4th Semester / Week 4
As we’ve seen, Covenant Theology attempts to place its followers back under the Mosaic Old Covenant Law (minus the civil and ceremonial aspects of the Law), yet so far we’ve learned that the book of Hebrews undeniably tells us the Old Covenant is “obsolete” and has disappeared. Furthermore, not only does the rest of the New Testament make it crystal clear that we’re no longer under the Mosaic Old Covenant Law, but the breaking of that Covenant was something that was even predicted in the Old Testament.
Let’s first make one observation about the prediction of the New Covenant in Jeremiah 31. This is what was pointed out by D. A. Carson: “[When Israel’s] leaders sinned, the entire nation was contaminated, and ultimately faced divine wrath. But the time is coming, Jeremiah says, when this proverb will be abandoned. ‘Instead,’ God promises, ‘everyone will die for his own sin.”’ (Jeremiah 31:30). This could be true only if the entire covenantal structure associated with Moses’ name is replaced by another.” While the Old Covenant was primarily a corporate covenant that’s powerless to save and could be passed along to future offspring, the New Covenant is instead primarily an individual and personal, powerfully saving covenant.
Let’s continue to allow Scripture to speak for itself as we look at a few more Old Testament passages. We’ll now turn to another passage we’ve also previously mentioned but to which we’ll add more detail:
“I took my staff, Beauty, and CUT IT IN TWO, THAT I MIGHT BREAK THE COVENANT WHICH I HAD MADE with all the peoples. So IT WAS BROKEN ON THAT DAY. Thus the poor of the flock, who were watching me, knew that it was the word of the Lord. Then I said to them, ‘If it is agreeable to you, GIVE ME MY WAGES; and if not, refrain.’ SO THEY WEIGHED OUT FOR MY WAGES THIRTY PIECES OF SILVER.
And the Lord said to me, ‘THROW IT TO THE POTTER’- that princely price they set on me. SO I TOOK THE THIRTY PIECES OF SILVER AND THREW THEM INTO THE HOUSE OF THE LORD for the POTTER,” (Zechariah 11:10-13).
Several of those phrases should sound very familiar. For example, thirty pieces of silver just so happened to be the exact price paid to betray Jesus, which was then thrown into the Temple, and then used to buy the potter’s field. All of which was fulfilled at the 1st advent of Jesus, and this fulfilled passage specifically mentions a prediction of how God was going to “break the covenant.” The divine design of that inferior agreement was for it to be replaced by something better, and again, the details surrounding that statement let us know precisely when it would occur: at the 1st advent of Christ. And it was then that God, “CUT IT IN TWO, THAT I MIGHT BREAK THE COVENANT WHICH I HAD MADE.”
In recognizing that the Old agreement was inferior, we should rejoice that the great mark of the New Covenant is the divine power that enables us to walk in His statutes and keep His judgments. This is something we’ve already seen from Jeremiah, that God Himself would do the work to empower us, but as we’ve seen before, Ezekiel also made a similar prediction:
“I WILL give them one heart, and I WILL put a new spirit within them, and take the stony heart out of their flesh, and give them a heart of flesh, that they may walk in My statutes and keep My judgments and do them; and they shall be My people, and I will be their God,” (Ezekiel 11:19-20).
As well as:
“I WILL sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean; I WILL cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. I WILL give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I WILL take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I WILL put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them,” (Ezekiel 36:25-27).
Furthermore, in our study of Daniel 9 we’ve learned the significance of the Old Covenant blessings and curses found in Deuteronomy 28, but in the very next chapter, Deuteronomy 29, even Moses had known and looked forward to a time when Israel would be given “a heart to understand” (29:4). He then correctly predicted that Israel would fail in keeping the Old Covenant (verses 22–28), but saw a time of restoration (30:1–5). Then, “The Lord your God WILL circumcise your hearts and the hearts of your descendants, so that you may love him with all your heart and with all your soul, and live” (verse 6). This demonstrates to us that the prophesied New Covenant is the total change of heart done by God Himself.
It’s now undeniable that the breaking and changing of the Old Mosaic Covenant Law had been revealed throughout the Old Testament so that He could move in a greater way in His people.
Next, we’ll evaluate what the New Testament tells us about the New Covenant and whether it’s already begun. It’s only natural to start with the most obvious reference given directly by Jesus Himself. In the gospel of Luke we read these words spoken by Jesus after He had taken the cup at the last supper:
“This cup is the New Covenant in My blood, which is shed for you.”
Paul even quotes those words of Jesus in 1 Corinthians 11:25 as he tells the Church about its responsibility to celebrate the Lord’s Supper, and he explicitly mentions that this is the celebration of the New Covenant, the covenant which had been prophesied in Jeremiah 31. Every Covenant involves the shedding of blood, referenced by the phrase “to cut a covenant,” and with the New Covenant it was the very blood of Jesus Himself that would inaugurate this greater and final Covenant. We also see in Matthew 5:17 that Jesus spoke these words:
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to FULFILL them.”
