End Times - Week 18

Class Outline:

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Thursday Evening Bible Study

Series:  the End Times - Bible prophecy about future events and periods

Teaching Summary for Week 18

The Kingdom and the Covenants

 

Part 5.  The New Covenant

 

The New Covenant is an unconditional, eternal, literal  covenant, based on the shedding of blood,  whereby the Lord re-affirms the promises to Abraham of future blessings  for Israel and all the nations of the earth.  

The most complete account of the New Covenant is found in chapter 31 of the book of Jeremiah.

JER 31:31-40

31 " Behold, days are coming," declares the Lord, "when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, 32 not like the covenant which I made with their fathers in the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, although I was a husband to them," declares the Lord. 33 "But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days," declares the Lord, " I will put My law within them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. 34 "They will not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, 'Know the Lord,' for they will all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them," declares the Lord, "for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more."

35 Thus says the Lord,

Who gives the sun for light by day

And the fixed order of the moon and the stars for light by night,

Who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar;

 The Lord of hosts is His name:

36 " If this fixed order departs

From before Me," declares the Lord,

"Then the offspring of Israel also will cease

From being a nation before Me forever."

37 Thus says the Lord,

" If the heavens above can be measured

And the foundations of the earth searched out below,

Then I will also cast off all the offspring of Israel

For all that they have done," declares the Lord.

38 "Behold, days are coming," declares the Lord, "when the city will be rebuilt for the Lord from the Tower of Hananel to the Corner Gate. 39 "The measuring line will go out farther straight ahead to the hill Gareb; then it will turn to Goah. 40 "And the whole valley of the dead bodies and of the ashes, and all the fields as far as the brook Kidron, to the corner of the Horse Gate toward the east, shall be holy to the Lord; it will not be plucked up or overthrown anymore forever."

 

 

The importance of the New Covenant

The New Covenant replaces the Mosaic Covenant.

The Mosaic Covenant was a conditional covenant. It promised blessings for obedience, and curses for disobedience (sin).

The obedience that was required as a prerequisite for blessing the nation of Israel was given to the nation in the Mosaic Law.

The nation was unable to fulfill the provisions of the Mosaic Law. Therefore they could not receive the blessings of the Law.

JER 11:1-11

1 The word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying, 2 " Hear the words of this covenant, and speak to the men of Judah and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem;

3 and say to them, 'Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, " Cursed is the man who does not heed the words of this covenant 4 which I commanded your forefathers in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, from the iron furnace, saying, ' Listen to My voice, and do according to all which I command you; so you shall be My people, and I will be your God,' 5 in order to confirm the oath which I swore to your forefathers, to give them a land flowing with milk and honey, as it is this day."'" Then I said, " Amen, O Lord."

6 And the Lord said to me, " Proclaim all these words in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem, saying, ' Hear the words of this covenant and do them. 7 'For I solemnly warned your fathers in the day that I brought them up from the land of Egypt, even to this day, warning persistently, saying, " Listen to My voice." 8 'Yet they did not obey or incline their ear, but walked, each one, in the stubbornness of his evil heart; therefore I brought on them all the words of this covenant, which I commanded them to do, but they did not.'"

9 Then the Lord said to me, "A conspiracy has been found among the men of Judah and among the inhabitants of Jerusalem. 10 "They have turned back to the iniquities of their ancestors who refused to hear My words, and they have gone after other gods to serve them; the house of Israel and the house of Judah have broken My covenant which I made with their fathers." 11 Therefore thus says the Lord, "Behold I am bringing disaster on them which they will not be able to escape; though they will cry to Me, yet I will not listen to them.

 

The only way that the Lord could bless His people Israel would be by means of a new covenant.

In this covenant, the Lord would have to accomplish by Himself the things that the nation could not accomplish because of their stubbornness and the weakness of their flesh.

The Lord would need to forgive their sins, give them an obedient heart, and empower them.

The New Covenant arises solely out of the Lord’s everlasting love and grace. It is unconditional.  It’s remarkable how many times the Lord says “I will” in passages that establish the New Covenant.

The basis of the hope that Jeremiah held out to the nation about to go into exile was not that they would turn themselves around and become obedient, but rather that the Lord would give them the ability to do so.

The New Covenant is “new” only in relation to the Mosaic Covenant.

JER 31:31-32

31 " Behold, days are coming," declares the Lord, "when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, 32 not like the covenant which I made with their fathers in the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, although I was a husband to them," declares the Lord.

 

The New Covenant is never set as against the Abrahamic Palestinian, or Davidic Covenant.

The New Covenant reiterates the unconditional nature of the Abrahamic, Palestinian, and Davidic Covenants in the face of national failure under the Mosaic Covenant (the Law).

This covenant stands in stark contrast to the covenant to Lord established with Israel at Mount Sinai. There He required obedience first before blessing -  but He did not provide the divine enablement under that covenant (since this divine enablement would not come until after our Lord Jesus Christ had died on the cross and risen from the dead).

ROM 8:3-4

3 For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh, 4 so that the requirement [righteousness] of the Law might be fulfilled in us [members of the body of Christ], who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

Let me quickly add that verse 4 is speaking of saints in the church age (members of the body of Christ).  The church does receive spiritual blessings just like the ones that Israel will receive when the New Covenant is fulfilled for them.