Treasures old and new

Matthew 13 : 47 - 53

After presenting and explaining the parables of the kingdom, Jesus receives an affirmative answer to his question, "Have you understood....?" The disciples are growing in their understanding, even though there will be future times of vacillation. I notice here that Jesus likens them to a householder who takes out both old and new things. They are not to be like the other type of religious teachers and scribes who specialized in fossilizing God's law, to their own comfort and ends.

This is a danger too today when earnest Christians bind up the Word out of fear of misinterpretation. In doing so, we run the risk of not hearing the Word afresh in each new situation and generation. The gospel is always 'new' because God is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. The same Divine Being who relates in a loving, dynamic way to his creatures, whose ways are not easily predictable, or according to any religious formula. I am not convinced of the other way of reasoning - that because God does not change, that limits the way he might respond to new situations of every age. His character does not change, but surely this does not limit him to certain ways of responding to his beloved creatures. Our Lord Jesus himself showed how 'new' his teaching was to the religious establishment - so much so they they failed to recognize him as one who came from God himself.

The old and the new, familiar ground and new paths, old routes and new directions. Can we embrace them all, as we listen carefully to God and to one another? Then we might join the ranks of those who have been 'instructed' and called to share the old and new treasures we have been entrusted with.