The Blessings of the New Covenant, Part 1

Thank you again, Mark. Once again, happy Sabbath to all of you. A special thanks to a gentleman who performed special music today. Very beautiful. You can always tell when Alan is going to perform, even if there isn't an instrument, because we have to double-stack chairs to accommodate his long legs. We have to put one chair on top of the other, but that's okay. It's so beautiful and heartwarming. It is worth watching him sit on two chairs.

Well, today I would like to discuss the blessings of being part of the New Covenant, and how privileged we are to be sanctified by God's New Covenant. It's a covenant that includes the process of transformation that eventually leads us to eternity. And we should all be profoundly thankful and grateful for the Father's calling. I believe the best way to describe the blessings offered under the New Covenant is to contrast it to the Old Covenant. And we can see the difference in the two covenants that God ordained. This actually is part one of a two-part sermon on the blessings of the New Covenant. In modern terminology, we can call these two covenants the Old Relationship and the New Relationship that God has between himself and humankind. I would like to highlight the differences today in these relationships by answering the why. That's, by the way, a big thing in the business world. There's a man who's made quite a good living by saying, you know, what's the why? Discover your why. And so we want to talk about why God established the Old Covenant and why he established the New Covenant. God made numerous covenants with individuals throughout history. He had a covenant with Noah. He had a covenant with Abraham. He had a covenant with Moses. We call that the Old Covenant. He had a covenant with David. And he had a covenant brought to us by the messenger of the New Covenant, Jesus Christ. There's one thing all these covenants, by the way, have in common, and that is obedience and respect for God's law. His value system is always a part of any contract that God makes with an individual or a group of people regarding a covenant. That is part of the template of any covenant that God has made or would ever make. That is, we have to respect him, love him, and live by his laws and his commandments. So let's begin as we think about these covenants. Let's begin by discussing something that we should realize and remember. So here's the first point that I want to make about the covenants today. God works with humanity at their level of discovery and their knowledge at different times.

I'm going to repeat that. God works with humanity at their level of discovery and knowledge at different times in history. Let's go to Genesis chapter 3 and verse 22 and get an indication of this. Again, Genesis chapter 3 and verse 22 see why covenants were even necessary. We're all familiar with the sin of Adam and Eve, and this is shortly after the event of their sin. Genesis chapter 3, beginning in verse 22.

It says, Then the Lord God said, Behold, the man has become like one of us to know good and evil. And the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is good and evil mixed. That's the difficulty. Sometimes it's hard to discern one or another, particularly in the kind of culture that we live in today. Things have become so confused and blurred that we live in a world that has good and evil mixed.

Good in that oftentimes there are, through scientific discovery and medicine, cures for very terrible diseases to extend people's lifetime to alleviate pain and suffering. But on the other hand, we're capable of incredible cruelty to one another and perversity and degeneration. So again, it's good and evil mixed, and one of the worlds we have as God's people is to carefully discern the difference between good and evil.

Genesis chapter 3 and verse 22, getting back to the verse, Behold, the man has become like one of us to know good and evil. And now, let's he put out his hand and also take of the tree of life and eat and live forever. There's probably nothing more terrible than someone who has evil, someone who has sin and the capacity to live forever.

Think of the level of self-destruction of someone who is evil and has sin and has eternal life or the capacity to live forever. The destruction they could wreak upon themselves and upon future generations. You simply can't allow that to happen. Verse 23, And therefore the Lord sent them out of the garden of Eden, to till the ground from which he was taken.

Verse 24, So he drove out the man, this is forcefully, and he placed carobim at the east of the garden of Eden, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to guard the way to the tree of life. Cut off access to eternal life because to achieve eternal life we have to do it God's way. And of course God's way involves repentance and it involves conversion and receipt of God's Holy Spirit. And all of the attributes of the new covenant is what it requires, God's way, in order for us to achieve eternal life. So indeed this happened, just like the Bible says it does, but it's also a metaphor for the human condition.

Humanity was cut off from direct knowledge of God. From this point on until today, mankind, humankind, will learn from trial and error. Mostly error, I might add, and that's how we will gain knowledge as a people. God allows generations to slowly discover the secrets of his creation and how the universe works.

