Sunday, March 22, 2015 | Lent
Fifth Sunday in Lent
Year B
Old Testament Jeremiah 31:31–34
Psalm Psalm 119:9–16
New Testament Hebrews 5:5–10
Gospel John 12:20–33
God works with whatever comes God’s way in order to accomplish God’s will for all of creation. This means that even though things do not seem to be working in favor of creation, God can use that. God can use natural disasters. God can use human made disasters. God can and will use all that is done in the world to accomplish what God intends. Yes, sometimes despite the wickedness of others, the sinfulness of our actions, God will accomplish God’s will for creation, in spite of us.
In our scripture from Jeremiah today, there is a new covenant being pronounced by God. The language is not one of what the people must do but what God did and will do. God says; I will make, I made with, I took them, I was their husband, I will make, I will put, I will write it, I will be their God, I will forgive.
When I was reading the scriptures for today, I began to ponder again what several students and myself had discussed with a professor in seminary. Here is the backdrop to the conversation and you can then see how this will relate to Jeremiah and the gospels and here in John’s gospel that was read today.
Jesus is both man and divine, human and God. Nothing new for us I am sure but on that same note, it is important to note that the free will of both exists, not mixed in any way both still unique and yet still as one in Jesus. So, if you are tracking, the human will of Jesus can do what He wants and so can the divine will.
Jeremiah tells of this new covenant, it is a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. Remember, Jesus is sent to the Jews first. They reject him and therefore they also reject this new covenant. Ahhhh but this is where it gets interesting. God can use this still for God’s will.
Can you imagine for just a moment, even though God can see what has happened and what is happening and what will happen, because God is not in our linear timeline, Jesus can make something happen that God did not expect. I know that might be a lot to wrap your head around but just stay with me on this.
Jesus comes Jews, the righteous under the covenant that God made with Abraham and his decedents. Next thing you know, Jesus is speaking with sinners, having meals with sinners, healing the sinners, the Jews and Gentile/Greek (That is anyone who is not a Jew…..You and me) I can just imagine God sitting in heaven and shaking God’s head and saying, Jesus, I never saw that one coming. I guess I will have to work with that now.
Okay, we don’t know if that is what happens but what is, is already but the point is that God can work with what comes God’s way. The good, the bad and the ugly. At the festival there were some Greeks who wanted to see Jesus.
Jesus says; 24 Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. 25 Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. 26 Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honor. [1]
We are not Jews, we are gentiles, we are the Greeks who want to see Jesus. We the grains of wheat die to our old ways into Jesus so that we can bear much fruit in the death and resurrection of Jesus and become saints. Loosing the life we know, reject the worldly life for the sake of eternal life.
Often what we are told to do in the world is not what God wants us to do. From John 1, 10 He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. 11 He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. 12 But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, 13 who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.[2]
Have you had times in your life, where nothing seems to be going, as you need? Nothing is going right and all you can see is more problems coming? Maybe you are in the midst of those troubles today and there is darkness all around you. God will use this time to still accomplish God’s will for creation in all that we encounter, all that we live in and through. We can bear much fruit in the death and resurrection of Jesus and become saints.
God uses circumstances, God uses people, God uses the environment, God uses any and all means to accomplish God’s will for all. Sometimes it is in the smallest way and other times it may be what some would say, is a miracle.
Jesus brought into the mix of the new covenant, the good, the bad and the ugly, each and every one of us and makes us saints yet we remain sinners until the new creation upon Jesus’s second coming. God can use us to accomplish God’s will in the world, wherever and whenever God wants. It is not always the miracles that make the difference; sometimes it is the small things through God, which can make all difference.
Let me leave you with this story, I read once:
Mary Ann Bird knew she was different from all the other kids when she was going to grade school. You see, she was born with a birth defect. Her classmates made it very clear how she looked different from everyone else.
When schoolmates would ask, “what happened to you?” Mary Ann would reply that along time ago she had fallen and hurt herself and the doctors messed up. Somehow it seemed more acceptable to have suffered an accident than to have been born different.
In second grade there was a teacher that everyone adored—Mrs. Leonard.
Annually everyone had a hearing test. Mrs. Leonard gave the test to everyone in the class and finally it was Mary Ann’s turn. She knew from past years that as they stood against the door with one ear covered, the teacher sitting at her desk would whisper something like—“the sky is blue” or “do you have new shoes?”
Mary Ann waited there for those words that God must have put into her mouth. Mrs. Leonard said in the sweetest whisper a second grader would ever hear, “I wish you were my little girl.”
Can you imagine what God can accomplish through and in Mary Ann, just because of the words she hears? Large things and small things, all matter and God uses them all.
[1] The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version (Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1989), Jn 12:24–26.
[2] The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version (Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1989), Jn 1:10–13.