davidbu@loowit.wr.tek.com (David E. Buxton) (04/05/91)
In my previous post I showed that the administration of the Covenants changed, the symbols changed and the promise, based upon a risen Saviour, is a superior promise of salvation. Yes, and there is baptism and the Lord's Supper. In all other respects the two Covenants are the same. ======================================= | Old Covenant | New Covenant | ============================================================================ | For all who obey Him | Deut. 7:9 | Heb 5:9 | +------------------------------------+------------------+------------------+ | Also for strangers, Gentiles, | Lev 24:22 | Gal 3:28,29 | | and the "nations" | Isa 42:6; 45:22 | | | | Ps 67:1-7; 22:27,28 | +------------------------------------+------------------+------------------+ | Don't add or subtract from it | Deut. 12:32 | Heb 9:16,17 | | | | Gal 3:15 | +------------------------------------+------------------+------------------+ | Love your neighbor as yourself | Lev 19:18 | Matt 22:39 | | | | Mark 12:33 | +------------------------------------+------------------+------------------+ | With all your heart, soul and might| Deu 6:5; 10:12,13| Mat 22:37 | | | Deut 11:13; 30:6 | Mark 11:30 | | | 2 Kings 23:3 | Luke 10:27 | +------------------------------------+------------------+------------------+ | Law to be placed in the heart | Deut 6:5,6 | Jer 31:31-33 | | | Ps 40:8 | Heb 8:10 | | | Prov 3:1 | Rom. 2:14-16 | | | | | +------------------------------------+------------------+------------------+ | Circumcision of the Heart | Deut 30:6 | Rom 2:28,29 | +------------------------------------+------------------+------------------+ | Forgive and remember sins no more |2 Ch 7:14 Ps 86:5 | Jer 31:34 | | | Ez 18:21-24, 31 | Heb 8:12 | | | Ez 33:11-16 | 1 John 2:1-4 | +------------------------------------+------------------+------------------+ It should now be clear that there are far too many parallels between the two Covenants to be able to say that God's law and His desire to place it in our hearts has changed in the least. Jesus clearly stated that He had not come to change even the punctuation of God's law (Matt 5:17-20; Luke 16:17). If God's promised blessings in the Old Covenant were defective then the New Covenant has equally defective blessings to offer. If the terms of the New Covenant are perfect then God's requirements in the Old Covenant must be perfect. "He is the rock, His work is perfect. . . ." (Deut 32:4) He does not change. For example, to love your neighbor is nothing new to the New Testament. By the time of Jesus it was a popular debate among the Rabbi to ask "who is my neighbor". And the different Rabbi had their various answers. The typical answer was that God does not expect people to love the unlovable and so neighbors were seen to be lovable compatible people. One reason Jesus came was to show what God really meant in the Old Testament when He asked us to love our neighbor - to love even the neighbor who hates us. The way we understand "love your neighbor", as Jesus explained it, is what God had in mind under the Old Covenant. From God's perspective, "Love" is nothing new to the New Testament and the New Covenant. MAN'S BROKEN PROMISES In Jeremiah 31:31-33 we read a prophecy about the New Covenant to come. Note that the reason given is - "My covenant which they broke, though I was a husband to them" (vs 32). " "Behold, the days are coming," says the LORD, "when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah; "not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, though I was a husband to them, "But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel: After those days, says the LORD, I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. " -- Jer 31:31-33 (NKJ) This prophecy was given in the context of Israel being in captivity and looking forward to their return from bondage. In that context it can be seen as simply an anticipated renewal of the Old Covenant. A New Covenant to be established when they came out of captivity. Paul applies this pro- phecy to the New Covenant ratified at the cross. Paul reads from the same prophecy, offering the same explanation: " . . . because they did not continue in My covenant . . . " (Heb 8:9) There are other texts like this one to be found: "The earth is also defiled under its inhabitants, because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, Broken the everlasting covenant." -- Isa 24:5 (NKJ) Here is a clue as to why Israel failed their part of the Covenant; how they responded in spite of God's eagerness to place His law in their hearts: Israel wants a king and rejects Samuel. God says they are rejecting Him. (1 Sam. 7:4-19) And so it was that they ended up trusting themselves and their kings instead of God's power to change their hearts. And so they ended up in bondage again and again. Even the Jews of today insist that it is within man's ability to be good and to keep God's laws, that while God may be needed for other things He is not needed in order to obey the law. Let this be a lesson to us under the New Covenant. Paul explains why they failed so that we will not fail in the same way under the New Covenant. Even if they had kept the Old Covenant perfectly there would still have been the New Covenant ratified at the cross, else Adam and Abraham would have been doomed relative to eternity. So the N.T. warns us about how they failed under the Old Covenant so that we will not fail similarly under the New Covenant. Is there really much difference between trying to keep God's laws without calling upon God to place them in our hearts vs setting them aside on some theory that they are now done away with? Depending upon God and doing things God's