And by the way, that's not linear. There have been periods in human history where we went backward. We have a phrase about a period of the Middle Ages called the Dark Ages, where actually some of the knowledge that had been gleaned and acquired from the Roman Empire was lost in Western Europe. And the culture and the knowledge and understanding of Western Europe actually went backward in time. So the growth and understanding of human knowledge is not linear. It goes up and it goes down. Sometimes it's two steps forward and one step back. But that is what God instituted. He allows, again, generations to slowly discover the secrets of his creation and how the universe works.

The phrase, drove out the man, means, you know what? You're on your own. You don't want to listen to me? Well, the two of you and your little serpent friend, whom you seem to want to listen to, you can create your own governments, your own nations, create your own languages, create your own religions, create your own cultures. You are on your own. I always have the right to intervene when I want to, but primarily I'm not going to intervene in the world until you're on the cusp of destroying yourselves in the future.

And then my son will come back, Jesus Christ will come back to this earth and establish that garden once again. But until that point of time, go ahead. Have it your way. You're on your own. And that's what happened to the human race. Eventually, when God worked with Abraham and Moses and David and the apostles, he was never under the obligation to give them expanded knowledge of science or the universe. He never revealed to them how viruses work, or DNA, or gravitational pull, or the third law of thermodynamics.

When he created the covenant with ancient Israel, he did not reveal those kinds of things to ancient Israel. Instead, he gave them laws according to where they were at. They were a Bronze Age people. Most of them were profoundly illiterate, except for the leadership Moses could write because he was part of Pharaoh's court and had a good education. But the majority of the people were illiterate.

As you'll find in the world of any slave people, usually the masters don't want slave people to learn how to read and write. That's a threat to their dominance. So that is rarely allowed in any part of the world, in any society. So again, God worked with them, but he didn't reveal them unknown or secret knowledge. He said, you're going to have to gain and learn these things on your own as time goes by. For example, when God gave Israel the Old Covenant, it was founded on the principles of fairness and compassion that were unknown among the other nations.

But he didn't explain why he wanted them sometimes when there was disease to isolate themselves. He didn't explain why, when they needed to go to the bathroom and do number two, that they should go outside the camp, dig a hole, and bury it, rather than just put it within the camp, or allow it to breed disease and flies and other things. He didn't explain about disease. He just gave them principles and laws to protect themselves and minimize the potential of diseases and other things by the laws that he gave them. He works with people in his covenant where they are at in their time at their level.

We need to understand that and appreciate that. The reason I try to emphasize this is that there are still a lot of people of faith who continue to blur the Old Covenant with the New Covenant. Their answers usually are contradictory. I get emails from people, some who are not of our faith and Sabbatarians, who continue to cling to parts of the Old Covenant.

How come you don't wear tassels? How come you don't have phylacteries hanging off your wrist with the Ten Commandments? The Old Covenant said you should do that.

I'll answer those questions, by the way, a little later. There are far too many people, sadly, who continue to blur the Old Covenant with the New Covenant. Usually, what they come up with are unsatisfactory answers, oftentimes, that don't make sense or contradict one another. We don't want that to happen. That's what this two-part sermon is all about. Let's talk about God's covenant with ancient Israel. He gave them advanced laws and principles that other nations wouldn't even know about or understand.

With the other nations, particularly in Canaan, it was dog-eat-dog. There wasn't time for compassion. There wasn't time for fairness. It was, I'm bigger and stronger than you are, so I'm going to dominate you. They had child sacrifice, for crying out loud. They weren't very good cultures. But God was giving them laws and principles that set them apart from the other nations. That, again, was something that they could do, even though some of these things would be a stretch for them and the culture that they came out of. Let's quickly look at some of these health laws. God gave them foods to avoid that may lead to disease.

For example, he didn't say, you shouldn't eat pig because you could get trigonosis. What's trigonosis? He didn't feel the need to explain that. He just gave them laws to protect them from disease. Washing, the importance of washing regularly, and oftentimes it was associated with illness or a ritual. But again, many human beings at that time lived like pigs. If they weren't close to a water source, they didn't even think of washing.

