NEW DEALS

Jeremiah 31:27-32:44; 1 Timothy 3:1-16; Psalm 88:1-18; Proverbs 25:20-22

“’The people will no longer quote this proverb: “The parents have eaten sour grapes, but their children’s mouths pucker at the taste.” All people will die for their own sins—those who eat the sour grapes will be the ones whose mouths will pucker. The day is coming,’ says the Lord, ‘when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and Judah. This covenant will not be like the one I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand and brought them out of the land of Egypt. They broke that covenant, though I loved them as a husband loves his wife,’ says the Lord. ‘But this is the new covenant I will make with the people of Israel on that day,’ says the Lord. “I will put my instructions deep within them, and I will write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. And they will not need to teach their neighbors, nor will they need to teach their relatives, saying, “You should know the Lord.” For everyone, from the least to the greatest, will know me already,’ says the Lord. ‘And I will forgive their wickedness, and I will never again remember their sins.’”

“So an elder must be a man whose life is above reproach. He must be faithful to his wife. He must exercise self-control, live wisely, and have a good reputation. He must enjoy having guests in his home, and he must be able to teach. He must not be a heavy drinker or be violent. He must be gentle, not quarrelsome, and not love money. He must manage his own family well, having children who respect and obey him. For if a man cannot manage his own household, how can he take care of God’s church? An elder must not be a new believer, because he might become proud, and the devil would cause him to fall. Also, people outside the church must speak well of him so that he will not be disgraced and fall into the devil’s trap.”

“Singing cheerful songs to a person with a heavy heart is like taking someone’s coat in cold weather or pouring vinegar in a wound. If your enemies are hungry, give them food to eat. If they are thirsty, give them water to drink.”

For folks who have a tough time reconciling Old and New Testaments, here’s the bottom line. Jesus Christ was a whole new deal. By completely fulfilling the law as no one before or after Him could, Jesus changed the game. The deck got reshuffled, and the rules of retribution and death were rewritten. No more was living a good life a guarantee of heaven. Isaiah was the first to realize it could not be done, but grace rendered a performance mentality next to irrelevant when it came to salvation. Eternal questions no longer concern active doing as much as they center on surrender and obedience. Instead of offering animal sacrifices, we are to offer ourselves to the Spirit so the Spirit can live through us.

So, why are so many of us still living by Old Testament rules and regulations? Why do we remain trapped by slavery to the law? I submit that it’s just harder to accept the freedom of Christ than we think looking at it from the outside. “Free to surrender” is not a concept that resonates particularly well with this generation. “Free to serve” does not sound like a blessing at all. Try explaining to a seeker that the greatest freedom in life is the freedom to unconditionally offer yourself in love for the benefit of another. It isn’t a concept we grasp readily, but it is a concept we need to understand if we are ever to get past the threshold of salvation and into the living room of sanctification.

So many people reject the freedom Christ offers because it just does not translate to our worldly minds as freedom at all. It sounds like slavery. Paul actually calls it exactly that when he encourages us to become slaves of Christ now that we are free from slavery to sin. However, the slavery that comes from giving ourselves over to Christ is anything but involuntary. It is the only way to true freedom.

As a teenager, I did serious battle with acne. Before the days of Retin A, my face, back and chest looked like a bombed out battlefield. It was a humbling and shaming thing to have to deal with, the equivalent of leprosy to an awkward young man none too sure of himself to begin with. Just talking to girls required major gumption gathering, and even with courage mustered, I was little more that a mercy case quickly forgotten as soon as a real prospect came along. Acne, of course, was not the real enemy; self image was. To survive, it was necessary to quit thinking about what others thought and ignore looks in general. Instead, the trick was to begin to see myself as I wanted to be, as I knew I could be, as Christ saw me. What humans can conceive, we can usually achieve, and eventually, I broke through numerous social walls with a bravado that surprised me. People quit noticing the acne because I didn’t see it. I refused to see myself as socially “handicapped” any longer. Instead, I completely yielded my looks and acne to Christ and went full speed ahead with what I could understand of His plan.

Now, what I actually was doing was seeing myself through Christ. He freed me from social convention and allowed me to see myself as I was created to be. In a very real way, He healed the acne long before the pimples disappeared. It did no good for anyone to say the acne did not matter. As long as we were playing by the social mores of high school and early college, it did matter. Once I realized I was free to say no to the kind of rules and regulations that stifled and frustrated social development, I was able to get over my personal anxieties and inadequacies. Jesus truly gave me a new deal… until Retin A finally did come along.