Bringing the Old to New

If you ever have time to sit and think about your life, you have the opportunity to see where and how much you have grown and acquired wisdom along the way. There is a recognition of how you prioritize things and people in your life. What was once a life goal sometimes becomes a distant idealistic dream of a very unrealistic world. For instance, as a child of 12 years, I would stand on the window seat with my invisible microphone belting out the words to Barbara Streisand’s The Way We Were, Earth, Wind, and Fire’s Reasons, John Denver’s Annie, and a host of other great artists. I was destined for stardom and promised my four-year-old brother that I would take him to Hollywood with me. Bless my mother for having to listen to all of this, but she never squelched my dreams.

Now, I am a bit older, and I can laugh about that phase of my life. My goal then was to be a STAR!😅 Interestingly enough, I have learned that stardom does not always come in the form of being in front of an audience. It doesn’t mean that you have to be the one getting the applause and accolades. Sometimes stardom comes in the form of being a behind-the-scenes player. As an adult and after stardom,  I can recall some of the rules of my household: (1)get home when the streetlights come on; (2) never lend your things to people because they won’t take care of them as you do; (3) watch who you associate with because you only get one reputation; (4) don’t let people play in your hair or use your comb and brush; (5) remember the golden rule; (6) if you are going to lead, do it in the right way; and (7) give the Lord some of your time on Sunday. Whew! There were so many other rules! As a teenager, you never give thought to how those rules from the “olden days” would have influenced your adult life. 

Reminiscing was just a reminder of how important it is to understand that the old applies to the new. This is how we learn and grow. These old rules help shape and form the person of today. Some of these rules from the “olden days” still resonate with me. For instance, I believe that at a certain time of night, there is nothing good happening and a person should be home. I try not to be a borrower of other people’s things, and with age, I have a select circle of friends known as my community. It is important to earn respect and give it in return. Remembering the Sabbath day is the rule that has stayed with me the longest, and it is the one that I appreciate the most. Like many people, I have had my share of seasons, but I am always appreciative of this one rule because it gives me perspective. Thank goodness for old resources that still apply to my life. When speaking of old resources, doesn’t this apply to how understanding the Old Testament is important to the relevance of the New Testament and its impact on our lives?

Recently, I was talking with a friend about a class on the Gospels and Acts. We concluded that many people favor the New Testament over the Old Testament. Why? We thought that people find the New Testament easier to read and understand. Readers can take the parables, the gospels, and Peter and Paul’s teachings and apply them to their own lives. The Old Testament is not quite as easy, but it is necessary because of its connection to the New Testament that is relevant to our lives. So, do we not study the Old Testament in church? Do we sleep through that part of the sermon until something from the New Testament grabs our attention? How can we make the Old Testament a little more exciting or more relevant to our present day? How important is the Old Testament? Richard L. Pratt, Jr. (1990) gives us a perspective in He Gave Us Stories.

‘The New Testament quotes the Old Testament over 320 times and alludes to it even more. This dependence on the Old Testament illustrates the importance of contemporary application. Jesus built His entire ministry on applying Scripture to His day, arguing tenaciously for the authority and applicability of the Old Testament. Similarly, Paul informed Timothy that the Old Testament Scriptures are for every believer: ‘All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.’ (2 Timothy 3:16, NIV). He also told the Roman Christians in Romans 15:4, ‘For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us so that through the endurance taught in the Scriptures and the encouragement they provide we might have hope.’ To treat the Old Testament as a relic of the past with no significance for today contradicts the Bible’s treatment of the Old Testament. We must strive to know how these texts relate to the modern world (Pratt, 1990).

The distance between the past and the relevant present is crucial to our development. The Old Testament should never be seen as just a historical account, it is the backbone of the New Testament and how it impacts the meaning of our lives. This is just a reminder that the history and rules from the past do not just die with the people of that time. It is a continuation of the world in which we live. It is a history that we continuously propel forward.  Bringing the old to the new solidifies who we are. I am thankful for the rules of my youth because it has given me structure in adulthood. Stop and examine other aspects of your life where the old is essential to the new.

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