Covenant Sunday - Deal or No Deal?

JEREMIAH 31: 31-34 John 15: 1-10

Back in 2005, Noel Edmonds was finally forgiven for inflicting Mr Blobby upon the British public and allowed back on prime time television after a lengthy absence to be the presenter of a new show, “Deal or No Deal.” Despite my very best efforts I have at times had to endure this particular show. For those who do not watch it, the contestant is provided with a box with one of a number of sums of money attached to it. As the contestant gets rid of boxes held by future contestants, he or she is able to form a view as to the likelihood as to whether they are likely to win a sizeable sum. From time to time, the show is interrupted by a shady character called “The Banker” who makes an offer of a deal to the contestant. In effect the show is about a battle of wits between contestant and banker. Both seek a deal in which they get the better of the other.

The Old Testament contains deals or as it put it “Covenants.” They represent agreements between God and God’s people. Following the example of ancient agreements between powerful Kings and less powerful Kings, there is the warning of sanction should the covenant be broken. And certainly the Old Covenant was broken by Israel. And by the time of Jeremiah with destruction and the reality of exile all too obvious, there was a sense that Israel was paying the price for breaching the Old Covenant.

But Jeremiah does not see the death of hope. Instead he is granted a vision of the relationship between God and humanity that is rooted not in the legal but in the wonder of God’s grace. This New Covenant is seen by Christians as being brought about through the Jesus who freely gives of himself that we might experience his salvation. Through him we are offered an unconditional love that is for all time and forgiveness for the times in which we mess up.

It is a bit like the relationship between a parent and a child. Any half decent parent knows that they will love the child born to them no matter what. There will be times when the child needs correction but however, impossible and ungrateful the child might be, there is love, that whilst such things might impoverish the lives of parents and child, can still never be broken.

And that is how it is with this New Covenant. God takes the risk of loving you and me. In taking that risk, God invites you and me to come alongside God, to identify ourselves with God’s work. To respond to the torrent of Divine love with a response of love from our hearts that finds identification in our lives.

This morning we gather with the opportunity to renew our Covenant with God. But let us be clear about one thing - should we decline to do so, God who is the perfection of parenthood, will not stop loving us. God has not left Godself with the wriggle room of a get out clause. God will go on loving each and every one of us because that is how God is. Like the father in that story Jesus told about the Prodigal Son, God will go on waiting for us and loving us, longing that one day we might respond to love and make the relationship complete.

Oh, we know all to well about the deals accompanied by threats. We know about the deals in which one party seeks to get the better of another party. But this is so very different. Before us stands the God to whom we owe our very beings, the God who is the enabler of the beautiful world, the God who is revealed to us in the self giving Jesus, the God who offers us a future, the God who offers us total and absolute love. Is that love to be unrequited? Or are we so touched that we are so absolutely bowled over that we want our lives to be a loving response, lives which really count as a gift to God.

God is reaching out to us right now. How shall we respond? Deal or No deal?



BIDEFORD METHODIST CHURCH - Sunday January 13th 2008

ALWINGTON METHODIST CHURCH - Sunday January 20th 2008