2011-07-08
Good Morning Dear Ones,
In the course of our series, “Our Covenant,” we are continuing with the segment on “God is Faithful.” Last week, I was led to discuss the first and second “Adam’s” from RO 5: 12-19. Then I went on to answer the question: Who really is Jesus Christ, covering COL 1: 15-20. Now it is the time to examine the old and new covenants.
We all know that the Bible is divided into the OT and NT, standing for Old Testament and New Testament. It would be clearer if it were called the old covenant and the new covenant. The old covenant is the Covenant of the Law. It was given at the base of Mt. Sinai, by God through Moses to the Jewish people only [EX 24: 7-11]. However, we all know that throughout the history of the OT, there were some exceptions to that rule, e.g. Rehab, Tamar, Ruth, and the Assyrians of Nineveh by Jonah. For the most part, it separated these people from any others by the belief in one God only –monotheism. The new covenant is the Covenant of Grace, that superb replacement for the old covenant first prophesied in JER 31: 31-34. What separated it from the old covenant was the Atonement of Jesus Christ, the salvation it gave, and the grace extended to people who believe in Him. The NT deals with a real understanding of God’s teaching, divinely-designed to replace the old legalism to which the practice of Judaism had deteriorated.
The Greek word for covenant is diathekey [pronounced dee-a-thay-kay], which means “a disposition, a contract, covenant, or testament.” One could trace this back to a disposition or settlement of one’s property at the time of his death. Greek is a very precise language, so it makes the distinction between and ordinary covenant, like a property settlement, calling it a suntheke [pronounced soon-thay-kay], from a spiritual covenant, a diathekey. A suntheke is a legal document in which the parties to it are in an equal position to each other, but a diathekey is an unequal partnership between God and man, in which God is the dominant party. The Covenant of Grace, for example, is a central part of the covenant relationship that all believers in Jesus Christ have with their Deity. It encompasses every facet of the people’s lives. This is the point that Louis Berkhof makes in his Systematic Theology, pp. 262-263. Diathekey received a new meaning when it became the vehicle of divine thought. This gives a fuller meaning to the word of God, expressed in 2 TIM 3: 16-17. “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”
I can’t resist saying something about the term “God-breathed.” It is so very special. I first encountered it in reading EZK 37: 9-10, a passage that must be understood in context. This whole section of the chapter deals with the Valley of Dry Bones. You’ll remember that this is a prophecy God has given to Ezkiel, while he was still the leader of a group of Jews living in exile in the Chabar river area of Babylon. It is a prophecy that Israel will one day be given life as a nation, rather than as she was at the time, scattered in dyaspora- in this case during the Babylonian Captivity. The term, “dry bones,” here refers to Israel. “Then He said to me, ‘Prophesy to the breath; prophesy, son of man, and say to it, ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says. Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe into these slain that they may live.’ So I prophesied as He commanded me, and breath entered them; they came to life and stood up on their feet –a vast army.” This unique way of stating this prophecy can come about, because God and God alone can give life, can “breathe” life into a people, an individual, or His very own word.
We get even better clarification of this important concept [God-breathed] when we read this passage against the backdrop of God’s promise made in EZK 36: 26-27, “I will give you a new heart and put a new Spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and giver you a heart of flesh. And I will put My Spirit in you and move you to follow My decrees and be careful to keep My laws.” In a way, God is promising to breathe life into our faith and trust in Him in keeping this amazing promise made so long ago. He makes good on that promise in RO 8: 14-16, so this is no empty promise as a part of His covenant relationship with us. Moreover, it doesn’t hurt to review JN 1: 1-4 to see how it fits so beautifully into this divine construct. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through Him all things were made; without Him nothing was made. In Him was life, and that life was the light of men.” In my mind, it’s perfectly okay to connect God’s word that we read and should study daily with it’s Author. Whether or not the “W” in word is capitalized, we are talking about God’s second personality, Jesus Christ. And of course, this description doesn’t fit into the confines of Newtonian physics. Instead, we are looking at God at work and His very nature, which has no limits, because it is supernatural. He and His power to breathe life into something inanimate is so much more than we can ever fully comprehend [PS 139: 6; IS 55: 8-9]. The same applies to His love for His human creation. Otherwise, He would not want us to enter into this special covenant relationship with Him.
PRAYER: O Lord, You have loved us enough to breathe life into us, into our bodies physically, our minds intellectually, our feelings emotionally, and our spirits with Your own Spirit. We are integrated beings when we are healthy, and our lives should be with You squarely in the center of them. You have not only breathed life into us a individuals, but You have called us FIRST into a covenant relationship with You [JN 15: 16]. Moreover, You have called us to have a covenant relationship with all other believers and potential believers, built into Your church, the Body of Christ. EPH 2: 19-22, “Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God’s people and members of God’s household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus Himself as the chief Cornerstone. In Him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in Him you too are being built to become a dwelling in which God lives by His Spirit.” We can see Your will clearly and must now act to make it so. Dearest Father, You have breathed life into us, given us Your own Spirit, and presented us with Your living word. Christ, Your second Personality, has given us a Model to follow in how we live, how we make decisions, how we think, and how we act. We are imperfect, and we recognize our need for Your presence and intervention to live righteously [MT 5 :3]. We thank and praise You forever for all You are and all You do for us. In Christ’s holy/mighty name, we pray. Amen.
NEXT WEEK: The Holy Spirit commands me to begin a new segment of “Our Covenant” called “God Initiates Relationship.” I’m led to begin with some of the mechanics of a covenant relationship and then go on to discuss some of the different aspects of one. If we think about it, our belief system is the only one in the whole world in which the Deity, a single God with three personalities, reaches down FIRST to His enemies, to make them His friends. RO 5: 9-11, “Since we have now been justified by His blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through Him! For if, when we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to Him through the death of His Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through His life! Not only is this so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through Whom we have now received reconciliation.” Yes, when we come to faith in Christ, we are now also God’s friends! Having a Deity in our lives Who wants and will actively participate in this special, covenant relationship is a great blessing. We never face our trials alone and abandoned. We can always turn to Him for guidance and help. PS 37: 23-24, “The steps of the godly are directed by the Lord. He delights in every detail of their lives. Though they stumble, they will not fall, for the Lord holds them by the hand.” When the “hard path that leads from a narrow gate” [MT 7: 13-14] gets too bumpy and hard, He has been known to pick us up and carry us through to the next place where we can walk beside Him. I know He has done this for me when I needed 5 ½ hours of surgery to live. He will do the same for any believer, taking him to the place that best suits His eternal needs. He deserves our eternal thanks and praise!
Grace Be With You Always,
Lynn
JS 24: 15