There are many
times the word covenant is used in the Bible. We can find that God made a
covenant with Noah in Genesis 6"18, But with thee will I establish my covenant;
and thou shalt come into the ark, thou, and thy sons, and thy wife, and thy
sons' wives with thee. God found Noah to be a righteous man and promised to
preserve life through
Noah and his
family. We can also see the covenant God made with Abraham, or Abramat the time
the covenant was made. We can also see that God made a covenant with those that
chose to follow his will. In Exodus 12:48 we read And when a stranger shall
sojourn with thee, and will keep the passover to the LORD, let all his males be
circumcised, and then let him come near and keep it; and he shall be as one
that is born in the land: for no uncircumcised person shall eat thereof. This
of course is the physical part of the old covenant. The reference here is that
any one who chooses to follow the Lord must show the signs of their commitment
to him. With the new covenant, the circumcision is of the heart, as found in
Romans 2:28&29, For he is not a Jew, which is one outwardly; neither is
that circumcision, which is outward in the flesh: But he is a Jew, which is one
inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the
letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God. The circumcision of the heart
simply means that you have cut out the old and grafted in the new, which is
Christ the Lord. Let me just interject this thought. Circumcision is performed
by cutting back the outside skin for the inner to come forth. Same thing goes
for the circumcision of the heart. The old heart needs to be cut back so that
the heart of God has room to enter in. So besides the fact that circumcision is
a commandment of God, as a sign of his covenant between him and Abraham,
circumcision makes room for the new to come forth.
Though there are many times the word
covenant is used in the Bible, we will only look at two of God's covenants in
this article. First we will look briefly at the old covenant found throughout
the Old Testament. We will consider the passage from Deuteronomy 4:13; And he declared unto you his covenant, which he commanded you to perform, even ten commandments; and he wrote them upon two tables of stone.
So what was this covenant, it was the Ten Commandments, but it was so much more than just commandments. It was also the guideline for most of our modern day laws. This covenant by God is a promise. It is a promise that, if we follow his commandments he will be a God to us and we will be his people/ This covenant also promised both blessings and curses. Blessings came from obedience to the LORD and his commandments; Deuteronomy 7:12&13, Wherefore it shall come to pass, if ye hearken to these judgments, and keep, and do them, that the LORD thy God shall keep unto thee the covenant and the mercy which he sware unto thy fathers: And he will love thee, and bless thee, and multiply thee: he will also bless the fruit of thy womb, and the fruit of thy land, thy corn, and thy wine, and thine oil, the increase of thy kine, and the flocks of thy sheep, in the land which he sware unto thy fathers to give thee. Curses came from disobedience; Deuteronomy 11:28, And a curse, if ye will not obey the commandments of the LORD your God, but turn aside out of the way which I command you this day, to go after other gods, which ye have not known.
This may sound pretty harsh, but taken in consideration the same applies to us now with mans' law, does it not? If you murder some one, you must therefore pay the penalty, right? Same goes with God. Another thing you have to take into consideration is that God was with the children of Israel at this time in the form of a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. They also knew God was God because he had proved himself by many great miracles, such as freeing them from Egyptian bondage, providing food and water for them when there was none to be found, and many more. You could say God was right there with them. It didn't take the kind of faith it takes now because they seen first hand who God was through the (types) of miracles he performed and through the prophets. We see first hand God's presence in us but it is in the form of the Holy Spirit. God is still with us today, but, because we have his written word, and the words of the prophets, God does not need to dwell with us the same way that he did in those days.
Another thing
about the Old Covenant was the way forgiveness was applied. When some one broke
Gods commandments there had to be a blood sacrifice each time. Leviticus
4:2&3 says, Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, If a soul shall sin
through ignorance against any of the commandments of the LORD concerning things
which ought not to be done, and shall do against any of them: If the priest
that is anointed do sin according to the sin of the people; then let him bring
for his sin, which he hath sinned, a young bullock without blemish unto the
LORD for a sin offering.A blood sacrifice was the only way forgiveness could be
applied. Continue reading on in this chapter of Leviticus and you will see
where the blood comes in and the procedure for preparing the sacrifice. Another
thing you may have
noticed is the phrase, sin through ignorance, there is a huge difference between sinning through ignorance and sinning willfully. If you take a look at Hebrews 1:26&27 we can see what God says about willful sin, For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, But a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries. I believe what the word is saying here is, how can God forgive us for something that we willfully continue to do, knowing that it is wrong. When we are children, we are taught that it is wrong to steal. Now as a young child, taking something that doesn't belong to us, may, be excused once or twice. As we get older, though, knowing that it is wrong to steal, it is no longer excused; we are punished for our crime. Same thing goes with God, when we know it is a sin to do something, and we do it any way, then we have to be punished for it.
noticed is the phrase, sin through ignorance, there is a huge difference between sinning through ignorance and sinning willfully. If you take a look at Hebrews 1:26&27 we can see what God says about willful sin, For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, But a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries. I believe what the word is saying here is, how can God forgive us for something that we willfully continue to do, knowing that it is wrong. When we are children, we are taught that it is wrong to steal. Now as a young child, taking something that doesn't belong to us, may, be excused once or twice. As we get older, though, knowing that it is wrong to steal, it is no longer excused; we are punished for our crime. Same thing goes with God, when we know it is a sin to do something, and we do it any way, then we have to be punished for it.
