In the article, I would first like to define each part and then we can look at how it is used in the Bible. I find this necessary because there are so many different views, that if you do not stick to the real meaning, the text can be used completely out of context. When we then use our understanding, we then get new meanings for the interpretation of the Bible. These new interpretations of the Bible we then adapt to our way of thinking, while when we have the right meaning, it has a completely different meaning. I think it has been used so many times by theologians to anchor their theological positions, that the moment you have the right meaning, the theologian’s entire view disappears like fog before the sun, or collapses like a house of cards.
The covenant is one of the topics that probably makes the biggest differences between different groups. Because few people really understand the covenant, we are faced today with thousands of different groups, and people who make their own deductions from how the Bible fits together. When I listen to someone or maybe just read an article and the person does not understand the covenant, then it stands out like a sore thumb because the person immediately proves his ignorance. I must let you understand right here early on that all four words used here all have the same foundation, and it is a promise. But more on that later.
So I will start by first using the meaning as given by the WAT (Woordeboek van die Afrikaans Taal), or other explanatory dictionaries where we find examples in the Bible of such an incident or incidents, and then how distortions have come in to confirm a certain view. I want to point out right here at the beginning that I will not put one view above the other, but will only point out the true and false examples. And just one thing you must remember. I will not hesitate to see anyone’s point of view. So I do not have, as people say, “sacred cows”, which I dare not touch. So if Luther did something that he should not have done, I will point it out because it forms part of his character and therefore also part of his theology and interpretation.
So don’t get too angry with me, I also had to research and seek information for years before I thought I could write something down and understand it, and it was not always an easy matter. And of course some people can no longer defend themselves today, but if they did or said something that is not right according to the definition, I believe that I have the right to point it out, since their followers still interpret it as correct.
A promise is a commitment by someone to do or not do something. As a noun promise means a declaration assuring that one will or will not do something. As a verb it means to commit oneself by a promise to do or give. It can also mean a capacity for good, similar to a value that is to be realized in the near future.
Now we can look at some of the promises in the Bible. As we will see, some of the passages may be used as promises and agreements and testaments and in covenants. But the way it is done or the conditions may be quite different. Where a promise can be made between any one of two or more parties, a promise can also be linked to yourself, such as saying I will never do or say something again. Consequences that can follow because a promise is broken can have from none to serious consequences, but it can also cause me great sadness. One good example for me is Jesus telling Peter that Peter would betray Him three times before the rooster crows in the morning. Peter’s response was his promise that it certainly would not happen. The rest is history. Peter broke his promise, and yet Jesus did not reject him. So when we look at a promise, it is quite easy to make, and even though I did it with Jesus, the consequences of my not fulfilling it may not be as big a problem as I think it will be.
I can mention something that has suddenly been written about, talked about and preached about a lot in the last few years is the vow that the Voortrekkers made with the LORD. Even though we try to call it a vow now, it is and always will be a promise. And yes, everyone suddenly wants to attach big consequences because it has been neglected for years, I sometimes wonder if it is about what the LORD accomplished that day, or if it is perhaps just a platform to make people feel guilty, and thus also gain a lot of followers. I do not want to drag politics into it, but it is unfortunately the case that that is all that that day is about for most people who celebrate it as a vow day. The fact that we would actually just celebrate it as a day like a Sunday is not the reason why we come together. As a child I didn’t have much to do with it because my parents were members of the United Party, or simply known as sappe, and didn’t see much of the Afrikaner government. My father even got booklets of Beyers Naude every month and I remember my mother getting angry because he was so opposed to the nats. So I personally didn’t have much to do with and knew about the apartheid benefits of the nats, the broeder bond, and their children.
Such a promise is quite a very easy item to define and describe. And there is not exactly a restriction on where you can make a promise, or what it entails. Probably one expression that a person often hears is a promise is made to be broken.
This is quite one that I hear quite often when you interview people before they are confirmed in marriage. Now you should know that I am licensed to confirm marriages between heterogeneous Christians. This is what is included in the founding articles and will not change, otherwise I would of course break one of the founding rules. Now the people I usually marry are people who are either completely unchurched or unchurched. Sometimes you get funny cases too, like when you marry a 7th day Adventist member (SDA) to a Roman Catholic because the lady’s pastor pulled his head out about two weeks before the wedding when he heard that this member wanted to marry the Anrichrist. Then you just laugh and move on. But unfortunately you often find that this is not the first marriage, but the second or more times that the person is going to be married. Then one’s question is always, “what went wrong?” And this is where you find out that promises are not translated into actions. People will promise everything but when it comes to carrying it out, it does not always happen.
