Today’s author is Prince of Peace member, Jim Armstrong.
The early church had many struggles. Jesus turned the world upside down. Everything was different. Nothing made any sense, everything was all mixed up and confused. Everything that was familiar in worship and faith life and how to find and serve God was in question. Life was in turmoil. How could that which these knew be now so different. The old rules didn’t fit with all the understandings of how to be the people of God. What now?
In the law of Moses, the identification of the people of God was the rite of circumcision and keeping the law. Keep the law perfectly and you will be accepted by God. But it didn’t work as it was intended. The law had come to an end in itself, and keeping the law to perfection was not possible. It didn’t work for the people of Isreal, and it doesn’t work for us. The sacrifice of the blood of the lamb for sin became just a ritual rather than a connection and bond between God and the worshiper. It did not bring the faithfulness and devotion that God desired.
So God came up with a new plan he would send his son to invade our time and space and show us how life was expected to be lived. But that plan didn’t work out very well either. The people of his day had other expectations. Somehow, he didn’t fit in with their world plan and so we end up with a death.
But God has a way of turning things around. Our life with God is still tied up with the blood sacrifice for sin and promise of life, but now its different. The old system was the blood sacrifice in Jerusalem. The lamb was slain and through the shed blood, it brought forth life to the people of God. But now it was not the blood of the lamb, but the blood of the lamb of God that brings about forgiveness and life. Our faith in him assures us that we become in him the people of God. In communion the bread (body broken) and the wine (blood shed) still bring to us himself. Do this to remember my love and my sacrifice… my love for you is what brings us to the Father.
The mark of God’s people is not physical like the make of circumcision in Old Testament time, the mark on our bodies. But the mark of God is now baptism with the mark of the cross upon our brow and upon our breast, the mark of God’s people.
Does keeping the law of Moses and the commandments make us acceptable to God? No, but the Messiah does. Does being an Israelite and being circumcised make one acceptable to God? No, but the Messiah does. Does being a member of the church and worshipping regularly make one acceptable to God? No, but Jesus the Messiah does.
The law of Moses is still important to us as a guide to how we should be living as the people of God. But the mark of God’s people is still faith in a risen Christ, who has given us of his spirit when there is a question of who we are as the people of God. Paul reminds the people of Israel in Acts 15 that God who knows the hearts of people is the one who gives them his sprit. And that it is through the Grace of God in Jesus the Christ that we are forgiven and saved and that the journey continues.
Once we have been to the cross, it is part of the journey of our life of faith, as an unfinished story.
The law of the Old Testament provides us with the basis of how we should live our lives, and the cross brings us to our connection with God. Our life of faith is never finished. It is an unfinished story. God is never done with us. The Christian church is always on the move, and we are a part of it.
Our journey of faith is not finished until our death comes to the new life of resurrection. Our faith is the beginning and eternity is the completion. Amen.