& we'll take a cup o' kindness yet

for auld lang syne

"Another New Year, and the one who makes all things new"

Happy New Year’s!
And for us, it is a happy occasion. It exemplifies all we hold most dear; Cherishing our past and hopefully looking ahead to what’s next. New Year’s; the celebration of last year and the promise of all the next one. It’s a holiday that embodies are highest aspirations…

And sure, there may be room for improvement, but that’s what New Year’s resolutions are for. A new year, a new you. Time to turn over a new leaf…

Although by now I’ve turned over enough new leaves to fill a forrest…

And if we had to admit it, that’d be the rub of New Year’s. Wouldn’t it?

Our past is just a little more sordid than the glitter that falls as the ball drops. Our future is not as full of the promise as innocent “baby new year.”

…In 1985, after years of declining sales, Coke-Cola decided to catch up and catch on. Pepsi, loaded with sugar and artificial sweeteners, had been outpacing Coke for years. All the blind taste tests confirmed it. 

To compete, the old company worked up a new recipe. Complete with the, now ubiquitous, high fructose corn syrup…

…The results, as we now know, were a disaster. 

Pepsi crowed, Coke’s new recipe was just regular, old Pepsi. And after less than three months, plain, old, regular Coke was back on the shelves…

New Year’s may embody our highest ideals. But the next morning's hangover, reveals another side of our ideals and aspirations…

For every new leaf turned over, there’s a scorched stump just behind. For every old acquaintance now forgotten, there’s another we can’t -no matter how hard we try…

It’s all just New Coke. The next iPhone. I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter. Another New Year, and a resolution that will be different this time, all over again. It’s not the redundant, “new and improved.” It’s just improved; if even that.

Despite our best efforts, we can never seem to break free of our past. We drag it behind us, like an old corpse…

Tonight we stare down the barrel of another new year. It hold promise, yes. But we all know last year won’t let us off scot-free, either. 

We come into 2017 with all our ideals, and our shortcomings too. 

Every New Year and each “new and improved” ware; they promise a future that’s finally freed of the past. 

And although we know better, we place our hopes in their promises. We make our resolutions and fork over our money. Hoping this time will be different…

Well, tonight as another new year dawns, you’ve come to a decidedly old fashioned place; The Church.

The Church, always so resistant to what latest. The Church, stubbornly promoting, not the new and improved, but something old and rugged; the cross…

The irony of it, is this out of date place is right where you ought to be to begin a new year. This place which looks with equal suspicion upon your resolution and the new and improved, is the only place that can actually deliver something that’s actually, truly new. 

A future not bound by Death. 

Not that there’s anything wrong with our resolutions, in and of themselves. The trouble, though, comes when they make promises they can’t keep. Which they always seem to…

Deciding to be healthier this year is praiseworthy. A fine goal. The trouble comes when we think it will make us live forever. When we imagine hitting the gym can make us into the kind of people who use our health for anything more than bolstering our own ego. 

Getting the new iPhone is fine, I suppose. But the trouble comes when we think it will finally make us trendy. When we expect it to remake us into the kind of people who can use its technology to do more than post a selfie…

But that’s the temptation every New Year’s, isn’t it?

It’s what Martin Luther noted way back in 1518 when he defended his theology with his Heidelberg Disputation. In thesis 24 he asserted, ‘without the theology of the cross we always misuse the best in the worst manner. 

Without the one who was crucified, we search in vain for something or someone else who can free us from the past we drag behind us. 

And there’s never been a shortage of those who are happy to do just that, are there? 

When their promises inevitably come us short though, they always turn in on themselves. Turn in on us. 

Which is how Martin Luther, following the tradition of St. Augustine, described “Sin.” Being turned in on oneself. 

Tonight what we hear is, only the one who was crucified and after three days raised, is the one who is capable of actually making and keeping a promise not bound by Death. Only the one who now sits on the throne, can actually make all things new.

Martin Luther in one of his New Year’s Eve sermons put it this way: No New Year’s horoscopes, no fortune-telling, no lucky wishes made at midnight can even come close to achieving what God promises to give us in his son, Jesus Christ: an untroubled conscience, a joyful heart, and the certainty of salvation. This will provide us with the strength and courage we need to face every New Year and every new day.”

…Jesus didn’t just come to save us from our worst, but our best too. Our highest ideals and most cherished values. 

The life Jesus promises, is one we would never expect, or conjure up either. 

It is a complete break from all that’s behind us. Not the life you already had, just more of it. But one that’s truly, new! Life not bound by your past or even death. 

Newest of all, this life that isn’t earned. It’s given, given freely. 

We Lutherans like to call that, “Grace.”

Grace, the promise of truly, new life. Life that is so new, it doesn’t come by efforts or resolutions. But as a gift. 

It comes from the one who suffered all our failed hopes and dreams. The one who died by our unkept promises and broken resolutions. The one God raised from the Dead and then seated on the throne. The one who makes all things new. 

Your future, your new life comes from Jesus’ wounded hands. The one who takes your past to the grave, and dies with it. Jesus gives the future we’ve always hoped for, but have never been able to cobble together. And he does it all, freely. 

He gives you this life regardless of your resolution or how well you kept them. And not just on January 1st, but the middle February too. 

On this new year, what matters is not our resolutions. But the one who is so resolute upon being your savior, that he takes upon himself the failure and even death of all highest and best; and gives us his own life in return. 

Martin Luther called that the “Happy Exchange.”

That’s the resolution you’re given to begin your new year. The freedom to be a “forgiven sinners, free-riding on Jesus.” 

To come before Jesus with nothing more than a pile of broken resolutions. To come before Jesus asking him to take them upon himself, and in return to give you his very life as your new one.

It’s an entirely different way to live, that’s for sure. Take that life, begin your year truly new. A sinner not bound by your past or Death; but forgiven of it, freed from it.

With a promise like that, how can this year not be different. With a savior like that, how can we not shout, “Happy New Year”? 

Well, Happy New Year’s, you bunch of sinners!