Fifth Lent
Jeremiah 31:31-34; John 12:20-33
Blessings on thee, little man,
Barefoot boy, with cheek of tan!
With thy turned-up pantaloons,
And thy merry whistled tunes;
With thy red lip, redder still
Kissed by strawberries on the hill;
Thou hast more than he can buy
In the reach of ear and eye,—
Outward sunshine, inward joy:
Blessings on thee, barefoot boy!
That was part of the poem I had to memorize in 4th grade. When I was in grade school, yea these many years ago, there was a lot more emphasis put on memorizing things—learning them by heart as we would say. If you learned something by heart you could call it up at the drop of a hat to entertain and inspire in any social situation—since of course everyone wants to hear about the barefoot boy. Some of you will remember in confirmation memorizing, as I did, the Small Catechism—until we knew it by heart. We don’t do that much anymore because, of course, being able to parrot the words didn’t mean we knew what “coveting” in the Ten Commandments meant or what a Sabbath was. Now days we’re much more invested in “understanding and application” which really may be more of what “by heart” means.
Despite the fact that Jeremiah is one of the longest books of the Old Testament we only ever get one lesson from it in our lectionary, our schedule of lessons, and that is the lesson we hear today in which Jeremiah brings the word from God; “the days are surely coming, says the lord when I will make a new covenant.” Now this is amazing good news to a people in exile, bereft of their homes, their land their livelihood. In the depths of despair they interpret their circumstances as punishment, as God’s abandonment of them. Yet here Jeremiah brings a new word of hope, “I will make a new covenant. Not like the old covenant which you broke but a new covenant,” so the promise that God made to them that I will be your God and you will be my people has not been compromised. Indeed God says, “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.” By heart, God wants to be known “by heart”.
The disciples have come to know Jesus. They have seen him perform signs, turning water into wine, defending a sinful woman by facing down the crowds and authorities; they’ve even seen him raise a man who has been dead four days. They know Jesus, maybe they have even memorized some of the things he’s said. Indeed Jesus notoriety has grown beyond these disciples, so much so that the whole world is knocking on his door. Some Greeks attempt to use their networking connections to “see Jesus”. There’s no indication that Jesus ever saw those Greeks. Instead he declares to his disciples “the hour has come.” Jeremiah had said “the days are surely coming and indeed now “the hour has come for the son of Man to be glorified and then when I am lifted up from the earth I will draw all people to myself.” Yes even these Greeks will be able to see me.
In a way, this is what Jesus has been attempting to do all throughout his earthly ministry, to draw people to himself. And now he is “troubled” for he is about to go die on a cross and he speaks of that troubling hour as his hour of “glory”. Where is the glory in that?’
I’ll tell you. It is the glory of a God who is determined to have us. It is the story of a God whose glory is to stop at nothing in order to have us, even death on a cross. “And when I am lifted up, I will draw all unto myself.”
Remember a people of God, a family; this was God’s idea, not ours. God came to a rag tag bunch of nomads, making a promise to be their God and to form them into God’s people. That was the covenant, a promise that God offered. Alas the story of God’s people is a story of all the ways that we broke, abused and turned against that divine promise.
Now the hour has come for that new promise. God will be glorified as Jesus is lifted up. Now lifted up might be taken to mean that this word made flesh, God come among us is at last ascending away from us, being lifted up from the grubby confines of earth to another more heavenly world. But there is a double meaning here in this “lifted up”. For here, in the context of the story that is working itself out among us, Jesus is being lifted up on the cross. He is being “lifted up “but not lifted away from us, but rather lifted even closer toward us. He is moving into the heart of our violence, our cruelty, and hatred. And this really is his true hour of glory. “And when I am lifted up, I will draw all unto myself.”
Just for this Sunday as we stand on the threshold of Calvary, take this as a working definition of the gospel, of the heart of the Christian faith: God deeply desires us and will do anything to get to us, even death on a cross.
And his cross, that instrument of cruelty, that sign of the complete cruelty of the human race is by his sacrifice turned into a great magnet that draws all into its field, a large net that catches sinful humanity within its cast.
Your life can best be explained as one long story of God’s unquenchable desire for you to know him by heart and then to mold our will to his.
But that’s just the rub—the challenge. How strange that we can will what is right and we can decide what to do and then turn around and do just the opposite.
When Jesus came forth from the tomb on Easter, he not only arose to new life, but so do we. New life really is possible for us—even for people like us who find it terribly difficult to change, to start over, to begin again, to be new people.
We believe that even as Jesus is raised from the dead, so are we. God writes a new relationship, not on tablets of stone but on our hearts. We are therefore not permitted to give up on ourselves, despair of our ability to be the people we would like to be, because God has refused to despair of us, to give up on us. God keeps creating us; Easter is God’s great defeat of defeat. Change is possible, new life awaits us.
Not being God I have often despaired of that possibility. I counseled a couple many years ago. Their individual problems, medical, psychological, social and emotional fed off each other but they had security in the relationship and refused to consider change. They basically lived off of Linda’s disability payments and Steve working the system of help agencies. Steve would call regularly to lay out their saga of disaster and to quash any possibilities of relief I might offer. Finally I gave up trying and would just listen hopelessly. When I moved away the calls came less often. Later I heard by the grapevine that Linda had died and for all anyone knew Steve was living on the streets.
One day sitting in my office a man came in. He looked familiar but it was too many years and I didn’t recognize him. Pastor, you remember me? Always a scary opening. But he charged on without embarrassing me. I’m Steve. And then it clicked he didn’t look at all like the Steve I had known.
I wanted to see you again. I wanted you to know how things were going. After my wife died I went into a terrible funk. I was living on the streets staying at one of those shelter places. They made me get a job in order to stay. Something happened. The work was good and I got promoted. I moved out of the shelter and met someone. I’m married, she keeps me straight. It’s a new life. I have to go but I just wanted you to know.
God does not give up on us, that’s the new covenant. The son of man was lifted up to draw us to himself, to write that promise on our hearts so we can’t forget. God does not give up on us. Through our good Fridays God promises Easters—God’s great defeat of defeat.
Pulpit Resource, William Willimon 2000, 2009
Amen