D ear Family
The night when Jesus reclined at the table with His disciples (yes, they reclined and didn’t sit neatly in a row on chairs as portrayed in that famous “Last Supper” painting of Leonardo Da Vinci in 1494—so much for those hidings to keep my elbows off the table) and told them that the cup of wine which He held represented the new covenant in His blood, I’m pretty certain they were somewhat confused. They missed much of His mission throughout His ministry and so this was probably also quite beyond their grasp. They certainly would have known the reference to Leviti-cus 17:11 which reads, “For the life of a creature is in the blood, and I have given it to you to make atone-ment for yourselves on the altar; it is the blood that makes atonement for one’s life.” But the full impact of that was initially lost on them. A “new” covenant for atonement? In His blood? Perhaps they had heard of or remembered Cousin John the Baptist’s words when he said, “Behold, the Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world.” If so, I can just imagine the vibrant excite-ment of anticipation in that little up-per room of earth shattering an-nouncement. The universe had nev-er ever heard such sweet words spoken before!
The new covenant is nothing short of glorious, divine, awesome! God’s standards for holiness and right-eousness certainly have not and cannot change, but His means for atonement have been made com-plete and fulfilled in Christ Jesus, applicable as before by faith.
This wonderful covenant commemo-rates the purchase of the covenant by the blood of Christ, and confirms the promises of the covenant. Those incomprehensible promises which are all “Yes” and “Amen” in him.
So, when we share in the Lord’s supper and pause to contemplate the new covenant, let’s remember that He shed His blood for us be-cause we needed it. We had no hope in the old covenant focused on sin and impossible obedience, but instead, because He loved us, and gave Himself for us, we now have a covenant found on better promis-es—put in our minds and written on our hearts by God Himself.
Oh that we would heed Paul’s words in 2 Corinthians 7:1, “Since we have these promises, dear friends, let us purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit, per-fecting holiness out of reverence for God.”
Tag Archives: new covenant
A New Chapter
A NEW CHAPTER
While I was doing research for my new book on prayer, I stumbled on a subject every believer should know inside out. It’s called the New Covenant. Of course, I realise that the gracious Holy Spirit, the supreme teacher, is here to lead us into all truth. It was He who led me to explore the ramifications of this covenant which Jesus introduced to His disciples in the Upper Room on the eve of His death.
Jeremiah predicted, centuries before, that God would make a new covenant for (not with) His people because the Old Covenant, the Mosaic Covenant of which Moses was the mediator, failed to achieve its purpose.
If the first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no need for a second covenant to replace it. But when God found fault with the people, He said: “The day is coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and Judah. This covenant will not be like the one I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand and led them out of the land of Egypt. They did not remain faithful to my covenant, so I turned my back on them, says the Lord.” Heb. 8: 7-9 (NLT)
What was wrong with the Old Covenant? God said that it was not the covenant that was faulty. It was the people. They were incapable of obeying God’s instructions because of sin. There was no provision in the Old Covenant to deal with the power that sin had over them.
Paul was aware of the problem of sin in his own life when he was a strict Pharisee and made every effort to obey the covenant.
Well then, am I suggesting that the law of God is sinful? Of course not! In fact, it was the law that showed me my sin. I would never have known that coveting was wrong if the law had not said, “You must not covet.” Romans 7:7 (NLT)
The law’s purpose was to teach the people what sin was and to show them how impossible it was to overcome sin by trying to obey the law.
At one time, I lived without understanding the law. But when I learned the command not to covet, for instance, the power of sin came to life, and I died. So, I discovered that the law’s commands, which were supposed to bring life, brought spiritual death instead. Romans 7: 9-10 (NLT).
God could not risk making another covenant with His people because of their failure to keep the Mosaic Covenant. Instead, He made a covenant with His Son. All who believe and receive His Son participate in the New Covenant by faith.
Those who lived under the Old Covenant could only look forward to what the New Covenant promised and would do.
“But this is the new covenant I will make with the people of Israel after those days,” says the Lord. “I will put my instructions deep within them, and I will write them on their hearts. I will be their God and they will be my people. And they will not need to teach their neighbours, nor will they need to teach their relatives, saying, “You should know the Lord.” for everyone, from the least to the greatest, will know me already,” says the Lord. “And I will forgive their wickedness, and I will never again remember their sins.”
