Stress Test Devotional April 20
April 20, 2024
Luke 5:36
He told them a parable also: “No one tears a piece from a new garment and puts it on an old garment; if he does, he’ll tear the new and the pieces from the new will not match the old.”
Relating new and old is very important! Once America was called the New World, even though it was populated with people from the Old World of Europe, along with long-time Native Peoples. Our foreparents faced the generational problem in an acute way, what of the old to keep and practice and what of the new to embrace and adopt, in our political and communal life. Some new elements do not fit with previous patterns. The Pharisees were hidebound traditionalists whose veneration for prior regulations and spiritual laws was their central characteristic. Jesus taught the need for an internal revolution, a new relationship with God, a new birth, that went deeper and further than external obedience. Christianity needed new forms of life and ministry not contained within older institutions.
PRAYER
Gracious God, Help our nation’s leaders to discern wisely what to keep and what to discard in our national traditions. Help our church’s leaders also, as we discern what to maintain and what to let go of in our life and ministry. May we never abandon the true and beautiful for the new and transient. May we never hold onto the old and familiar when you want us to grasp something fresh and vibrant. We ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.