When I have a regular Christian wedding, I always read 1 Corinthians 13 towards the end the proceedings the promises that one person makes to the other, and it is summed up so beautifully in that part of scriptures. “Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. (1Co 13:4-7)” And then it depends on how I feel about which person’s name I substitute in place of the word love. The passage usually shocks most guests when they hear that if they love each other, that’s the way you should act in marriage. As you read the passage, replace the word love with your own name, and see how easily and how many times you broke all these promises. My wedding sermon is also here on my website for you to look at and read. This is the one article that is usually downloaded from my website 100+ times a month.
It’s really very easy to think of so many examples, but I think this choice of promises will be quite easy for us all to understand.
Now what if our morals have become a little frayed and we now find that we do not want to use the Bible as a manual to establish our sexual life in particular? Well, then you have stumbled over the first hurdle of being a Christian, and you might as well use your time better by not reading any further. I am writing for people who really want to be children of the LORD, and not for those who want to have their ears stroked. “But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves. Many will follow their sensuality, and because of them the way of the truth will be maligned; and in their greed they will exploit you with false words; their judgment from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to pits of darkness, reserved for judgment; and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, with seven others, when He brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly; and if He condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction by reducing them to ashes, having made them an example to those who would live ungodly lives thereafter; and if He rescued righteous Lot, oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men (for by what he saw and heard that righteous man, while living among them, felt his righteous soul tormented day after day by their lawless deeds), then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from temptation, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment for the day of judgment, and especially those who indulge the flesh in its corrupt desires and despise authority. Daring, self-willed, they do not tremble when they revile angelic majesties, whereas angels who are greater in might and power do not bring a reviling judgment against them before the Lord. But these, like unreasoning animals, born as creatures of instinct to be captured and killed, reviling where they have no knowledge, will in the destruction of those creatures also be destroyed, suffering wrong as the wages of doing wrong. They count it a pleasure to revel in the daytime. They are stains and blemishes, reveling in their deceptions, as they carouse with you, having eyes full of adultery that never cease from sin, enticing unstable souls, having a heart trained in greed, accursed children; forsaking the right way, they have gone astray, having followed the way of Balaam, the son of Beor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness; but he received a rebuke for his own transgression, for a mute donkey, speaking with a voice of a man, restrained the madness of the prophet. These are springs without water and mists driven by a storm, for whom the black darkness has been reserved. For speaking out arrogant words of vanity they entice by fleshly desires, by sensuality, those who barely escape from the ones who live in error, promising them freedom while they themselves are slaves of corruption; for by what a man is overcome, by this he is enslaved. For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and are overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. For it would be better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than having known it, to turn away from the holy commandment handed on to them. It has happened to them according to the true proverb, “A DOG RETURNS TO ITS OWN VOMIT,” and, “A sow, after washing, returns to wallowing in the mire.” (2Pe 2:1-22)
Probably the easiest example is gossip. In a big town or city you can easily ignore it and get on with your life. But as soon as you get to the countryside it’s a completely different story. Then you hear today how you would say something bad about somebody else the next week already. Only the people were there of course when you mentioned it. So believe me, every story just has a little piece added just to make it more palatable.
We all promise as Christians to always speak the truth and live it out, so that’s your promise, but when we get the opportunity to add a nice twist to a story, then we do it and so we break the promise we made.
noun
-
harmony or accordance in opinion or feeling.
“the two officers nodded in agreement“
-
-
a negotiated and typically legally binding arrangement between parties as to a course of action.
-
plural noun: agreements
“a trade agreement”
-
-
the absence of incompatibility between two things; consistency.
-
“agreement between experimental observations and theory”
Now we can look at agreements in the Bible.
Probably one of the easiest agreements in the Bible is the one between Cain and Abel. There was no written agreement, but Cain wanted so much to satisfy his earthly needs that he would give his firstborn right to Abel. And this without any witnesses except the LORD. But the LORD makes sure that that agreement is fulfilled.
Such an agreement may be this small thing, but it can touch the course of all humanity. So we find an example where two very good friends from elementary school days buy two farms that are located directly next to each other, and everything goes well until it comes to the water rights. One then found out that his farm had three days of water use, and that his friend only had two days. Then he understood why the previous owner had built such large dams so that he could store his water. When they looked at the water servitude that was registered with the title deed, the agreement was quoted as I mentioned, but that it had been used differently for years since the farm, which already had three water sources, also had a very strong borehole. So the farmers did not have the new use registered at that time. But the new owner wanted to use the water that came from a spring and sell it as fresh bottled water.