The operative word for those under the Old Covenant was “Do”. Their lives were an endless round of doing, which was never enough because of their sinful hearts. No matter how much they “did” they could not satisfy God’s holy standards. All the sacrifices for their unfaithfulness could never free them from a guilty conscience.
God made a promise through Jeremiah that the new covenant (which He would make with Jesus) would take care of sin in such a way that it would be completely removed and would never be an issue with Him again.
The New Covenant did away with the old system of Aaronic high priests, the Levitical priesthood, animal sacrifices and promises of an earthly inheritance, and replaced it with Jesus. He is the New Covenant. He is an eternal high priest because of the power of an endless life; He is the mediator of the New Covenant; He is the once-for-all perfect sacrifice which removed sin forever and He is the way to the Father.
The operative word of the New Covenant is “Done”. He declared, as He drew His final breath on the cross, “It is finished!” All we need to do now is to believe His promises. Anything that adds to or takes away from what Jesus accomplished by His life and death is under God’s curse.
Let God’s curse fall on anyone, including us or even an angel from heaven, who preaches a different kind of Good News from the one we preached to you. Gal 1:8 (NLT).
Acknowledgement
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Wheaton, Illinois, 60189. All rights reserved.
New Covenant Prayer – The Foundation
NEW COVENANT PRAYER – THE FOUNDATION
Prayer is a common activity in all religions. In fact, religion is a felt need because human beings are incomplete within themselves and need a higher power upon which to depend in their weakness and to supply their needs.
Since people are essentially at enmity with God and refuse either to acknowledge His existence or to recognise their accountability to Him as their Creator, they have created gods for themselves which are both figments of their imagination and beings (though non-existent) made in their image so that they can manage and manipulate them for their own ends. Prayer to these “gods” is not true prayer. This kind of “prayer” has no fellowship with its god, and it does not submit to the will of such a god. People relate to their gods on the basis of fear. Whatever they do is often an attempt to appease or to manipulate them for their own ends.
We cannot understand true prayer unless we understand our essential relationship with our Creator. In order to short circuit our accountability to our Creator, we have invented both gods and what we call “prayer” but that does not absolve us from accountability in any way. We can neither make God go away, nor can we shake off our responsibility to Him just because we choose to do so.
God has two very valid reasons for calling us to account for what we are and what we do with our lives. He is both our Creator and our Reconciler.
1. GOD IS OUR CREATOR
There is no other account of creation that gives a simpler or saner record of the event. Unlike all other attempts to explain how the universe came to be, including the theory of evolution that many scientists support that presupposes that everything just “happened”, the Bible explains the origin of all life by starting at the beginning.
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth (Gen.1:1)
Since God claims responsibility for all of creation, He has the right to direct the affairs of individuals and nations.
I am the Lord, who has made all things, who alone stretched out the heavens, who spread out the earth by myself (Isa. 44:24).
2. GOD IS OUR RECONCILER
In Paul Young’s book, The Shack, the main character, Mackenzie, asked Papa (the person who plays the part of God the Father), the question, “What exactly did Jesus accomplish by dying?” Papa’s response was both simple and riveting. “Honey, you asked me what Jesus accomplished on the cross; so now listen to me carefully: through His death and resurrection, I am now fully reconciled to the world.”
“The whole world? You mean those who believe in you, right?” Mack asked.
“The whole world, Mack. All I am telling you is that reconciliation is a two-way street, and I have done my part, totally, completely, finally. It is not the nature of love to force a relationship but it is the nature of love to open the way,” responded Papa.
God has opened the way for the world to be reconciled to Him. He invites us to change our minds about Him and to return to Him. He reinstates all who receive His forgiveness as His beloved sons and daughters.
…God was reconciling the world to Himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them. (2 Cor. 5:19).
It is this Father/son relationship which qualifies us to come to God and to call on Him for a response to our prayers. There can be no true prayer outside of this relationship.
Back on Line
BACK ON LINE
Hello, my dear readers.
After a rather long break, I am back on line. My life has been in a big upheaval over the last few months. After serving in my church for the past twelve years as pastoral assistant with all the bits and pieces that accompany a function like this, I have moved to another city 56km away to be with my children. I still function in the church every week, travelling up on a Thursday to teach two discipleship classes and working in my office doing some of my usual functions on Friday mornings.
