GLIMPSES OF LENT AND EASTER FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT: FROM THE OLD LIFE TO THE NEW

JOSHUA 5:9-12, II CORINTHIANS 5:14-21

Augustine was one of the most influential theologians in the entire history of Western Christianity. Soon after he was converted to Christianity he was walking down the street in Milan, Italy. There he met a prostitute whom he had known most intimately. She called but he would not answer. He kept right on walking.

“Augustine,” she called again. “It is I.”

Without missing a beat and with the assurance of Christ in his heart, he replied, “Yes, but it is no longer I.”

You don’t have to know much about the Christian faith to know that when you become a Christian or when you are one there is something different about you compared to the way you used to be, compared to the way you used to live. Christians live under new conditions.

Paul tells us in his letter to the church at Corinth that for those who follow Christ as Lord the old life is gone and the new life has begun. In short we have experienced a makeover from God. We are new creations of God. The Bible describes this newness using various metaphors such as being born again, passing from slavery into freedom, moving from darkness into light or from despair into meaning, from mourning into joy, or from death to life. We walk no more by the flesh but by the Spirit or we are no longer conformed to the world, but to the will of God. Through the scriptures the newness of life that we have been given in Jesus Christ is emphasized.

Perhaps nowhere is that newness talked about more powerfully than in Paul’s description of our baptisms in Romans 6. Paul tells us that when we were baptized, we died and were buried with Christ. Our Old lives lived solely for ourselves, with all of their sin and guilt, their lack of hope and of a future, their bondage to the world and its evil, were buried six feet under by Christ’s death on the cross and his burial. But by the resurrection of Christ, we were raised from the water of baptism to a new life, a new future, a new goodness.

In an article in the October 21, 1992 issue of the Christian Century, Ralph C. Wood told of the baptism of man imprisoned for the terrible crime of molesting his ten year old daughter. The man’s wife and daughter forgave him of his sin, whereby “the molester got on his knees and begged for the mercy of God and his family” (p. 926) As a result, the prison chaplain agreed to baptize him into the Christian faith. The only “baptismal font” available was a plastic lined wooden coffin, and so the prisoner, burdened by his sin, was lowered by the chaplain into the death of Christ and raised from the waters, washed clean of his past and given a future by the resurrection of Christ. From that time on, he was a new man; after serving his time, he became faithful father and husband and member of his local church. And so the work of Jesus Christ makes us new creations.

Now I am telling you this from the New Testament perspective because you can see a similar parallel in the Old Testament lesson from Joshua. The Old Testament version of baptism is circumcision. Both baptism and circumcision signal an entrance into a relationship with God through the covenant. The agreement God made with people.

In the verses describing the context just before our text we read that all of the Israelite men who crossed the Jordan River into the Promised Land with Joshua and their families were circumcised. They and their families entered into a new life and became as signified by being circumcised the covenant people of God.

Just as last week we acknowledged and claimed at his baptism that Jonah Micheal Slimick is a child of God so the people of the Exodus acknowledged a new beginning as the people of God who now lived in the Promised Land.

To emphasize the newness of their situation we are told that they no longer needed to be fed by God with the manna that had been their food in the wilderness. Rather, now they could eat the produce of the Promised Land. It is like changing your address or getting a new license plate for your car. Everything was fresh and different. The Israelites had begun a new life.

Now she has a taste of the glorious freedom that had been promised by God for such a very long time. God has kept his promises. The life of slavery with its hopelessness and bondage is in the past. The long forty-year trek through the wilderness with its dangers, its thirst and hunger, the deadly serpents and dangers is behind them. The difficult passage through the river Jordan has been accomplished with the help of God’s miracle where by God held up the flow of waters long enough for the people to pass through.

I find it interesting that as the Jews fled from Egypt out of slavery God parted the waters of the Red Sea and now as they enter the Promised Land forty years later God parts the water again….this time the waters of the Jordan River. Wonder what that imagery means? Could it be that being delivered from slavery can only be accomplished by God’s miraculous powers just as it takes God’s intervention for us to enter any kind of Promised Land? Could that be it? When I stop and think about it the only real and lasting deliverance and the only worthwhile Promised Land I have ever experienced have come my way by God’s hand.

Israel the wandering people now have a home, commandments to guide her in her new life, and a relationship with the God who will be her refuge and strength through all her future. The old Israel and we, the new Israel, have been given a new beginning. The old life is gone, the new has come.

I am confident that you like me you often wish for the new to come, that the old disappear. This story tells me that that newness is near, accessible and available.

The story doesn’t stop here. Israel now also has a mission. She has not been redeemed from slavery and guided through the terrors of the wilderness and given the land simply because God loves her although that certainly is the case. God doesn’t redeem his people and enter into a covenant relationship with them for no reason. Rather, God chooses and loves his covenant people, because he loves all people and has a purpose for all the families of the earth.

