Word to the Wise
Thursday, August 7, 2014 - Thursday in the 18th Week in Ordinary Time
[Jer 31:31-34 and Matt 16:13-23]But this is the covenant I will make with the house of Israeel after those days, says the Lord. I will place my law within them, and write it upon their hearts; I will be their God, and they shall be my people. [Jeremiah]
Although Jeremiah is speaking of a renewed covenant after the exile to Babylonia is over, the Christian community would come to interpret this passage in terms of the new covenant represented in Christ. It is difficult, I think, for many Christians to think in terms of the biblical idea of the covenant. We somehow see that as something that disappeared when Jesus came. However, the Gospel of Matthew portrays Jesus as saying that he did not come to abolish the "law and the prophets": but to "fulfill them." The nearest thing that most Americans might associate with "covenant" would be the U.S. Constitution! We lack a sense of a collective relationship with God that Jeremiah's words speak to.
The "new covenant" is a law written on the heart, which would be a challenge to many both before and after Jesus' time. The human heart can be a dangerous thing to lean on! Perhaps we feel safer it if is all in writing and enforceable with penalties. Maybe the Code of Canon Law provides a level of comfort to some! But such things are external and Jeremiah is speaking of a relationship that had been lost and would be renewed in a new way. The early Christian community saw it in terms of Jesus' death and resurrection: a new "exodus" and deliverance. Can we think of our relationship with God in that way? AMEN
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