In medieval Europe, people would go an entire year before they took a bath. Think about being in that room with them after a year. He gave them laws like quarantine or isolation between the sick and the healthy. Again, he doesn't explain why. He has no obligation to explain how germs have spread. He just gives them these advanced principles. He gives them principles like third-party verification of healing. This is important, and I'm guilty of this, and I'm sure some of you are. You want to come to church so bad, right?

We come to church and we're sick, and we risk giving a disease to someone else. In ancient Israel, if you were sick, you had to have a priest look at you. If you had a running sore, he had to examine that sore and give you an okay before you could go back within the camp and participate with the community. So there's third-party verification of illnesses. He gave protective principles against blood-borne diseases. Some of the instructions about women who gave birth and isolating them in their newborn for a period of time was to protect them from blood-borne diseases.

Again, these were cultures and peoples that did not have the level of cleanliness like we do in our culture today. He gave them laws regarding how to handle bodily discharges, and I'll just leave it at that. He spoke about slavery. Now, God didn't want slavery, but slavery was part of every human culture on earth. I want to take a sidebar here. Slavery is the world's oldest and largest economic institution. It existed in every culture from virtually the time Adam and Eve left the garden until about 1794, when France outlawed slavery, the first major nation on earth, to be bold enough to say that slavery is not permitted.

About 30 years later, Great Britain joined France in outlawing slavery. So God says every culture has slavery. It's part of the natural human condition, slavery. And after all, I did tell you that you and your little serpent friend could have your own governments, your own cultures, your own societies. If you want to have slaves, go ahead.

You can have slaves because that's what you do to one another when you won't listen to me. But God's law in this old covenant demanded better treatment of slaves and compensation for them if they were abused or maimed. Again, other kingdoms in Canaan, it was dog-eat-dog. You had a slave, you had the right to kill them if they displeased you.

Women under the old covenant, unmarried women, were allowed to own land and pass it on to their descendants. That's mentioned in Numbers 36. There was to be respect of female war prisoners. They just couldn't be summarily raped and abused.

There were regulations on how to properly treat female war prisoners. In Deuteronomy chapter 24, Moses gave a certificate of divorce. Later on, Jesus would say, Moses did that because of the hardness of their hearts. That, again, like slavery, isn't part of God's will. Jesus said, from the beginning, it was not so and you should not divorce your wife.

But Moses gave them an institution that said, you have to have a divorce certificate and you have to hand it to your wife. Why was that advanced? Even today, in most Muslim countries, a husband can divorce his wife by verbally saying, you're out of here. I want a divorce. This advanced covenant said, no, you have to put it in writing and you have to hand it to your wife. Why? Because that should initiate a discussion. And now that you put it in writing, if it were unfair, the wife could take it to the elders of the village.

And there could be a further discussion if there had been abuse or something going on. So, even though some of these principles would be considered insensitive in the 21st century by our standards and values, I want to emphasize that they were advanced beyond what the other nations on earth were doing, particularly in Canaan at this time.

Again, Jesus said in Matthew 19, verse 18, Moses, because of the hardness of your hearts permitted you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. What does Jesus mean by the hardness of your hearts? According to where you were at, in time, everyone divorced their wives.

It was part of every human culture. So, understanding your carnality, I decided to make it harder to divorce your wife, even though that is not according to my will. That's what Jesus is saying. Another principle that God would not allow according to his will was multiple wives.

God's intention from the beginning, as Jesus said, he made them male and female, set them apart in a marriage relationship. We have Adam and Eve. We don't have Adam, Eve, Julie, Martha. We also don't have Adam and Steve. We have Adam and Eve, one man, one woman. But in the Old Covenant, a secondary wife and her children had to be treated with respect, and they had to receive at least some inheritance. Even if it wasn't the firstborn, even if it wasn't the primary or cherished wife, there had to be some respect there again. This was unknown among the other nations. Poverty. There were time periods where all debt was released, seven years, fifty years, agricultural fields.