In Genesis 12, the very beginning of the story of Israel’s story, Abram is told at that time that he and his descendents are to be instruments through which God will bring his blessing on all people. Contemporary Judaism has lost sight of that purpose. Many Christians have, too. We have corrupted the “good” world that God made at the beginning. Now God wants to restore the goodness to the world that it has lost. We live under the curse of sin and death but through Israel, God wants to do away with evil and bring his blessing on all people.

Israel’s life in the new land, the land of Canaan is understood as a time of testing. (See Joshua 23:14-16, Judges 3:1-6) Will she be a faithful people, following the will of her Lord, praising his name and serving him in everything she does, so that other nations will see God’s work in her and turn in commitment to God as well? If so, then Israel will fulfill her God given task of being the way of blessing for all the families of the earth. If she will be faithful to what God is asking she will bring other nations to worship the one true God. Or will Israel turn to other gods and goddesses and go her own way, deserting the task for which God has made her his own?

Now that is the same task you and I and all Christians are called to. We also have a mission.

Just as Israel can be a light to other nations we can be a light to others. Southminster by and large has a good reputation in this community. That in and of itself draws many people here.

At Julius Rhyne’s funeral there were three other pastors present each of which said to me that they had heard good things about Southminster. I’ve heard it from laypeople as well. That witness has major implications for our church future growth and well being for you see it enables us to have an effect , to be a blessing to others. On the other hand when a church reputation in the community is not a good one because of infighting or discord or because of a negative notoriety of one kind or another it often can be a death knell.

There are those in our denomination who still believe that a church that has acted out can be turned around and at times a new church has been planted within an existing one that hasn’t done very well. It is possible but highly questionable. Once the reputation or should I say the witness of a church has gone sour it is well nigh impossible to get people to come to that church and thus her mission is gravely imperiled. When the church of Christ has experienced a deterioration of her reputation her mission is undermined. You might as well disband the church and start over in another place under another name.

That is in fact what God did with the nation of Israel once her witness was soiled and undermined by the people’s lack of faithfulness.

What is true for the nation of Israel and for churches is true for individuals as well. Because God has redeemed me and you we have a responsibility, a mission. We have a calling from God to live faithful lives. walking according to God’s commandments…..why? So other people will see God’s work in us too, and thus be drawn to confess his lordship.

All of us know people who model for us a faith that is active, passionate and vibrant. But we also know people who do not….and they too leave their mark.

The question for us as it was for Israel is will we be faithful? Will we obey and trust our Lord so that he can use us in his purpose of blessing and restoring his world to goodness?

We can have no more meaningful life nor can Jesus Christ equip us more fully for the task than he has already done by his cross and resurrection.

Tony Campolo tells this story about a friend of his who was an associate pastor in a large Presbyterian Church in California who loved to go to the Nordstrom Department store in Bell Air during the Christmas season. She couldn’t afford to buy much at that store but she enjoyed looking at Christmas. The Christmas decorations were always magnificent and there was live music on several floors.

One of one her visits, my friend was on the top floor of the building looking at some of the finest dresses in the world, when the elevator doors opened and out stepped a bag lady. Her clothes were dirty and her stockings were rolled down to her ankles. She just stood there holding a gym bag in her right hand. It was obvious that this woman was out of place and not about to buy anything. The dresses were in the thousand dollar range and this bag lady did not seem to have that kind of money.

My friend expected a security guard to promptly arrive and usher her out of the building. But instead of security guards, a stately sales lad came over to her and asked, “May, I help you Madam?”

The bag lady said, “Yeah! I wanna buy a dress.”

“What kind of dress?” the saleswoman asked in a polite and dignified manner.

“A party dress.” The bag lady answered.

“You’ve come to the right place,” said the saleswoman. “Follow me. I think we have some of the finest party dresses in the whole world.”

The saleswoman then spent more than ten minutes matching dresses with the woman’s skin color and eye color, trying to help her ascertain which dress would go best with her complexion. After selecting three dresses that the saleswoman deemed to be the most appropriate for the bag lady, she bade the woman to follow her into the dressing room. My friend hurried into the adjoining dressing room and put her ear to the wall.

She wanted to hear all of this. It was remarkable.

The bag lady tried on all the dresses with the saleswoman’s help. But then, after about ten minutes, the bag lady said sternly, “I’ve changed my mind. I’m not going to buy a dress today!”

“That’s okay,” the saleswoman said gently. “But here’s my card. Should you come back to Nordstrom department store, I do hope you will ask for me. I would consider it a privilege to wait on you again.”

From old to new. The question for you and me is this: will we accept his call and today begin this mission? Amen

This sermon was written and preached by Dr. Jerry D. Bron at the Southminster Presbyterian Church, Gastonia, NC on the third Sunday of Lent, March 4, 2010.This sermon manuscript does not give credit for sources used so please do not use this material for any other purpose.

Glimpses of Lent and Easter from the Old Testament #4 Flash Drive