And there the friendship came to an end, the farm was then sold again, and now everyone is just light-footed towards the man who will not even meet his long-time friend to help now and then so that he can only get water for his crops. But that is just how life is now.
Another example from the Bible is that the LORD commands Israel to kill all the nations in the land that the LORD promised them in Canaan. Israel knows better and they just make the other nations subordinate to the Israelites and so Israel loses what the LORD gave them. Thus they broke the covenant with the LORD, and we know from history that the people or congregation of Israel lost the land of Canaan. All the tribes of Israel except Benjamin, Judah and the Levites could still boast that they were still children of Abraham in the physical sense.
noun
-
1. a person’s will, especially the part relating to personal property.
“father’s will and testament”
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2. something that serves as a sign or evidence of a specified fact, event, or quality.
“growing attendance figures are a testament to the event’s popularity”
We have all probably heard the expression that someone rules from the grave. This is how strong the law sees a will. If the person was of sound mind and there were witnesses, that will is valid. Every now and then there are cases where people, and this is now family, oppose the will because it was not declared that all previous wills are hereby revoked and so people try to circumvent certain sections. But that is how it is. If the willmaker has omitted something in it that you did not know about or did not think the person would include such detail in the will, there have certainly been many people completely caught off guard with a will.
There are always a few that might make you wonder why it happened like that, but if you do not know the history, it can catch you completely off guard. For example, I heard that there were two farmers here in our area who farmed next to each other. One had a beautiful daughter and the other the perfect man. But they couldn’t get married because grandpa decided that never in any generation could the one family be united in marriage with the other. Luckily for them, the law has changed so that today you can enter into a civil agreement that is just a marriage with a different name, and so they were able to bypass the will, without any problems. But I think both guys must have been rolling in their graves the day the two were united in marriage.
But a will is an absolutely essential document so that each person knows exactly what will happen to each person after the death of a person. And here we come to one of the biggest stumbling blocks. Now we know what will happen after the death of a person and now we are all trying to get into the willmaker’s best books and stay there.
Now we find that Jesus already established the testament for us with Abraham’s lineage, and our naming of the old and new testament is essentially wrong, because now we can very well interpret it as if it was only in force after Jesus’ death, but because we do not know the difference between a testament and a covenant, our everyday theology is not built on Jesus as the cornerstone. It is built on our interpretation of the covenant and testament as our Church organization or belief system see it.
Let me quickly throw in an example that will immediately make people wonder. During the Reformation, one of the principles that took root especially in Germany was the so-called Anabaptist movement. But like so many people still do today, we like to classify people into groups. So they suddenly found themselves in five groups, and had to flee for their lives because Calvin wanted to have them all killed. They did not agree with his interpretation, and Calvin made sure that he had enough people in high positions so that they could then be arrested and charged with not following the state’s official religion and then sentenced to death and of course Calvin had nothing to do with it. So all the Anabaptists looked for a new place to live and some of the states in America opened their doors to the people and they moved there. Many of the children’s first language is still German, and they only go to school until grade 8 because then they have learned enough to be able to run a farm, and that is what is expected of them. Now somewhere around 1918, their “Synod” decided that they would not participate in new technology any further and that is where they got stuck with their clothes, hairstyles, transportation and everything that everyone laughs about today. So you can use technology from 1917 but not from 1919. Quite interesting.
Why I also disagree about when a testament begins and ends, the Father made a testament or agreement with Abraham that He would always be their God, if they would be His people. Therefore, even though Israel strayed from His covenant every now and then, He determined in His covenant that they were His people, so He had to listen to them because that was part of the covenant. How did the LORD share this covenant with Abraham? “And the LORD said to Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house, unto the land that I will show thee. And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; that thou shalt be a blessing. And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee; and in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed. So Abram departed as the LORD had spoken unto him; and Lot went with him. And Abram was seventy and five years old when he departed out of Haran. And Abram took Sarai his wife, and Lot his brother’s son, and all their substance that they had gathered, and the souls that they had gotten in Haran, and they set out to go into the land of Canaan: and they came into the land of Canaan. And Abram passed through the land unto the place of Shechem, unto the plain of Moreh. The Canaanites were then in the land. Then the LORD appeared unto Abram, and said unto him,
As usual, first the dictionary meaning.
covenant
/ˈkʌvənənt/
noun
noun: covenant; plural noun: covenants, an agreement.