One other thing
about the Old covenant, and the way forgiveness was given is, who could offer
the sacrifice. Only the priest that was anointed could offer a sacrifice for
sin to be forgiven. Nowhere in scripture, that I have found, since the law was
given to Moses, has any one other than the priest made the offering for
atonement. We can read of this in many places, we can see it in Leviticus.
4:20; and the priest shall make an atonement for them, and it shall be forgiven
them, Lev. 4:26; and the priest shall make an atonement for him as concerning
his sin, and it shall be forgiven him, and we can also find it in Numbers
15:25; And the priest shall make an atonement for all the congregation of the
children of Israel, and it shall be forgiven them; If you search this topic,
you can find many other scriptures that will show that it was always the priest
that makes the atonement for the people.
We know that the old covenant was with Israel and
concerned the law, or the Ten Commandments as found in Exodus through
Deuteronomy. But what was the law or Ten Commandments given for? Romans 7:7 What shall we say then? is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet. From the very beginning man was consistently disobedient to God, even before the commandments were given in written form. Adam had just one command, and of course we know that he did not keep it. Genesis 2:17. But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it. Man has never been able to keep God's commandments. You might say; well doesn't the Bible say that Job was perfect? Yes indeed, it does say that, but does this mean that Job was without sin? To define perfect in the sense of describing Job we need to look at the definition of the word from this particular passage. Strong's dictionary defines it as: complete, usually pious (showing reverence for God) gentle, dear, coupled together, perfect, plain, undefiled, upright. So to say that Job was perfect may be one thing, Job was upright, he reverenced God, he was undefiled, (didn't bow to other gods), but to say that Job was without sin is something totally different, because we know that all have sinned, as is stated in Romans 3:23 For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God. Now I know that most attribute "all have sinned and come short of the glory of God" to Paul. But, let's look at some passages of scripture that came before Paul's letters. Jesus made this statement in John 8:7 "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her." Jesus is stating the fact that they all had sin. Psalm 14:3 tells us: They are all gone aside, they are all together become filthy: there is none that doeth good, no, not one. So Jesus himself as well as the Old Testament tells us that ALL have sinned.
The New Covenant
gives us a little insight to what Jesus taught, and how Paul came to continue
in Jesus' teachings. Now I know there are those that say Paul contradicted
Jesus, but we will discover why that is not a true statement. First let me make
one thing clear, the question has always been asked, aren't there
contradictions in the Bible? Let me say this, there are no contradictions nor
mistakes in God's word, there are however errors in what man has both penned
(written) and translated in the Bible. This is a topic that was covered in
chapter one, "Scriptural Interpretation."Before we look at the new
covenant we need to look at the source of the new covenant and how it is
instituted.
According to scripture Jesus is the source
of the new covenant as found in Matthew 26:28 For this is my blood of the new
testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins. Jesus said of
himself that he is the New Testament. The word Testament here is another word
for covenant or promise as found in any major dictionary and in the Strong's
Bible dictionary. Notice that Jesus said in this verse that, it was his blood
and that it was shed for many for the remission of sins. According to scripture
there is no forgiveness of sins without the shedding of blood. We can see this
in Hebrews 9:22; And almost all things are by the law purged with blood; and
without shedding of blood is no remission. Although the phrase "almost all
things" is found here, we can still see by other scriptures that the blood
is what cleanses us from sin. Did you know that when you get a cut, that the
bleeding occurs for the wound to be purified? This is the purpose of bleeding,
it purifies the wound. The blood of Jesus covers our sin, when we apply it, so
that our sinful nature is purified. Since most attribute Hebrews to Paul
though, we will use a passage from: 1st John But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin. Leviticus 17:11 For the life of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul. So blood had to be shed for atonement to be made for sin. In the Old Testament blood had to be shed each time sin was committed and once in the year for the sin of the people as a whole. This blood had to come from an unblemished lamb, or a lamb without fault or was perfect in every way. Leviticus 4:32 And if he bring a lamb for a sin offering, he shall bring it
a female without blemish.
