Handwriting On The Heart vs. Handwriting Anywhere Else
Jeremiah 31:31-34 31:31 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. 31:32 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. 31:33 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. 31:34 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.
Notes:
- How much high school physics, geometry, algebra do you remember? How about the Constitution, or the rules of conjugating verbs and diagramming sentences in a foreign language or even in English? All those things were in books, but after we learned these things, many of us eventually forgot them.
- Jeremiah struggled mightily with Israel, repeatedly warning of God’s judgment that would be brought on by continued disobedience to the law of God—written on tablets (the 10 commandments). Finally, almost 600 years before Jesus came on the scene, catastrophe befell the people of God. The nation was overthrown with the Temple being destroyed, the King was dethroned and many Israelites were taken into captivity in Babylonia. The symbols of God’s faithfulness were destroyed in the midst of this bleak situation that caused people to wonder where was God, the one who had promised to be with them. While this may have been an extreme situation, we don’t have to have things get that bad to start asking our own questions about God’s faithfulness when we face confusion, pain, frustration over the ordinary things of life. What on one day may seem ordinary, on another day becomes extra-ordinary when death, sickness, pink slip, bounced check, eviction or notice of denial of health insurance benefits or some other circumstance touches your life.
- Jeremiah declares God’s faithfulness is intact; it is the people’s that’s in question. Handwriting remained on the proverbial wall, and not the heart.
- Instead of saying I told you so now that judgment has come, Jeremiah speaks words of hope. Despite the people’s corrupt practices and their penchant for injustice and exploitation, idolatry and all the ways they had violated their commitment to God, God will not break faith with them.
- The good news is that God will bring something new out of the desolate situation. God will restore hope where it had evaporated. God will bring life from death. God will make a pathway in the desert—a way where there had been no way.
- God’s law will no longer be engraved on tablets of stone, plaques on statues, or emblazoned on walls of a rotunda where they are seen but not followed. The days are coming says the Lord, when the law will be engraved on people’s hearts and on full display in the living of their lives. Previously, they were written on stone which the people could easily disobey and they did.
- No longer will people just know about God, but the days are coming when people will actually have a personal relationship with God and know God, not just about God. Faith will no longer be simply about having the right words and assumed right theology to spout off about God. While academic study may be helpful, it will be insufficient to bring about the relationship being described here. “And I will be their God, and they shall be my people.” God will wash away sins and remember them no more (despite our continued infractions).
- Why does there have to be a new covenant? Because the old one was irreparably broken. We demonstrated that just like with the old HS or elementary school lessons we once were taught, we had and will continue to have difficulty remembering, embracing in both our head and our hearts, especially in our own strength.
- As loving God as God is, we are not abandoned in our frailty. God promises to do a new thing through the power of the Holy Spirit. God meets us in the trials and challenges of our lives and liberates us. This divine provision helps us to do what we could not do on our own—remain true to God’s law and word.
- If Jesus, who ushers in the new covenant has come, why do we still struggle? Even those of us who profess to be Christian. Because this prophecy has a current and future aspect to it. We will see some manifestation of the work of the Holy Spirit writing God’s law on our hearts as we cooperate with the Spirit to get it there. Just like the text books we talked about, if I never open a book, never do any homework, never put into practice what I have learned, never talk to the teacher and ask questions about what I don’t understand, never get in study groups to talk over the assignments with other motivated students who are trying to learn also, never say no to video games, tv shows, hanging with friends or talking on the phone—fasting from something I like doing—in order to spend more time in the textbook or to set up a conference with the teacher, then guess what—I will forget what I thought I knew as soon as the test is over. And when I have graduated from that class I will pack up the books and give them away because I’ve finished with them—without the material being emblazoned on my heart.
- Spiritual disciplines we have been talking about will help us cooperate with the Holy Spirit in emblazoning God’s word introduced in a new way through Jesus, on our hearts.
- As we near the end of the Lenten season, a time of deep introspection, reflection and repentance, the shadow of the cross is beginning to loom large in the not- so- distant future. It reminds us that the path to the promises of God are through darkness—we may have to experience hardship and challenges. Some of us are walking through the darkness of the valley of the shadow of death, others are experiencing sickness and the realization that the sin and brokenness of this world sometimes manifests in the brokenness of our bodies. (In this week’s Children’s time we talked about how in the dark, things can look very scary—when we can’t see clearly).
- Yet hope is still there, that the days are surely coming when even the scariest of things that present themselves on the darkest days of our lives, will make way for God’s light to shine forth in the daybreak, and even the cross will ultimately point us to the empty tomb, resurrection and life.
- Work with God, especially in the days of Lent to allow the Spirit to write God’s word on your heart so that you may love God and to love God’s creation—other people and everything God has made–and then allow others to “read it” as they witness you live your life. After all, it has been said that you may be the only Bible some people will ever read so make sure God’s word is written on your heart. Amen.