“there was a covenant between them that her name was never to be mentioned”
verb
verb: covenant; 3rd person present: covenants; past tense: covenanted; agree by lease, deed, or other legal contract. “the landlord covenants to repair the property”
We find that at least in the English language they have som special meanings for a covenant of the Bible. In the Bible, a covenant is a binding agreement between God and a person or group of people. Covenants are a key theme in the Bible, and are the structure of the biblical story.
Here are some things to know about covenants in the Bible:
Definition
A covenant is a personal, relational agreement between two parties that establishes a relationship, conditions, promises, and consequences.
Purpose
Covenants are a key part of God’s plan to restore humanity to its divine calling.
Types
Covenants can be conditional or unconditional. Conditional covenants require at least one party to uphold certain conditions, while unconditional covenants do not have stipulations.
Examples
Some examples of covenants in the Bible include:
The Mosaic Covenant: God established this covenant with the Israelites, promising protection and blessings in exchange for their worship and obedience to the law code.
The covenant with Noah: God promised that he would never again destroy the Earth with a flood.
The covenant with Abraham: God promised that Abraham would become the ancestor of a great nation, if Abraham went to the place God showed him and circumcised all the males of the nation.
The covenant with Jesus: In the New Testament, God promised salvation to those who believe in Jesus.
Some of these examples above are already flawed as the covenant is not really an acceptable way of interpretation or understanding in the English language.
As you will see, there is little written in the explanatory dictionaries, because we as Westerners do not understand the principle of a covenant, and there were even in the Greek and other ancient languages in which the Bible was originally recorded, which also did not have different words for the specific principle and word. This is a ritual that was used by the Near Easterners, but it disappeared because most Christians here fled to Europe after the death of Christ, and certainly did not flee to the people of the Near East.
There is one book that sheds quite a bit of light on the subject and it was written by Henry Clay Trumbell with the name of “A Blood Covenant, a primitive rite and its bearings to Christians.”
As we can deduce from the name, the person wrote the book because it sheds more light on the Christian side of the covenant. Furthermore, we also find that many theologians attach different interpretations to the word, and this can then simply change the entire meaning of the gospel, and this is what can also lead us on the path that the author wants you to take, or suddenly make you wonder if you have made a wrong interpretation. We hear so much about the New Covenant, but do we understand what it means, or do we understand what happened? According to the Old Covenant, every year we entered the Most Holy Place in the temple to make atonement for our sins with blood. This was also the celebration of the Passover, where each household had to take and eat a lamb without blemish. The lamb then brought reconciliation between the people and God.
“And Abram said, “Since You have given no offspring to me, one born in my house is my heir.” Then behold, the word of the LORD came to him, saying, “This man will not be your heir; but one who will come forth from your own body, he shall be your heir.” And He took him outside and said, “Now look toward the heavens, and count the stars, if you are able to count them.” And He said to him, “So shall your descendants be.” Then he believed in the LORD; and He reckoned it to him as righteousness. And He said to him, “I am the LORD who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans, to give you this land to possess it.” He said, “O Lord GOD, how may I know that I will possess it?” So He said to him, “Bring Me a three year old heifer, and a three year old female goat, and a three year old ram, and a turtledove, and a young pigeon.” Then he brought all these to Him and cut them in two, and laid each half opposite the other; but he did not cut the birds. The birds of prey came down upon the carcasses, and Abram drove them away. Now when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram; and behold, terror and great darkness fell upon him. God said to Abram, “Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, where they will be enslaved and oppressed four hundred years. “But I will also judge the nation whom they will serve, and afterward they will come out with many possessions. “As for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace; you will be buried at a good old age. “Then in the fourth generation they will return here, for the iniquity of the Amorite is not yet complete.” It came about when the sun had set, that it was very dark, and behold, there appeared a smoking oven and a flaming torch which passed between these pieces. On that day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, “To your descendants I have given this land, From the river of Egypt as far as the great river, the river Euphrates: the Kenite and the Kenizzite and the Kadmonite and the Hittite and the Perizzite and the Rephaim and the Amorite and the Canaanite and the Girgashite and the Jebusite.”(Gen15:3-21)
So here we find all the regulations for the covenant. As we see here, Abraham did not really play a role in this covenant, and he only had to play a passive role. He himself did not know what was happening around him. In the New Covenant we find that Jesus was the sacrifice, that He became the Lamb who died for our sins, and thus worked for our forgiveness. All we have to do is believe that Jesus was and is the Christ (Savior, Messiah), and as a sign of this is the celebration of the Lord’s Supper and then we are baptized to declare that I died with Jesus, but also that I rose with Him. This further means that I must change my territory, by leaving Egypt, the place where Pharaoh (satan) rules, by being baptized, and establishing myself under the kingship of the LORD outside of Egypt.
