God of Covenant

Looking around which kind of God we like to praise - on the fifth Sunday of Lent B
the prophet Jeremiah invites us (Jeremiah 31.31-34):
The LORD says: I will make a new covenant... - not like the old one -
Deep within them I will plant my LAW ... writing it on their hearts...
and they will all know me.

It looks like: the idea of Covenant is developping...  God has new ideas...
We know the NOA-covenant (rain-bow): no more extinction - Life is secured.
EXODUS-covenant: oout of slavery - into liberation...
SINAI-covenant: survival-rules...   how to live into the future...

And now Jeremiah comes with a new VISION (telling us, it's the vision of God):
The new covenant will be not only with humanity (NOA), not only with the people of God (EXODUS, SINAI), but now with every individual person.
That's quite an interesting extension of the covenant-idea.
Transfer for a moment this new covenant-idea into our time (2015):
Not only the UNO, not only the STATE, not only the CHURCH, not any AUTORITY
will tell you the LAW of GOD because "it's written on the person's heart".
This makes the search after God's LAW totally complex ! How will all these
"institutions" unite their view and take into account "what is written on the heart
of every person" - really a complicated view !

For Christian people remains the question: Is this now the new covenant Jesus brought us ? The one, we enter by Baptism, we secur by the Eucharist, we actualize
by every Sacrament ???  Pay attention:
1.) The CHURCH tells us: the NEW COVENANT is alredy done - Jesus has given signature by his blood, by his life of engagement for us until death.
2.) You are invited to sign the new covenant; it means to live like Jesu
3.) This covenant cannot be broken any more because Jesus has given signature
for us (I will forgive their iniquity and never call their sin to mind).
What Jeremiah hears is a VISION... and we are called to look around and to open our ears... maybe we discover the new covenant is emerging. 

GOD's WORK of ART

Catholic people will never forget "YOU ARE DUST..." or "YOU ARE STARDUST..."
But today (4th Lenten-Sunday 15.03.15) the Church likes to tell us: don't forget:
God will send us again and again prophets cf. 2 Chro 36.14-23; Ambassadors
to convince us: it's time to make a turning-point to God. Such a profet, a famous
Ambassador of God is Jesus Christ. His mysterious message for Nicodemus (John 3.14-21) is much more than we are able to understand:
 "everyone may have eternal life in him" /  "God loved the world so much...."

The interesting way from "You are dust..." to  "You are ambassador..."
is transfiguration. For many people JvN is just DUST, for many people JvN is
AMBASSADOR of God.  WHY this difference, this change ???  
Jesus himself gives the answer: "The Son of Man must be lifted up".
Transfiguration is "lift up your hearts"; lift up Jesus of Nazareth; lift up your XY... Moses has given a pre-sign in the desert: As people complained: we will die because of the poisonous snakes - Moses made a metal-snake, put it on a pole (lift it up to be seen well from everyone) and it happened: anyone who had been bitten would look at the metal snake and be healed (Num 21.9).
Jesus (in the desert of today) must be lifted up: it means: Jesus must be shown
to everybody as the one who has died (on the cross): the one who brings death as
judgement is now dead. AND YOU LOOK AT HIM - and there will be a healing power coming over you ...  you will not die any more by judgement... you are saved.
"LOOK AT HIM" (take into your view his whole life; and all what people have spoken about him) and you will find yourself middst in the great transfiguration-process.

What you see is changing you + once changed - you change what you see
First: you see JvN as dust (nothing special)...  but now you open your eyes...
Sec.: you start to study the Bible; to listen to the Churches...
Third: you try to follow him; to establish your own Christian-life-style...
Forth: you and what you see is changing = transfiguration-process...
Fifth: you never know where the way is going... life in abundance has started.
In this sense Paulus says (Eph 2.10) "WE ARE GOD's WORK of ART."  

DUST - STARDUST - Transfiguration

They told us: "You are dust... " / we accept: it's a reality ! but: it's NOT THE REALITY !
Today everybody knows: WE ARE STARDUST ... and stardust is source, ground- element of Life or prelife-ground. Enjoy "you are stardust... "   it's NOT THE REALITY !
You are a child: the product of nature - sure, it's a reality.but: Some people transcent the natural child-figure and they tell you "You are a God-child" - that is trans- figuration; they see more and more and more...  our universe is a cosmos (a net of forces) it's a reality. but some people see more: the say the cosmos is a
creation (a work made by God). In this kind we all live in a stormy ocean of trans-figurations.  
JvN like everybody is a "victim" of such transfigurations: "we see you as..."

In the Lententime we have such a transfiguration-ladder in regard of God.
Which kind of God you like to praise ? Joel 2.12 is a step...
1. Sun (Gen 9.8-15)  we got the conviction: God is "God of Covenant"
    God is totally in relation with us / in reality: no God without us.
2. Sun (Gen 22.1-18) we got the conviction: God is "God of Life".
    No more life-sarifices - stop Abraham until today...
3. Sun (Ex 20.1-17) we got the conviction: God is "God of Liberation".
    And we start to understand that the commandements are chances...
4. Sun (2 Chro 36.14-23)  God is "God of messengers"
    He sends angels, profets, kings, ordinary people, children as his spokpersons.
5. Sun (Jer 31.31-34) we got the conviction: God is "God of the hearts".
    The law of God, the commandements are written deep in peoples life.
All these "convictions" are transfigurations: The mysterious figure "GOD"
will get again and again a new value, a new meaning we are on a discovery-way.

For religious people (Christians, Jews, Muslims etc...) these God-convictions
(pictures) are a dynamic reality - formatting our lives, our personality. These
convictions lead us (the believers - like Jesus) into action (John 2.13-25: zeal
for God's house will devour me). And at the end: our lives are representations
of our convictions. All transfigurations in the world will bring us nearer to THE
REALITY, bc they are "turning-points to God".