Jesus didn’t just merely sweep the requirements of the Law “under the rug.” God doesn’t lower His standards for anyone, the price must be paid and Jesus didn’t just try to make the Law go away by abolishing it without the requirements being fulfilled. Instead, He completely claimed all of it as His own in order for Him to completely and finally fulfill it. Because He has perfectly fulfilled the Law, the requirements have now been satisfied. The very definition of the Greek word for “fulfilled,” “pléroó,” is “to make full, to complete, to perfect, to consummate, to carry into effect, bring to realization.” Once something has been completed it no longer has to be done again because it’s ultimate goal has been accomplished. Jesus has completed the purpose of the Law, and only through its fulfillment has it been made “obsolete.”
The apostle Paul then goes to great lengths to make clear that the Mosaic Old Covenant Law has been replaced by something better. The purpose of the Law was to magnify sin, which is no longer needed in the New agreement. Paul recognized that the Law itself stirred up the desire to sin as well as pride in those that mistakingly thought they could fulfill the requirements of the Law themselves. We’ll start first with his words to the church in Rome:
“For sin shall not have dominion over you, for YOU ARE NOT UNDER THE LAW but under grace,” (Romans 6:14).
“My brethren, you also have become DEAD TO THE LAW through the body of Christ, that you may be married to another—to Him who was raised from the dead, that we should bear fruit to God. For when we were in the flesh, the sinful passions which were aroused by the law were at work in our members to bear fruit to death. But now we have been DELIVERED FROM THE LAW, having died to what we were held by, so that we should serve in the newness of the Spirit and not in the oldness of the letter,” (Romans 7:4-6).
“The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me FREE FROM THE LAW of sin and death. For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, that the righteous requirement of the law might be FULFILLED in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit,” (Romans 8:2-4).
“CHRIST IS THE END OF THE LAW, to bring righteousness to everyone who believes,” (Romans 10:4).
And now Paul’s words to the church at Galatia:
“A man is NOT JUSTIFIED BY THE WORKS OF THE LAW BUT BY FAITH in Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law; for by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified,” (Galatians 2:16).
“Before faith came, we were kept under guard by the law, kept for the faith which would afterward be revealed. Therefore THE LAW WAS OUR TUTOR to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith. BUT AFTER FAITH HAS COME, WE ARE NO LONGER UNDER A TUTOR,” (Galatians 3:23-25).
“Tell me, you who desire to be under the law, DO YOU NOT HEAR THE LAW?…For these are THE TWO COVENANTS: THE ONE FROM MOUNT SINAI WHICH GIVES BIRTH TO BONDAGE, which is Hagar—for this Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia, and corresponds to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children—but the Jerusalem above is free, which is the mother of us all… Now WE, BRETHREN… ARE CHILDREN OF THE PROMISE… Nevertheless what does the Scripture say? “CAST OUT THE BONDWOMAN and her son, for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the freewoman.” So then, brethren, WE ARE NOT CHILDREN OF THE BONDWOMAN BUT OF THE FREE. Stand fast therefore in the LIBERTY by which Christ has made us free, and DO NOT BE ENTANGLED AGAIN WITH A YOKE OF BONDAGE [to the Mosaic Law],” (Galatians 4:21 – 5:1).
“If you are led by the Spirit, you are NOT UNDER THE LAW,” (Galatians 5:18).
A passage from Paul written to the church at Ephesus:
“But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For He Himself is our peace, who has made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of separation, having ABOLISHED in His flesh the ENMITY, THAT IS, THE LAW OF COMMANDMENTS CONTAINED IN ORDINANCES, so as to create in Himself one new man from the two, thus making peace, and that He might reconcile them both to God in one body through the cross, thereby PUTTING TO DEATH THE ENMITY,” (Ephesians 2:13-16).
In another passage in Hebrews we read:
“How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? And for this reason HE IS THE MEDIATOR OF THE NEW COVENANT, by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions under the first covenant, that those who are called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance,” (Hebrews 9:14-15).
So far it’s clear that Jesus Himself was the mediator of the New Covenant, and all of those are straightforward passages indicating that the New Covenant has been inaugurated, but can Christians claim this covenant for ourselves, or is it only for national fleshly Israel, based upon their DNA? We’re going to study 2 Corinthians 3 in greater detail next week, but for now, here’s the Good News for Christians:
“Our sufficiency is from God, who also MADE US MINISTERS OF THE NEW COVENANT, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life,” (2 Corinthians 3:6).
Clearly, the church in Corinth was mostly made up of Gentiles, and they were told that they were ministers of the New Covenant, therefore, this agreement most definitely includes Gentiles.
After studying all of these passages, we as Christians should be quite thoroughly assured that we can truly claim the New Covenant as our own, and all of us are ministers of the New Covenant, a priesthood of all believers. But there’s one more very important passage that we haven’t looked into yet which we’ll study next week.
“Helping People See Jesus and Exploring All That He Has Fulfilled” 