When we study and investigate the customs of the time, we find that there were various pieces of clothing and evidence exchanged that were signs of the covenant. Let’s look at what the people had to exchange when they made a covenant, and what its meaning is for today: They had to exchange their outer garments. For us, this means that He gave us His garment so that we could receive His nature and character.
They had to exchange girdles. His girdle offers us His power and His Strength.
They cut their wrists and mixed the blood. The mixing of the blood means to us that we receive cleansing from sins. Just remember that in all covenants, the mixing of blood means that everything I have now belongs to the other person, but also that everything the person has now also becomes mine. I can only mention that this is also the reason that marriage is known as a covenant, because we are now one after we have “cut” the covenant. When a woman has intercourse for the first time she loses her virginity and blood flows. So the two people have made a covenant. Now with our new lifestyle of sleeping around and doing whatever we want, I wonder how many people really realize what it was all about because they had sex with so many other people and now you are walking around with all that person’s sins and problems. And of course you can’t understand why you are so confused. I can remember as a child that up until the late sixties if I’m right, you could apply to have the marriage annulled if the woman could prove that she was still a virgin. In such a case it was as if you had never married.
Everything that was mine became the other person’s, including their names. So we find that our name changes, and through that we receive His reputation and authority, while He offers us His scar on the cross as a sign of a permanent commitment.
Possessions are exchanged. He also exchanges our possessions, and so we receive eternal life, and He takes our death upon Himself. The covenant is sealed with a meal. At the Lord’s Supper we eat the covenant meal together as partakers, and the covenant is thus confirmed. The last sign of the covenant, the memorial pole, is the bloodstained cross on Golgotha. For if He had not died, we could not receive eternal life.
The most important meaning of the covenant was that the LORD declared with it that if He broke any of the conditions, Abraham could do the same with Him as He did with the animals. So if the LORD therefore causes the covenant with Abraham or any person who became part of the covenant to die, we can therefore kill the LORD as He killed the ox. This was a general agreement and we can see it play out later in the Bible where David and Jonathan made a covenant that if something happens to David or his family, Jonathan would then raise David’s children as his own. The reverse happened, however, and this was the reason why David raised Mephibosheth because Jonathan was killed because he was Saul’s son, and this was how the customs were at that time. And remember Mephibosheth was paralyzed because his nurse dropped him when she heard that David was now going to rule as king but she also did not understand the covenant.
So we can understand that when the LORD asked Abraham to sacrifice Isaac he did not hesitate. The LORD had two choices, He had to either raise Isaac from the dead but it was destined for Jesus, or He had to provide an alternative, which He did and it was the sacrifice that Israel had to make repeatedly every year because it was only valid for a year. This is also the reason why Jesus had to die, because the Father expected Abraham to sacrifice his son, and therefore He had to sacrifice Jesus so that he could fulfill his part of the covenant by sacrificing His son for our sin.
But of course there were also great benefits for those who chose to become part of the covenant. But they had to choose. They were not automatically part of the covenant. Read Ezekiel 18 to see what happens to believing and unbelieving fathers and sons.
How do I become part of the covenant? The first time I use communion, where I declare that only He can save me. Then I can partake of His body, the bread, and the wine, the blood of the Lamb. Then I must leave Egypt, to get away from the rule of Pharaoh (satan). How do I do this? Through the baptism of the believer and the baptism with the Holy Spirit which indicates the death of the old man, and the resurrection of the new man. Because I must choose whether I want to become part of the covenant. Not my parents, church or anyone can decide for me. I must go and lay down my life at the cross. John 3 verse 5 and 6: “Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. 6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.”
But what was this covenant about, and why do I speak as if we, as gentiles, also had a part in it? I would like to show what Jesus came to do, why He came to do it, and what the consequences of it are for us as children of the covenant.
So I would like to make a comparison between the two covenants and what we are taught as the Old Covenant and why we who as gentiles are then part of the Covenant. I call it the covenant before Christ, and then the covenant with Christ as Lamb.
I would like to look at the steps of a covenant. It is fully described for us with the exodus of Israel from Egypt to the land of Canaan. After all, this is what the LORD promised Abraham where his descendants would settle. This is also my guide for today, since I also want to get to Canaan. The only difference is that Israel as a congregation made the physical journey, while today we can experience the spiritual journey to get to our Canaan. This is the place that the LORD has destined for me. I will first describe what Israel had to do, and then follow what it should do for us as New Covenant members and what it means.