You were to leave parts of it unharvested so the impoverished could go and glean food on their own so they didn't have to starve. If one generation of a family fell into debt and sold themselves into what we would call servitude today, or becoming an employee for someone to pay off their debt, the next generation, their very next generation, had to have access to their original land needed to make a living.

The ownership of the land always resorted back to the original family it had been given to. In Deuteronomy chapter 15 verse 11, it says, You shall open your hand wide to the poor. Again, this is advanced. You don't say, Ah, well, we'll always have poor among us. Let them starve. What did Grubch say in the infamous Christmas story? The two folks come up and ask him for a donation, and he says, Why? I paid taxes, and they say, Well, we have many poor and hungry among us. And Scrooge says, Have we no prisons? So is that the answer?

Just put people in prison if they're poor, if they can't take care of themselves? No! The old covenant said that you shall open your hand wide to the poor. And even if you claimed someone's garment as a surety for a debt that they gave you, you had to return that garment at nighttime so they didn't have to sleep in the cold, so they could cover themselves up. Sexual laws, there were laws to protect the sanctity of marriage. It may have been multiple marriages, but at least it was still considered the institution of marriage.

There were laws to minimize the spread of sexually transmitted diseases and to eliminate perversion throughout their culture, unlike the United States in the 21st century. Judicial fairness. There had to be a trial by impartial judges. No vigilante justice. No one had the right to say, well, I'm aggrieved, so I'm going to take matters in my own hand, and I'm trial, judge, jury, and executioner. That wasn't allowed. You had to go to judges, and you had to plead your case.

And there was the need for two witnesses, not just one. Not so the aggrieved party could make all these accusations and paint you to be a bad, despicable person, according to these laws. There had to be two witnesses.

There were cities of refuge. If you accidentally killed someone, there was a mindset in that culture. Again, God worked with people according to where they're at. A mindset in that culture and that relatives felt an obligation to kill that person who had harmed their relative. But if it was an accident, the cities of refuge allowed them to run to one of these cities and be protected so they weren't killed benchfully by a relative.

There were laws respecting boundaries. You couldn't move a property boundary. You had to have honest weights and measured. There was no compulsory drafting of warriors. Did you realize there was no compulsory draft? Before a battle, the general said, all right, how many are newly married? Go home. How many of you just bought a piece of land and you haven't even settled on it yet? Go home. Here's the third thing he said. How many of you are anxious and fearful about this coming battle? You may go home. Now, I'm sure there was a lot of peer pressure.

And even though that was to be said, it was a little difficult to leave your brother or your cousins or your buddies and go back home. But my point is, it wasn't a compulsory draft like we've had in our cultures today. That was part of the judicial fairness. There was fair compensation for the loss of an animal, bodily harm to another human being.

Do you see, compared to the other types of kingdoms and nations that existed at that time, how God, working with a people with what they're at and capable of doing, He gives them laws and principles, even if some of them, ultimately, are not according to His divine will? As I've said before, what God allows and what God wills are two totally different things.

Now, Jesus Christ, in the New Covenant, corrects a lot of the things that were allowed in the Old Covenant, corrects them to what God's original will was. So, having said that, I would like to emphasize the second point of the sermon today, and that's the Old Covenant reward was based on physical promises. The Old Covenant reward was based on physical, material promises. Period. Let's go to Deuteronomy 6 and verse 3 and read just one of many scriptures that encourages them and tells them they're going to a land flowing with milk and honey. Again, Deuteronomy 6 and verse 3. Again, this is the second point. The Old Covenant reward was based on physical promises.

Therefore, here, O Israel, be careful to observe it, that it may be well with you and that you may multiply greatly as the Lord your God of fathers has promised you a land flowing with milk and honey. Here, O Israel, the Lord your God, the Lord your God is one.

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your strength. And these words which I command you today shall be in your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and you shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way, when you lie down and when you rise up, you shall bind them as a sign in your hand, and they shall be frontlets between your eyes.

