"What's new?" is a common greeting. There are many answers people give: "A new car." "A new house." "A new boat." "A new suit ... a new dress ... a new coat."

Others focusing more on relationships than things answer: "A new boyfriend or girlfriend." "A new husband or wife." "A new friend."

Jeremiah, the prophet, focuses not so much on things of the earth or human relations but on a personal relationship with the eternal Lord, a new covenant with God. "The days are surely coming, says the Lord, When I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah" (Jeremiah 31:31, italics mine).

Notice, the prophet says, "The days are coming...." In other words, something new is out there in the future. Something new and fresh is to be anticipated. Vision is needed to project a new time, a new age, a new personal relationship with God. Surrounded by darkness, Jeremiah was a man of vision.

An anonymous poem describes the possibility of vision in the midst of darkness.

Some people do not behold and do not see.
This is called blindness.
Some people behold and see.
This is called sight.
Some people see beyond what they behold.
This is called vision.

Jeremiah saw the sins of the people. He saw their idolatry. He saw that they had broken the covenant that God had established with them when he brought them out of Egypt. He saw that they had gone the broad way that leads to destruction instead of the narrow way that God had shown them. But he saw beyond what he beheld. Jeremiah saw a new day and a new way.

Jeremiah Saw That Something New Was Coming

Jeremiah seems to struggle to find just the right words to describe this new thing that is coming. He searches his mind to describe the overwhelming change that is approaching. He calls it "a new covenant" (v. 31). A covenant is an agreement. The old covenant was an agreement of law. The Lord had established this covenant with Moses. God's side of the covenant was to provide a way of life that would provide a way for the people to avoid the destruction that threatened them. The Israelites' side of the agreement was to follow that way and be God's people.

The Ten Commandments, if followed, would provide unity and fulfillment for God's people. When broken, these laws break the people and lead to division and disintegration. Before his very eyes, Jeremiah saw the division and disintegration of God's people. He saw punishment for the sins of the people at the hands of Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonians who were about to conquer and deport the people of Jerusalem. Jeremiah also saw that something new was needed to give the people hope. That's the context for the prophet's words about the new covenant.

The new covenant means hope for people who are down and out, people who are divided and estranged from God, from themselves, and from other people. Hope reaches out and touches us when we hear that God is doing a new thing.

The new covenant means that God's Law will be written not only on stone, but on the hearts of God's people (v. 33). In other words, the new relationship with God will be inward, not just outward. The new relationship is a matter of people obeying God out of love, not out of fear. The covenant is an intimate relationship with God.

The new covenant means that people will know God (v. 34a). In Hebrew, the verb "to know" means personal, intimate relationship. When a husband went into a tent and had a sexual relationship with his wife it was called "knowing" her. So, in the new covenant, people can know God not just through a set of rules. They can know him personally. "Be still and know I am God" (Psalm 46:10) means personal relationship with the almighty at his invitation.

The new covenant is based on starting again through repentance and forgiveness (v. 34b). To repent means to turn around, or turn back to God. The people had drifted away from their Creator. They had forgotten their Redeemer. Ritual had replaced relationship. "Something new is coming," Jeremiah is saying. The time is coming when people who have forgotten to remember God will remember him once more.

Jeremiah was a suffering servant of God. For his outspoken ways, he was often threatened with death. He was ignored, rejected, and persecuted. Finally, when his predictions came true and the Babylonians conquered Jerusalem, Jeremiah was totally rejected by his own people. His words and his life of suffering for the people point beyond himself to Christ.

In Christ, Something New Has Come Near

Another prophet spoke about the possibilities of a new personal relationship with God being achieved through the suffering servant, "a man who was despised and rejected, acquainted with infirmity ... despised and held in no account" (Isaiah 53:3). We pick up the story of the Savior of the new covenant in Isaiah.

Surely he has borne our infirmities and carried our diseases; yet we accounted him stricken, struck down by God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the punishment that made us whole and by his bruises we are healed. Isaiah 53:4

The Savior of the new covenant was oppressed and afflicted, like a lamb that is led to the slaughter (Isaiah 53:7). A perversion of justice caused his death (53:8a). He was stricken for our transgression (53:8b). All of this suffering crushed him, yet it was part of God's plan (53:10a). He was an offering for sin (53:10b).

Jeremiah suffered for his people. Jesus died an excruciating death on the cross to save people from their sins. The new covenant was promised by Jeremiah; it was opened by Jesus Christ, the suffering servant.

The story of the life of Christ and the beginning of his church is called the New Testament. The word "testament" means covenant. The new agreement between God and people is a way of the gospel of grace. In the death and resurrection of Christ, God does for us what we can't do for ourselves. What's new? A new covenant.

When Christ came, the new covenant began. In Christ, the newness of God's kingdom (his reign over us for our own good) approached. At the beginning of his ministry Jesus said, "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near" (Mark 1:15, [italics mine]). Something new came near.

At the Last Supper, Jesus said, "Take, eat; this is my body. Then he took a cup, and after giving thanks he gave it to them saying, ‘Drink of it all of you; for this is my blood of the (new) covenant which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins' " (Matthew 26:26-28). Something new is in the Lord's supper.

The Gospel of John calls that something new, "light." "In him [Jesus, the Word] was life and the life was the light of all people" (John 1:4). That light came, shone brightly, but not all believed what they saw. The light shone in the darkness, but some people were spiritually blind and did not comprehend the light, but neither did they overcome the light (John 1:5). Jesus, the light, is new.

John 12:20-33 (the Gospel Reading for the fifth Sunday in Lent) tells us that people of all cultures and races seek the light in Jesus. "Sir, we wish to see Jesus," the Greeks told Philip. When Philip told Jesus about the people who wanted to see him, he said, "... I when I am lifted up from the earth will draw all peoples to myself" (John 12:32). In other words, "They can see me on the cross. That's where they can really see me." That's something new. That's the new covenant in action. In the cross, people of all colors and kinds experience the magnetism of the uplifted Lord. That's the wonder of the new covenant.

In the person of Jesus, the kingdom of God draws near. In the death of Jesus, the new covenant of grace is established and people are drawn into the sacrifice made for them. "I'd rather die than give you up," Jesus is saying. That gets people's attention. Jesus is the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world.

What's new? Everything is made new in the cross and resurrection of Christ. The uplifted Lord reaching out from his throne on the cross gives us a new vision of reality. Therefore we can sing a new song of praise to the Lamb of God (Revelation 5:9). Hear the vision in Revelation:

Then I looked, and I heard the voice of many angels surrounding the throne and the living creatures and the elders; they numbered myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands, singing with full voice,

"Worthy is the Lamb that was slaughtered to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!"

Then I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea, and all that is in them, singing, "To the one seated on the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever!" Revelation 5:11-14

What's new? We sing the new song because we have a new vision of God and therefore we see beyond what we behold on this earth; we can see the new Jerusalem, the new heavens, and the new earth (Revelation 21:1-2).

What's new? Let your imagination try to see beyond the darkness and hear beyond the noise of the world's chaos: "And the one who was seated on the throne said, ‘See, I am making all things new' " (Revelation 21:5).

Since Jesus made it possible for us to personally know this one on the throne, hear the words again in a personal way: "See, I am making all things new, even you."