But why did the LORD let them leave Egypt? “Now it came about in the course of those many days that the king of Egypt died. And the sons of Israel sighed because of the bondage, and they cried out; and their cry for help because of their bondage rose up to God. So God heard their groaning; and God remembered His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God saw the sons of Israel, and God took notice of them.” (Exo 2:23-25) “The LORD said, “I have surely seen the affliction of My people who are in Egypt, and have given heed to their cry because of their taskmasters, for I am aware of their sufferings. “So I have come down to deliver them from the power of the Egyptians, and to bring them up from that land to a good and spacious land, to a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanite and the Hittite and the Amorite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite. “Now, behold, the cry of the sons of Israel has come to Me; furthermore, I have seen the oppression with which the Egyptians are oppressing them.”(Exodus 3:7-9)
We also read that he LORD specified what role each person had to fulfill. “Then the LORD said to Moses, “See, I make you as God to Pharaoh, and your brother Aaron shall be your prophet. “You shall speak all that I command you, and your brother Aaron shall speak to Pharaoh that he let the sons of Israel go out of his land. “But I will harden Pharaoh’s heart that I may multiply My signs and My wonders in the land of Egypt. “When Pharaoh does not listen to you, then I will lay My hand on Egypt and bring out My hosts, My people the sons of Israel, from the land of Egypt by great judgments. “The Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD, when I stretch out My hand on Egypt and bring out the sons of Israel from their midst.” So Moses and Aaron did it; as the LORD commanded them, thus they did.”(Exo 7:1-6)’”
So in the whole story Moses represents the LORD, Pharaoh the Satan, Aaron the prophet and therefore the mouthpiece of the LORD and Moses’ rod the Holy Spirit.
Now we can look at what Israel had to do to leave Egypt, and what Moses prescribed for them.
• Covenant before Christ: Circumcision of the foreskin. This was to remind them that they were part of God’s chosen people. The LORD said to Moses and Aaron, “This is the ordinance of the Passover: no foreigner is to eat of it; but every man’s slave purchased with money, after you have circumcised him, then he may eat of it. “A sojourner or a hired servant shall not eat of it. “It is to be eaten in a single house; you are not to bring forth any of the flesh outside of the house, nor are you to break any bone of it. “All the congregation of Israel are to celebrate this. (Exodus 12:43-49) “When your son asks you in time to come, saying, `What do the testimonies and the statutes and the judgments mean which the LORD our God commanded you?’ then you shall say to your son, `We were slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt, and the LORD brought us from Egypt with a mighty hand. `Moreover, the LORD showed great and distressing signs and wonders before our eyes against Egypt, Pharaoh and all his household; He brought us out from there in order to bring us in, to give us the land which He had sworn to our fathers.’ “So the LORD commanded us to observe all these statutes, to fear the LORD our God for our good always and for our survival, as it is today. “It will be righteousness for us if we are careful to observe all this commandment before the LORD our God, just as He commanded us.(Deut 6:20-25)
• Covenant with Christ as Lamb: Circumcision of the heart. All people are born in Egypt, a life without the LORD, a life where I stand under the authority of Satan (Pharaoh). Like Israel, I must cry out to the LORD to free me from Egypt. So my behavior must change. I must realize that I can do nothing to save myself. I must believe that Jesus did everything to restore the relationship between me and the Father. I must realize that I am a sinner and that I will be lost if I continue to live my own life. I must repent. I must act like a child of the LORD. I must begin to live the love of the LORD according to 1 John 3 on earth. My behavior must be the proof that I am a child of God. No external circumcision is necessary. “Then those who feared the LORD spoke to one another, and the LORD gave attention and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before Him for those who fear the LORD and who esteem His name. “They will be Mine,” says the LORD of hosts, “on the day that I prepare My own possession, and I will spare them as a man spares his own son who serves him.” So you will again distinguish between the righteous and the wicked, between one who serves God and one who does not serve Him. Malachi 3:16-18)
Jer 31:33: “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”.