And you shall write them, these laws, these commandments, on the doorpost of your house and on your gates. And it shall be when the Lord your God brings you into the land, that's physical, of which he swore to your fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give you large and beautiful cities, that's physical material, which you did not build, houses full of good things, that's physical material possession, which you did not fill, hewn out wells, that's physical material, which you did not dig, vineyards and olive trees, which you did not plant, when you have eaten and are full.

So these were the promises. There's nothing there about eternal life. It isn't until they go in the captivity that later on, the prophets like Jeremiah and Isaiah long past the covenant, the old covenant establishment and the law of Moses, in the future, prophets like Jeremiah and Isaiah will talk about the kingdom of God, Daniel included will have illusions about eternal life. But there are no promises associated within the old covenant about eternal life. I just want to comment briefly, because I do sometimes get emails and phone calls, about why we don't do some of these things.

Well, why don't you wear like phylacteries, little box on your wrist that has the Ten Commandments written in miniature? Well, first of all, Jesus Christ condemned it. That's one good reason right there. Why don't you write these commands in the doorpost of your house? Why don't you wear tassels on your garments? Well, I'll tell you why we don't do those things.

It's because in John chapter 14 and verse 26, Jesus said that the Holy Spirit will bring to your remembrance all things that I said unto you. When you have the Holy Spirit, God's law is written on your heart. You no longer, in comparison to that, you no longer need shallow physical things like tassels or boxes hanging off your wrist or little things hanging down over your eyes or writing God's Ten Commandments on your doorpost.

The law is written in your heart. And that's exactly why when you examine the entire New Testament, you find this many discussions about tassels. Are you ready for this? Here's how many times tassels are mentioned in the New Testament. Zero! And that's why. So again, as we look at these scriptures, everything was promised here, our physical material promises and blessings based on obedience.

There's no mention of eternal life or becoming part of the children of God. Instead, the blessing offered was the opportunity to have good, rich, physical blessings and good things and to live to an old age. For example, one of the commandments, Exodus 20, verse 12, Honor your mother and father that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God is giving you. So the promise was a long physical life. It had nothing to do with eternity, nothing to do with being part of the family of God, becoming one of his children. Totally different promises because it was a different relationship. As I mentioned earlier, it wasn't until after the captivity that prophets would talk about the kingdom of God and also give glimpses about eternal life being offered. Now, that's the Old Covenant. In contrast, the New Covenant minimizes physical blessings. It takes it and turns it upside down. Let's see that. Matthew, chapter 26, verses 27 and 28. The primary emphasis of the New Covenant has nothing to do with physical blessings, material gain, wealth, big homes, olive trees, cities, wells, big cars, a bulging 401k, whatever. The New Covenant has nothing to do with those things. It is based on building a relationship. It all begins by understanding who was the messenger of the New Covenant. So let's start there. Matthew, chapter 26 and verse 27. Speaking of Jesus Christ on the Passover, He took a cup and He gave thanks and gave it to them, saying, Drink from it, all of you, for this is the blood of the New Covenant, which is shed for many—that's as many as the Father calls—for many, for the remission—that's the complete forgiveness—the remission of sins. The New Covenant is a spiritual agreement. It has nothing to do with physical gain. It has everything to do with spiritual gain. It's about reconciliation, once and for all, through the shed blood of our Savior Jesus Christ. It's about relationships. It is faith in Jesus Christ as our Savior, and obedience to the Father's will. Now let's go back a few chapters and see what Jesus says we should emphasize, rather than Doug Wells and big cities and gold and wonderful, abundant crops and all the things that were part of the Old Covenant. Jesus says, Matthew 6, verse 31, if you'll turn there, please.

Therefore, do not worry, saying, What shall we eat? Or, What shall we drink? Or, What shall we wear? What kind of meal am I going to have? Is it going to be steak? Or, is it going to be turkey spam again tonight? What am I going to have to drink? Am I going to have chateau d'hui?

Or, am I going to have a glass of water again tonight? What shall I have? Shall I wear these clothes from big lots? Or, can I show off my Gucci handbag tonight? Jesus said, Don't worry about any of that silly, inconsequential stuff, because, you know what, it's temporary, it's physical. Someday, it's all going to be burned up anyway. For after these kinds of things, physical pleasures and pursuits, material gain, the Gentiles seek, because they don't know God. They're not part of the new covenant.

