the forefront of our minds as we come in confession. But the Spirit is promised in the New Covenant. The Spirit is promised so that we can make a pleasing offering to God. So let us ask for more of the Holy Spirit with confidence that the Father will delight in our prayer and answer.

3. Relationship

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 iniquity, and remember their sin no more.

(verse 34)

In some Christian circles there is a lot of cheesy talk about the Gospel meaning that people can have ‘a personal relationship with Jesus Christ’. It can sound like the Beautiful News is reduced to a cosmic mateyness. But however crassly it can be presented it remains at the heart of the Gospel: the New Covenant invites us into a personal relationship with the Almighty. ‘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,’ says our text. All within the Covenant shall know the Lord.

What we are called into is not religion – a set of rules and rituals with a belief in the existence of God. We are called into a relationship. God is so intent on breaking down the barriers that he ‘will forgive [our] iniquity, and remember [our] sin no more.’ His Son went to the Cross that we might know him personally. He sent his Spirit so that we might live to please him and reflect Christ.

No, the New Covenant brings us into personal relationship with God where we know him. It is why each of us can approach him in prayer, thanks to the Cross. It is no longer true that prayer is the preserve of specialists. All have an audience with the King, thanks to Christ’s work. It is not simply that we talk to the Father but that he talks to us. We hear his word and respond. Preachers and Bible teachers may help in understanding that word, but there is no papacy of scholars who are the only ones truly to understand the divine message. It is open to all who put their faith in Christ and become his disciples.

How does that enable us to respond with greater fidelity to the challenges of entering into a covenant with God? Like this: it is a personal relationship because it is about love. Our response – as well as being enabled by the renewing power of the Holy Spirit – is also the response of relationship. It is the reply of love answering love.

So it isn’t the following of rules. It isn’t cold, deadly obligation. It’s an affair of the heart. A heart set free by divine redemption and renewed in the image of Christ by the Holy Spirit wants to express love, gratitude and devotion to the One who brought about redemption.

And that’s what we’re about today. What God has done in Christ is so immense, so universe-shattering that we are not interested in tired old New Year Resolutions. Our answer is the reply of Covenant to his Covenant. And he who has redeemed us makes it possible for us to do so. This is the New Covenant.

Technorati Tags: Jeremiah, Boots, ChangeOneThing, Methodist, CovenantService, NewCovenant, OldCovenant, Covenant, NewYearResolution, redemption, MattRedman, renewal, HolySpirit, AWTozer, DLMoody, relationship