“And I will give them one heart, and put a new spirit within them. And I will take the heart of stone out of their flesh and give them a heart of flesh, that they may walk in My statutes and keep My ordinances and do them. Then they will be My people, and I shall be their God.” (Ezekiel 11:19-20)
For in Him all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form, and in Him you have been made complete, and He is the head over all rule and authority; and in Him you were also circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, in the removal of the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ; having been buried with Him in baptism, in which you were also raised up with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead. (Col 2:9-12)
What does Paul say about us as gentiles: “For in Him all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form, and in Him you have been made complete, and He is the head over all rule and authority; and in Him you were also circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, in the removal of the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ; having been buried with Him in baptism, in which you were also raised up with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead.” (Rom 3:29-31) But he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that which is of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter; and his praise is not from men, but from God..” (Rom 2:29)
Do you know that there are such beautiful pieces written or songs written that are close to our hearts, the words of which are completely wrong and do not fit into the message of salvation. I quoted a few sentences just to prove my point. We as Afrikaans speakers know it all too well. “I know every turn-off path. Every time I got lost. Every time you came to get me somewhere. Make it Lord, the last time”. (Koos Dup) We all know the song but do we understand that we are asking the LORD that we will not stray again like in the past. I think the first sign of the covenant is that I will flee from the wrong, but here I almost feel like we are blaming the LORD that we make wrong decisions. Here the writer asks that the LORD should go and get him again where the person has already made the wrong decision. So I am not doing wrong, because the LORD lets me do it and then He must come and get me when I act wrong. The whole reasoning does not make sense with what we teach about repentance. I just want to quote the passage from Romans 2 again: “But he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that which is of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter; and his praise is not from men, but from God.” (Rom 2:29) So I have to stand up for my wrongdoings. But unfortunately it is the case that this is the doctrine that Calvin described, and with the vast majority of people in South Africa being Calvinists, it is a difficult part because the LORD has already decided what will happen to me. I have no influence on what will happen to me in the future.
• Covenant before Christ: Unleavened bread was to be eaten. Leaven was a sign that you were puffed up and that you had sin. So their bread had to show that there was no sin. We find the following scripture in Corinthians: “Your boasting is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough? Clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. For Christ our Passover also has been sacrificed. Therefore let us celebrate the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.
(1 Corinthians 5:6-8)
• Covenant with Christ as Lamb: Jesus is the bread of life. He could have no sin, because He is also God. “”Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. “This is the bread which comes down out of heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. “I am the living bread that came down out of heaven; if anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever; and the bread also which I will give for the life of the world is My flesh.”Joh 6:49-51) “While they were eating, Jesus took some bread, and after a blessing, He broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take, eat; this is My body.”(Mat 26:26)
• Covenant before Christ: They were to slaughter a lamb and eat it. “”Speak to all the congregation of Israel, saying, `On the tenth of this month they are each one to take a lamb for themselves, according to their fathers’ households, a lamb for each household. `Now if the household is too small for a lamb, then he and his neighbor nearest to his house are to take one according to the number of persons in them; according to what each man should eat, you are to divide the lamb. `Your lamb shall be an unblemished male a year old; you may take it from the sheep or from the goats. `You shall keep it until the fourteenth day of the same month, then the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel is to kill it at twilight.” (Exo 12:3-6)
• Covenant with Christ as Lamb: “And I saw between the throne (with the four living creatures) and the elders a Lamb standing, as if slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God, sent out into all the earth. And He came and took the book out of the right hand of Him who sat on the throne. When He had taken the book, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each one holding a harp and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. And they sang a new song, saying, “Worthy are You to take the book and to break its seals; for You were slain, and purchased for God with Your blood men from every tribe and tongue and people and nation. “You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to our God; and they will reign upon the earth.” (Rev 5:6-10). I have to get to the cross of Jesus, where I realize what it means to die. That Jesus died for us so that we can live. To this day, before I can eat any meat, the animal I am going to eat had to give up its life so that I can live, and that is what Jesus came to do. He gave up His life so that you and I can have His life, a life where death has no power over it. Even with Adam and Eve we learn that they took fig leaves to cover their guilt, but the LORD killed a goat to make clothes for them to cover their nakedness. But here too, blood had to be shed to make atonement for sin.
• Covenant before Christ: They had to smear the blood on the doorposts. This meant that death had passed by the house. “`For I will go through the land of Egypt on that night, and will strike down all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments–I am the LORD. `The blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you live; and when I see the blood I will pass over you, and no plague will befall you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt. (Exo 12:12-13).
• Covenant with Christ as Lamb: We must come under the blood of Jesus. “And when He had taken a cup and given thanks, He gave it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you; for this is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for forgiveness of sins. (Mat 26:27-28) So if I take communion, the angel of death will not be able to touch me, and I will gain eternal life.
