Some time ago a member of this congregation complained that he didn’t hear many sermons based on the Old Testament. When he found out that I was going to be preaching on April 2nd he challenged me that I should base my sermon on the Old Testament. I agreed and to my delight discovered that the lectionary indicated that the lesson for that Sunday was from the prophet Jeremiah, chapter 31, the well known words: “But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord, I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God , and they shall be my people.” (verse 33)

Jeremiah lived in a very turbulent time. The end of the sixth and the beginning of the fifth centuries before the birth of Christ were probably the most tumultuous times in the history of the Middle East, much like our time. Old empires were replaced by new. There was warfare between the superpowers of that time and the small countries in between were flattened. Israel, the northern kingdom of the former kingdom of Israel, was out of the picture by that time and Judah longed to be liberated from Babylonian empire and turned to Egypt, the other superpower to support them. Jeremiah was more than skeptical and loudly complained against this plan. He predicted that Judah would be defeated and Jerusalem laid waste. He was called a “Prophet of Doom” by the people who were loudly proclaiming that their God would support them and that Egypt would come to their defence.

Jeremiah’s prophecy proved true. After besieging the city of Jerusalem for eighteen months, in the summer of 586, the army of Nebuchadnezzar broke through the walls of Jerusalem. They rampaged through the city. Blood flowed in the streets. The people tried to escape in all directions or go into hiding. King Zedekiah tried to escape but was caught. The last he saw before his eyes were put out was the execution of his son. The city was decimated including the royal palace and the beautiful temple that King Solomon had constructed. The Holy of Holies, that most important part of the temple, the room that only the high priest was allowed to enter and that only once a year, was destroyed. It contained the Ark of The Covenant, the stone tablets of the law that Moses had brought down from Mount Sinai many years earlier. The ark disappeared and was never heard of again. Many of the people were put in chains and marched off across the desert to captivity in Babylon.

The defeat and destruction was most traumatic for the people. It seemed to them that either their God had been defeated or had abandoned them. It was, indeed, a most significant turning point in the history of Israel. Jeremiah, because of his pro Babylon stance, was left free. But now the Prophet of Doom became the Prophet of Comfort. From the devastation of Jerusalem he encouraged the people in Babylon. He told them to be faithful to their God even though they had no temple, to seek to live normal lives as much as possible. He also predicted that there would come a time when they would be liberated and would return to Judah. Most important of all he told them that God would make a new covenant, one that was not written in stone but on the hearts of the people.

The Exile turned out to be a turning point in the religious life of the Jewish people. The Judaism that we now know, Rabbinic Judaism, synagogue worship, is based on learning and venerating the law rather than on the sacrificial cult.

A generation later Babylon was defeated by Cyrus the Great of Persia who released the captives. They did not return in great numbers. Many of them had indeed made their home in Babylon and were of no mind to return to the land of devastation. Those who did return were deeply disillusioned when they saw the ruin, the sand blowing over the remains of the city. Over the years, however, they did rebuild. Read the books of Ezra and Nehemiah for that account. The temple was rebuilt by Herod the Great and in Jesus’ time the sacrificial cult was going full tilt.

The Persians were replaced by the Greeks under Alexander the Great and then by the Romans. However, eighty years afte the time of Christ, the Romans had enough and they destroyed the temple and the city and forbade Jews to live there for three hundred years. It was the end of Jewish tenancy of that area until our time.

The Jews scattered throughout the known world. By the time of Jesus there were Jewish communities in most of the large cities around the Mediterranean. They took with them their faith. Their place of worship was the synagogue where the Jewish scriptures were taught. The sacrificial cult was history.

The fullest expression of the New Covenant was given by Jesus whose mission it was to reform the Jewish religious life of Israel and for his efforts he was crucified. Jesus did not abrogate the law but held up a greater law, the law of love which would test all the other laws. We find this best expressed in his Sermon on the Mount. The gospel is based on his teaching of forgiveness, compassion, right relationships and love for neighbour and God.

Kurt Vonnegut, the well-known American novelist, is best known for his book Slaughterhouse 5 which is based on the saturation bombing of Dresden during the last months of World War II, which he himself as a prisoner of war had witnessed. After the bombing the prisoners were employed to dispose of the bodies left by the attack. Vonnegut has recently published another book. A Man Without A Country is not a novel but a collection of thoughts about the United States. He is extremely disappointed with the course that his country has taken, thus the title.

I want to read to you a paragraph from his book: “For some reason, the most vocal; Christians among us never mention the Beatitudes. But often with tears in their eyes, they demand that the Ten Commandments be posted in public buildings. And of course that’s Moses not Jesus. I haven’t heard one of them demand that the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes be posted anywhere.

“'Blessed are the merciful in a courtroom? ‘Blessed are the peacemakers’ in the Pentagon? Give me a break!”

Popular Christianity in America is flourishing but it is more concerned about being right than being compassionate. Thousands are turning out to worship and praying for the return of Christ in power to set up a divine empire. Evangelists announce that the division between church and the state is a myth and put all their efforts into supporting an ultra conservative political agenda. They believe that Christ will return but not until the temple in Jerusalem is rebuilt on Temple Mount and the old cult of sacrifice is reinstituted. That is not our faith.

We have recently heard a great deal about the Christian Peacekeepers particularly because of the now resolved hostage crisis in Iraq. All but one have been liberated. Theirs is not to build up a kingdom but rather to stand between the adversaries and keep the peace until cooler heads prevail. Quite a different understanding of what God demands of us than what you hear from many of the evangelical pulpits. The Peacekeepers believe in and act on the law that God has inscribed on the heart, a law of love and justice and peace.

Three years ago a 22 year old American woman, a peace activist from Olympia, Washington went to Gaza. On March 16th, 2003, she confronted a military bulldozer that was about to destroy a Palestinian home. She stood in front of it believing that the driver would stop. But he didn’t and Rachel Corrie died under the blade of the machine. Rachel did not want to die, she was full of life and idealism. She died like Jesus died, not as a sacrificial bargain with God but rather because the law of love was deeply inscribed in her heart, a law she had chosen to live by.

An amazing event took place in this church two weeks ago at the time of the visit of our bishop. Bishop Coffin preached and excellent sermon based on the story of Jesus cleansing the temple, throwing out those who were propheting from the sacrifices people had come to make. The point he made was that God’s house must be open to all people. We heard him clearly.

It is customary that the bishop pronounce the episcopal blessing on the congregation but we had the temerity to turn this around. At the conclusion of the service we invited the bishop to come down to the chancel steps while the congregation came forward, first our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters and then the rest of the congregation. We surrounded the bishop and placed our hands over him and blessed him. We did this because we were aware that the bishop had made a difficult and controversial decision. This decision was not based on the Ten Commandments or the Book of Leviticus or the Thirty-Nine Articles or any canon law, but rather on the law that was inscribed on the heart.

I was deeply moved by this event, as were we all. I know the bishop was deeply touched by this blessing and would always remember this event.

“I shall write my law on their hearts and I shall be their God and they shall be my people.”