I do a lot of home canning, so here are two tips for using mason jars to bottle beer (which I've never done):
1) Wipe off the top of the rim of the jar before putting the lid down. Dirty rims are the #1 cause of broken seals.
2) The reason mason jars seal so well is that the heat in the canner melts the wax on the lid, allowing the jar rim to push into the wax and seal up tight.. It's enough to have a hot jar and a hot lid, w/o boiling. It might be enough to use a hot lid alone, and I think that probably would work better and no harm the beer (not enough heat to kill the yeast or heat up the liquid). So, putting the lids in boiling water for 10 seconds before using them would probably help make a good seal.
Chances are, old lids will do OK, too, but each time you re-use a lid, you take a chance.