“TAKING A
RISK” a
COVENANT SUNDAY SERMON
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A sermon preached Readings Jer 31:31-4, John 15:1-10 |
Jer 31:33
"This is the covenant I shall make with the House of Israel…..
I shall plant my law within them, writing it on their hearts."
Two new residents arrive in a
luxury block of flats.
At no 16, a new resident arrives -
He signs a tenancy agreement,
pays a deposit and the first month's rent,
agrees to keep no dangerous pets,
to put out the rubbish in the agreed manner,
and contribute to the cost of upkeep of the grounds.
If he falls down on his side of the agreement,
he will be asked to leave and his tenancy terminated.
Next door at no 18, another new resident moves in -
he signs nothing,
and neither agrees nor commits himself to anything -
indeed he is not capable of providing promises or deposits -
for he is only a baby.
The new resident at no 18
has been brought home from the maternity hospital by his mum.
His mum and dad hope that on his part
the baby will come to love and cherish them as he grows up -
but if they are honest they know
that there will always be a place for him in their home
whatever he does.
If he should happen to grow up hard hearted and
ungrateful,
well then his and his parents' lives will be diminished,
and for none of them will their life be what it might have been.
But in all this, his parents know
they will still love and accept their child -
they will never evict him.
Two very
different modes of relationship – based on love and contract -
I wonder
- What sort of relationship do we have with God??
In parts
of the OT, it seems that it is very like a tenancy agreement -
if we keep our side of the deal, pay the rent and put the bins out
(ie say our prayers and care for the planet)
then God will keep his side of the deal and be our God.
But the
prophet Jeremiah sees deeper -
and he is already beginning to understand
what is finally to be fulfilled in Christ -
that our Covenant with God isn't like that -
God is not our landlord, he is our loving father, our Mother.
His
covenant with us is a matter of heart not contract.
God
offers us the world and his love with no strings attached,
and simply invites us to respond with loving gratitude.
Today we
are invited to renew our covenant with God.
Lets
be clear about this -
If we decline, God will not stop loving us -
any more than if a two year old boy has a temper tantrum,
do his parents stop loving him.
Life will
be the poorer because we do not love our heavenly father,
but still he will love us and beg us love him in return.
God’s
covenant commitment comes from the heart –
there are no get-out clauses -
That is
the risk God takes in loving us –
And this
is the risk of love he asks us to take on our side too.
I don’t know if you caught the rerun of the movie
Good Will Hunting on TV over
Christmas –
a marvellous film with Matt Damon playing Will,
a young mathematical genius
who can’t bring himself to engage with the world –
He works as a
cleaner and on a building site,
he has made no real trusty friends
since he was a child,
he certainly won’t risk any serious
new relationship.
We discover that as a child
he had been viciously abused by his step father –
he isn’t going to risk letting anyone else
near enough to hurt him again…
He gets involved with a girl (played by Minnie Driver)
who asks him to move with her from Boston to California.
But he refuses to go.
Will is in on probation –
and has to attend counselling sessions.
His counsellor (played by Robin Williams)
asks him why he won’t go to California.
Why, says Will –
because I can’t risk her turning out to be less than perfect
and then rejecting me.
The Counsellor rounds on him and says
“Well, I think that's a great philosophy
Will -
that way you can
go through your entire life
without ever having to really know
anybody.”
There is also an irony in the conversation –
the Counsellor’s wife has died two years before,
and he also, because of his loss,
is finding he cannot make new relationships
Two wounded
hurting people fearful of commitment.
Both of them discovering that the only way
to learn and grow and love and live is – in one way or another -
to risk committing, being open to others, risking the consequence.
As Charles Kennedy has found out this weekend –
a stance of openness, admitting your vulnerability,
can be creative and liberating –
but that very vulnerability can be seized on
and exploited by others – that is the risk you take.
Maybe you
know this piece – I’ve quoted part of it before -
I first heard it on the BBC reality TV show Castaway –
the one where a group spent 12 months together
isolated on the otherwise uninhabited Hebriddean
Island of Taransay.
I
remember one of the guys
at the very end of a year in this small close knit community,
reflecting on the stresses and strains of trying to make a community work.
He sat on a rock and read this piece to camera –
To laugh is to risk appearing the fool,
To weep is to risk being called sentimental.
To reach out to another is to risk involvement.
To expose feelings is to risk showing your true self.
To place your ideas and your dreams before the crowd
is to risk being called naive.
To love is to risk not being loved in return.
To live is to risk dying.
To hope is to risk despair,
To try is to risk failure.
But risks must be taken,
because the greatest risk in life is to risk nothing.
The person who risks nothing,
does nothing, has nothing, is
nothing,
and becomes nothing.
He may avoid suffering and sorrow,
but he simply cannot learn, feel,
change, grow or love.
Chained by his certitude, he is a slave;
he has forfeited his freedom.
Only the person who risks is truly free.
The story
of Jesus is the story of a man
who risked everything out of love for us
empties
himself and comes down from the safety and security of heaven
and becomes a man for us
risking hurt and rejection for us, even unto a cross –
For he knows that this is what it means to love.
In our
passage today, Jeremiah talks of God as covenanting with Israel,
and describes God as Israel’s husband.
When
Israel breaks the covenant, God becomes a rejected lover.
So God
promises a new covenant –
“It will not be like the covenant
I made with their forefathers
when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt,
because they broke my covenant,
though I was a husband to them, declares the Lord” (Jer
31:32)
So finally God in Christ comes to
his people -
Like a trembling young lover
bringing flowers to the doorstep
wondering what response he might receive,
Knocking on the door of the heart of his people.
So our Lord comes to
you and me today and says
I love you –
I can’t stop loving
you and you will always have my love.
What are you going
to do about it??
Will you (as you
may) spurn me and leave me out in the cold
still loving you with an unrequited love from afar?
Or will you respond and risk your
all
in loving me and those who are dear to me?
That is God’s Covenant Challenge –
He is knocking now.
Do you hear him?
What answer will you give?