Narrative Lectionary Key Verse for Today
“He also told them a parable: ‘No one tears a piece from a new garment and sews it on an old garment; otherwise the new will be torn, and the piece from the new will not match the old.”
NL Daily Devotion for Thursday, January 28, 2021
by R. M. Fergus, Clergy Stuff
I love to sew, and I’ve done my share of mending holes and tears in my favorite things. But at some point, the fabric is just too worn to hold another stitch, and as much as it pains me, I have to let go of that piece of clothing that was so familiar, so comfortable, such a part of who I was. What then? Joy of joys, I get to go to the fabric store and make something NEW! Something fresh and beautiful that will become a new part of who I am. How cool is that?
In Jesus, God was doing a new thing. Not just a nice, pretty patch to the way things had always been, a whole new garment. To God’s people, who had been doing things “they way they’d always done” for centuries, such an idea would have come with fear and grief for what might be lost. Especially to those who had benefitted most from the status quo. But it was time to shake things up, create something new and draw people back to God’s boundless grace and deep care for those who did not benefit from the status quo.
Our own churches get into that same rut, that same “the way we’ve always done” mindset that keeps us from recognizing the deep brokenness in the world around out and the way we are called to address it. We look at the way mainline denominations are shrinking and we want to keep patching the old garment with shiny new programs. But the evidence is clear: it doesn’t work. It’s time for a new garment. And, of course, we are all going to see that with fear and grief. But at the same time, how exciting! How is God doing a new thing in our lives and in our faith communities that will draw us back to God’s boundless grace?
What things do I cling to that might get in the way of God’s doing a new thing?
