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A New Covenant

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A NEW COVENANT

But God found fault with the people and said: ‘The days are coming,’ declares the Lord, ‘when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and with the people of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they did not remain faithful to my covenant, and I turned away from them,’ declares the Lord.

This is the covenant I will establish with the people of Israel after that time,’ declares the Lord. ‘I will put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. No longer will they teach their neighbour, or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest. For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.’

By calling this covenant “new”, He has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and outdated will soon disappear (Heb. 8: 8-13).

Why did God give His people the Mosaic covenant if He knew it wouldn’t work? It seems a futile exercise, doesn’t it?

The covenant that God entered into with His people at Mount Sinai was never intended to be His final dealings with them. It was an interim covenant which was meant to serve a specific purpose.

When Israel came out of Egypt, they had behind them a long history of life in a pagan society and slavery to a cruel and oppressive nation. It would take many generations to establish a culture into which their Messiah would be born. They had to unlearn and relearn many truths about God, themselves and their world in order to understand the nature of God, especially His holiness, His righteousness, His justice and His mercy.

The pagan gods of the Egyptians were the product of human imagination, created in the image of fallen man and often reflecting the worst of human nature. They were heartless, unpredictable and demanding. They were takers, never givers, and they certainly did not have the well-being of their worshippers at heart. Of course, behind every pagan god lay the originator of the evil that they were, Satan, their creator.

God could not simply step in and take over. It would take many generations to teach the people about Himself and to win their trust and their loyalty. How would He do it? He built it into their culture and the national and personal lives. He created a way of life for His people that reflected Him. All 613 “laws” were intended to show them how to live in harmony with Him and with one another, teaching them the nature and seriousness of sin, how to deal with sin and how to love God with all their heart, mind, soul and strength and their neighbour as themselves.

God’s national constitution had a spinoff. It also showed up their impotence to obey God’s teachings. Instead of producing obedient children, it produced rebels. Every time God’s word said, ‘Don’t,’ they did, and every time His word said, ‘Do,’ they didn’t. This was also part of the preparation for the new covenant. Until God revealed their hearts by giving them instructions which they failed to follow, they would never realise how impossible it is to satisfy God’s perfection. They would never learn to rely on Him for the power to obey.

There had to be another way, a way which intervened so powerfully that their very hearts would be transformed. Their rebellion would need to go and be replaced by a new motive and a new internal direction. Rules did not work. They only incited rebellion. A prohibition was an invitation to break it. That’s the nature of the human being.

How would God solve this problem? It would take His divine power to overrule the natural inclination of man to go his own way. That’s what man chose in the beginning. He rejected the way of love and chose to make his own rules. Only God could restore him to what he was created to be. He needed a new covenant with new promises AND the will to obey.

That’s where Jesus stepped in. He became both mediator of, and the sacrifice that ratified God’s new covenant. But God added something else – the power of the Holy Spirit who withdrew when the first pair decided to go it alone. He is the key to the success of the new covenant. By removing sin through the sacrifice of Jesus, God could restore the Holy Spirit to the human race. He came at Pentecost to indwell and empower every believer who embraces and follows Jesus.

Jesus is the perfect fulfilment of God’s teachings. We no longer need laws and rituals. He shows us how to live as God’s beloved sons and daughters who resemble Him and reflect Him to the world. All we need to do is to watch and follow Him. He is the way. His word is in us by His Spirit, the Spirit of truth who leads us into all truth.

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.

 

God Spoke And Still Speaks

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GOD SPOKE AND STILL SPEAKS

In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days He has spoken to us by His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, and through whom He also made the universe. The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of His being, sustaining all things by His powerful word. After He had provided purification for sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven. So He became as much superior to the angels as the name He has inherited is superior to theirs. (Heb. 1: 1-4)

The letter to the Hebrews is a treasure; it contains many gems of truth to encourage us. At the same time, it is a thoroughly Hebrew book, steeped in the traditions of the Old Testament and giving us many insights into its religious thought and practice. What was the intention of the writer, and why did he write it?

We know that Jesus was a Jew, born into a pious Jewish family and raised as the eldest son of Joseph and Mary, a young couple who were faithful to their responsibilities as Jewish parents and who gave their Son every opportunity to became a faithful Jew Himself.

But Jesus was much more than the eldest son in a Jewish family. He was also uniquely the Son of God. His upbringing in a human family served its purpose for a season, but had to give way to His greater person and purpose as the Son of God. He did not come into being at His conception in the womb of Mary. That was the beginning of His mission on earth, but before He came to earth He was always God.

God has always spoken. Creation is His silent voice (Psa. 19: 1-4) and still speaks an eloquent testimony to His power and divine nature. (Rom. 1: 20) He also spoke through His chosen vessels, the prophets. Who were they? They were ordinary humans who were chosen and called into a unique relationship with Him. They were His messengers to His people and to the surrounding nations who needed to hear God’s warnings.

The prophets were God’s confidantes. He shared His secrets with them. (Amos 3: 7)He told what would happen before it happened so that His word would be proved true. He took them into His confidence so that they could pray His purposes into being as His partners and representatives on the earth. They were to declare His word to His people as warnings and encouragement to keep His people on track with Him. (Jer. 23: 22) It was their responsibility to heed His word and stay with Him in the fulfilment of His purposes.

The prophets were also God’s representatives to the kings. They accompanied the kings on their journey as rulers of His people. They were beside them in times of crisis, giving them God’s instructions, directing them through times of trouble, rebuking and correcting them when they lost their way, and teaching them the word of God so that they would rule wisely according to God’s ways.

But the prophets were only men. Their ability to represent God to the people was limited by their humanity. God’s plan was to send a representative to the earth who was an exact replica of Himself. In the fullness of time, He sent His Son (Gal. 4: 4) who was exactly like Him, ‘the radiance of His glory’ to speak for God and as God. As His obedient and submissive Son, Jesus had the authority to speak what the Father spoke because He was in perfect harmony with the Father.

He spoke for the Father in His words and actions, but most eloquently through His death through which He made atonement for the sin of the world and reconciled the human race which was alienated through sin, to the Father.

Jewish Christians were having second thoughts about leaving their Jewish religion and trusting in Jesus as their Messiah because of persecution. The Jews were tolerated and left to pursue their religion in peace but Christians, whom the Jews rejected as well as the Roman government, were hated because they challenged the emperor’s claim to deity.

The writer to the Hebrews informed them that to do that was to deny who Jesus was and what He had done and to leave the plan of God unfinished if they rejected their Messiah. Jesus is God’s last word – because He is God’s Son. God speaks through Him as the completion of everything He has to say. If they rejected Him, God the Father had nothing more to say and likewise, to us.

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.