I am trying to get back into a routine with a small puppy to care for who takes up quite a bit of time and attention. She is the cutest little darling – a Yorkshire terrier named Tosca. She is only almost nine weeks old, very small and but very active.
Over the past months I have been studying the book of Hebrews with renewed interest in the New Covenant. My latest book, Designer Prayer, unlike my other books, is taking a great deal of research, study and prayer and is slowly taking shape with new insights into Biblical prayer as God intends it rather than as we, in the main, have created it for ourselves, patterned on either pagan prayer or prayer in the Old Covenant.
My research has taken me into the meaning and significance of what Jesus did at the cross to change everything. He set us free from whatever was required in the Old Covenant, and established a completely new situation for us.
From time to time over the next few months, I would like to share with you what I have discovered in the hopes that it will also free you to experience and enjoy totally new fellowship with the Father and with the Son through the Holy Spirit.
What Changed Everything?
WHAT CHANGED EVERYTHING?
You have not come to a mountain that can be touched and that is burning with fire; to darkness, gloom and storm; to a trumpet blast or to such a voice speaking words that those who heard it begged that no further word be spoken to them, because they could not bear what was commanded: ‘If even an animal touches the mountain, it must be stoned to death.’ The sight was so terrifying that Moses said, ‘I am trembling with fear.’ (Heb. 12: 18-21).
Why did God reveal Himself to His people in such a terrifying way? Could He not have tempered His appearance to them and made it a little less majestic and frightening?
We must remember that this is the same person who met Moses at the burning bush; the one who called Himself “I AM”. He was the same one who, when He was here in the flesh, said, “Before Abraham was, I AM.” The pre-incarnate Jesus revealed Himself to people time and again before He came to earth as a man. He often appeared as “the angel of the Lord” and spoke as God. This was the majesty and glory of the one who was to become the Son of God, a humble servant who came as a man.
The people of God had lived under the shadow of the Egyptians who worshipped the heavenly bodies and multiple other gods which were represented by idols. How was God going to impress upon them who He was so that they would take Him seriously and obey the word that He spoke to them through Moses?
His appearance on top of the mountain in blazing fire and smoke so dense that it shrouded the mountain top with darkness and gloom, and the terrifying noise of the accompanying trumpet and the sound of His voice, was something they ought never to have forgotten. It should have been a reminder to them and to their children, that their God was not one to be trifled with. He was holy and untouchable, unlike the Egyptian gods who were just like them.
This spectacle should have been indelibly imprinted on their hearts. They should have taught it to their descendants, that the God who visited them in the desert, and who came to dwell among them in the tabernacle, was real. He required them to obey Him because the consequences of disobedience would be in keeping with who He was.
Why are we no longer terrified of this God? Has He changed? Has He relented and down-scaled His glory? What changed everything? Where is the unapproachable, untouchable God? Where is the God who demanded the death of an animal who strayed too near the mountain? Where is the God who demanded blood for every infringement of His holy standards?
But you have come to Mount Zion, to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem. You have come to thousands upon thousands of angels in joyful assembly, to the church of the firstborn, who names are written in heaven. You have come to God, the Judge of all, to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, to Jesus the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel (Heb, 12: 22-24).
God has not changed, but He put in place, through Jesus, the plan He set up before the creation of the world, that would change the hearts of people. His appearance at Mount Sinai as the unapproachable God was the stark reality of the monstrous barrier of sin that separated people from Him. No amount of animal blood could remove that barrier. It could only remind them of the sin that stood between them and God as an insurmountable barrier.
The picture is different now – not terror but celebration; not fire and smoke and gloom and darkness and trembling and weeping and pleading with Moses to stop, but a huge party attended by angels and people of all races, languages and cultures. No longer Mount Sinai, but Mount Zion – the place where God has established His name forever. No longer a God who was hidden behind an impenetrable curtain but Emmanuel, God with us. No longer fear, but perfect love. No more guilt and shame but laughter and joy and worship and thanksgiving.
God has not changed. We have because He changed us. Abel’s blood cried for revenge. The blood of Jesus speaks mercy. Hallelujah!
Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
Have you read my new book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (copyright 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!
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