way is the spirit of the law. Proposing that the law of God is done away with is to deny the power of the Gospel. Devising a Mishna of law keeping is a keeping of the letter of the law. Only when we call upon God is there any hope. NEW COVENANT EVERLASTING COVENANT: Everlasting Covenant with "all flesh" (Gen 9:16,17). With Abraham and following generations (Gen 17:5-7). Covenant because Abraham kept God's Commandments (Gen 26:4,5). Same as with forefathers (Deut 6:17,18). With David (2 Sam 23:5). Everlasting Covenant with Isaac (Gen. 17:19). Same Everlasting Covenant with Abraham, Isaac, Jacob & Israel (1 Chr 16:16,17; Ps 105:9,10). Everlasting salvation for Israel (Isa 45:17). Everlasing Gospel (Rev 14:6). " "For this is My blood of the New Covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins. "-- Mat 26:28 (NKJ) "Now may the God of peace who brought up our Lord Jesus from the dead, that great Shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the Everlasting Covenant. " -- Heb 13:20 (NKJ) OLD COVENANT LAW = NEW COVENANT LAW The Old Covenant and the New Covenant are really the same Covenant with the same terms and conditions and the same 'law' of God. "Law in the heart" (O.C.) == "Law in the heart" (N.C.) "Law" of God (O.C.) == "Law" of God (N.C.) This is especially made clear when we consider all the texts that insist that God, His law does not change and Jesus does not change. (Num 23:20; Deut. 4:2; 12:32; 32:4; Ps 111:7,8; 119:89, 152; Prov. 30:6; Eccl. 3:14; Isa 8:20; Hab 3:6; Malachi 3:6; Matt. 5:17-20; Luke 16:17; Heb. 1:12; 13:8; James 1:17. "Brethren, I write no new commandment to you, but an old commandment which you have had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word which you heard from the beginning. "-- 1 John 2:7 (NKJ) ". . . . not as though I wrote a new commandment to you, but that which we have had from the beginning . . . ." -- 2 John 1:5 (NKJ) "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. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven." (Matt. 5:17-20) (See also Luke 16:17) Jesus is making it clear that He did not come to change the law. His state- ment makes it clear that He saw no reason why the cross would change the law. The only way to change the law without doing violence to the above scripture is to confine the changes of the law to changes ordained from the beginning under the plan of salvation, under the Everlasting Covenant. The plan of salvation called for Jesus sacrifice which would do away with sacri- fices and the Old Covenant priesthood. After the cross, to continue to per- form sacrifices, or any other aspect of the ceremonial system, would be to break the law that ordained that these systems would end at the cross. Clearly, the law written by God's own hand does not change even in its punc- tuation. And when we examine the 4th commandment it is abundantly clear that these are commandments that only God can claim to have authored - who else can claim to have created this earth. The 4th commandment makes it clear that neither Moses nor Hammurabbi nor any king of this earth wrote the law of God. There are those who insist that Paul does away with the law. According to the following text, such a conclussion would make Paul a false Apostle: "To the law and to the testimony! If they do not speak according to this word, it is because there is no light in them." -- Isa 8:20 (NKJ) Peter warns about such notions about Paul (2 Peter 3:15-18). A proper understanding of what Paul has written will uphold him to be a true Apostle of the Bible and of God. Some will say that the Old Covenant failed because it was impossible to keep. But that is to say the the New Covenant is just as impossible to keep. In the Old Testament we find that there were indeed people who accepted God's law in their hearts and did keep God's law: Enoch (Gen 5:24), Abraham (Gen 26:5), Joseph (Gen 39:2-6), Moses (Deut 34:10), Job (Job 1:1), Daniel (Dan 1:8-20), Samuel ( 1 Sam 3:19), Boy king Joash who repaired the temple (2 Kings 11,12), Josiah (2 Kings 23), Solomon for a time was a royal example (1 Kings 10:1-9) keeping God's commandments with all his heart (1 Kings 14:8). The prophecy that Jesus would magnify the law, and make it honorable (Isa. 42:21). Jesus life was a perfect keeping of the Old Covenant and God's law (Luke 2:52). While there were kings of idolatry there were also kings who brought their people back to God. As a whole, in generalities, God's people did not keep their end of the deal with God as called for in the Covenant. But clearly there were exceptions. And in the New Covenant con- text Jesus said - Enter through the narrow gate for wide is the road to des- truction. Small is the gate to life and few will find it. (Matt. 7:13; Luke 13:24) There were exceptions under the Old Covenant and there will be exceptions under the New Covenant. Each time God gave a new covenant to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Israel, and to David; was God giving them each a brand new and radically different covenant? No! Not at all. It really is the same Everlasting Covenant given again and again from generation to generation! So it is with the New Covenant. Rather than giving Christianity a radically new and different Covenant; God was simply establishing for Christians the promises that He gave to Israel. "And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise. "-- Gal 3:29 (NKJ) Under the New Covenant we are simply inheriting the promises of the Old Covenant with Israel. The New Covenant and the Old Covenant are really no different - except for the way in which they were ratified, celebrated and administered. Dave (David E. Buxton) From the Silicon RainForest of the Northwest