• Covenant before Jesus: The law was written on stone tablets as per Exodus 20. Moses also described the consequences even further: “`Moreover, the LORD showed great and distressing signs and wonders before our eyes against Egypt, Pharaoh and all his household; He brought us out from there in order to bring us in, to give us the land which He had sworn to our fathers.’ “So the LORD commanded us to observe all these statutes, to fear the LORD our God for our good always and for our survival, as it is today. “It will be righteousness for us if we are careful to observe all this commandment before the LORD our God, just as He commanded us.
(Deu 6:22-25)
So their righteousness was by keeping the Law.
• Covenant with Christ as Lamb: Law is written on our hart’s. Jer 31:33: “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.” The writer of Hebrews declares it as follows: “FOR THIS IS THE COVENANT THAT I WILL MAKE WITH THE HOUSE OF ISRAEL AFTER THOSE DAYS, SAYS THE LORD: I WILL PUT MY LAWS INTO THEIR MINDS, AND I WILL WRITE THEM ON THEIR HEARTS. AND I WILL BE THEIR GOD, AND THEY SHALL BE MY PEOPLE.” (Heb 8:10) “”“In His days Judah will be saved, And Israel will dwell securely; And this is His name by which He will be called, `The LORD our righteousness.’ Jer 23:(5-6)
So our righteousness is Jesus Christ our saviour.
• Both Israel and gentiles. “The same law shall apply to the native as to the stranger who sojourns among you.”. (Exo 12:49) And a multitude of mixed people also went up with them, and flocks and herds—a great multitude of livestock. So even in Moses’ time, foreigners were part of the covenant people. But it was also the first congregation on earth. Moses uses the word assembly of Israel here to refer to them. In the King James Version of the Bible the word “congregation” is used 363 times in 350 verses to refer to Israel as a “congregation” This also confirms what the LORD promised Abraham. “No longer will you be called Abram, but your name will be Abraham, for I have made you a father of a multitude of nations.”.
• Covenant with Christ as Lamb: There is no change. Because it is not necessary. Provision was already made for us. Jesus came to accomplish only what was necessary so that He could do what was pointed to Him and take all sin upon Himself and put us in right relationship with the Father. This applies to every person who believes that Jesus is the Lamb, Israel and stranger. Now we can live in the righteousness of Jesus, because He is our righteousness. As Jeremiah puts it: “`In those days Judah will be saved and Jerusalem will dwell in safety; and this is the name by which she will be called: the LORD is our righteousness.” Jer 33:16 When we possess His righteousness, we can go to the LORD with boldness. : “Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. ” Heb 4:16.
When we look at the Book of Hebrews, we see how the writer, who I assume was Mark, since he worked with Barnabas and Paul for a year among the Jews and Greeks in the first church in Cyprus, and also traveled with them wherever they went, always referred to what Jesus came to do. He always proved that everything Jesus came to do was better than any of the predecessors. So he compared Jesus to angels, but yet Jesus was found to be better than angels. Then follows Hebrews 5 and 6, which exactly match what Israel had to do with the exodus from Egypt. Look at the six steps, the first four of which have already been completed, and only the last two have yet to be fulfilled. “(Heb 6:1-3)
The last two steps, everlasting life and everlasting death, is what Jesus described in Matthew 25 and John in Revelation 6: “I looked when He broke the sixth seal, and there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth made of hair, and the whole moon became like blood; and the stars of the sky fell to the earth, as a fig tree casts its unripe figs when shaken by a great wind. The sky was split apart like a scroll when it is rolled up, and every mountain and island were moved out of their places. Then the kings of the earth and the great men and the commanders and the rich and the strong and every slave and free man hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains; and they said to the mountains and to the rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the presence of Him who sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb; for the great day of their wrath has come, and who is able to stand?” (Rev 6:12-17)
So we see here that the steps of the covenant as I have explained in the passages in Hebrews and other books, did not come to make a promise, but entered into a covenant with us, and that is what it means. So we obtain eternal life when we enter into covenant with the LORD, and the steps are spelled out for us here, and of course also include the last two steps of the passage in Hebrews. So if we accept it and share it in the order as set out, eternal life is your end point, whereas if you do not believe it, you may end up in Egypt, or perhaps the place none of us want to end up in.
I know where I want to end up. What is your choice?
So now that we know the difference between the different expressions in the Bible, we have all the information to know the differences between promises, agreements, testaments and covenants to be able to make our decision to become part of the covenant.
This is the only way to get into the New Jerusalem, so it is quite important to know in your life.
