"New for Old!"

Is it possible to make the change from the old to the new?

It was Aladdin, from the Tales from the 1001 Nights, who offered 'New lamps for Old!' As Aladdin discovered, the old was much better than the cheap replacements he was offering.

Lord Myners is suggesting that the Coop Group gets itself a new Board structure, to replace the old one which has so spectacularly failed to over that great organisation. But will the old guard want the new?

Jesus was very clear that the new that he was bringing would not easily fit in with the old that was obsolete.  “Besides, who would patch old clothing with new cloth? For the new patch would shrink and rip away from the old cloth, leaving an even bigger tear than before. 

And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. For the wine would burst the wineskins, and the wine and the skins would both be lost. New wine calls for new wineskins.” (Mark 2.21-22)

Many Christian communities have struggled to work out the implications of this radical transformation. It is so easy for the movement of the exciting new life of God to become trapped in a rigid structure of rules and requirements. How we work out this challenge will determine whether we go forward into God's unknown future, or backwards into safe obscurity. 

St. Paul challenged the Corinthian church with the same choice. 'So we have stopped evaluating others from a human point of view. At one time we thought of Christ merely from a human point of view. How differently we know him now! This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!' (2 Corinthians 5.16-17)

Because we are new people, we have to learn to treat one another in new ways. Instead of the old habits of self-centred fighting, we are those who have been called to a transformed life, because of the mercy of God. 

'And all of this is a gift from God, who brought us back to himself through Christ. And God has given us this task of reconciling people to him. For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them. And he gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation.' (2 Corinthians 5.18-19)

We, the reconciled, become God's means of bringing reconciliation and new life to those around. The old ways will never solve anything. Only the new life of Christ can bring the change that will last into eternity. So let us live that new life today!

Best wishes,

Richard