For your Heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. It's interesting. He doesn't say, when you're going to receive them, He just says, God knows. But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, the righteousness of God the Father, the righteousness of Jesus Christ, and all these things shall be added to you.

It doesn't say when. In most of our situations, it will be after we are resurrected and we receive our reward upon the return of Jesus Christ. Verse 34, therefore, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble. Most other translations, there were like six that I read that said it a little differently.

I'm going to read it. Each day has enough trouble of its own. Or in modern terminology, let each day's trouble be enough for that day. Don't worry about tomorrow. Don't worry about a month from now, two months from now. I mean, we could die in our sleep tonight. So rather than worry about these kinds of things, frankly, of which 90% will never happen, rather than worrying about these future things, you have enough troubles today to focus on, to solve those problems and issues and challenges.

Let's take one day at a time. It's what Jesus is saying here. He states that material blessings will come in time after we get our priorities straight. Luke 12 and verse 32, if you'll turn there with me. Luke 12 and verse 32. Jesus says, Do not fear little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell what you have and give alms. What? These physical things that I have that I cherish so much? Sell what you have and give alms. Provide yourselves moneybags that do not grow old.

Spiritual moneybags. A treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches nor moth destroys. Verse 34, For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. Jesus is saying, as part of the new covenant, real wealth and your investment should be in heaven.

And therefore, when Jesus Christ returns, because of those things, He brings your investment back a hundredfold. He gives you a reward that's unbelievably wonderful because of your faithfulness and your dedication. That's what this scripture is saying. Again, unlike the old covenant promises, the new covenant emphasizes a spiritual over a physical gain. A spiritual gain never fades away. It can never be stolen. It can never be lost in cryptocurrency.

I want you to consider the difference of these two covenants. In the old covenant, obedience would result in abundant crops, and lack of physical disease and long physical life. In the new covenant, obedience may very well result in economic distress in you getting laid off. It may result in you getting sick. It may result in you having an average lifetime, or even a shortened lifetime, because of a terrible pandemic or virus that encircles the earth. Why? Because Jesus said that we are still in the world. John 17, verse 11, he says, Now I am no longer in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to you, Holy Father, through your name, whom you have given me, that they may be one as we are one.

You see, in the new covenant, we haven't been isolated in a land.

We're scattered physically all throughout the earth, in various cultures, and we experience the challenges and difficulties of living in those cultures. And that includes sometimes being laid off. That includes sometimes getting very, very sick. And it's actually through those difficult times that God tests our metal and makes us stronger and uses those events to build character within us, to prepare us for service throughout all eternity. So there's a reason for that. But again, I want to emphasize where the old covenant was about achieving wonderful material gain. The new covenant is about spiritual gain, and it minimizes physical gain and achievement in this world.

I'd like to mention point number three. This will be my last point today. And again, as I mentioned, this is part one of a two-part series on the blessings of the new covenant.

To understand the blessings that God has given us as male and female, and given us as individuals, that each and every one of us can have our own personal relationship with God, in order to understand and appreciate that, we need to know what the old covenant was about. Let's go to Deuteronomy 16.16. We often read this during the Holy Days just before an offering. Deuteronomy 16.16. Deuteronomy 16.16. Three times a year, all your males shall appear before the Lord your God in a place that he chooses. At the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the Feast of Weeks, and at the Feast of Tabernacles, and they shall not appear before the Lord empty-handed, every man shall give as he is able, according to the blessing of the Lord your God, which he has given you. There are many instructions of the old covenant that uses the phrase, Every male, or each male, shall do such and such. Again, this is because the old relationship, the old covenant, was primarily based with the male head of household who represented the entire family. The males were the ones who represented the values and the cultures of the entire family. Here's a very sad example. Achan. You remember Achan? In the Battle of Jericho, they were told to take nothing to destroy everything in the city. Achan took a garment, and he took some silver and some gold, and he buried it in his tent. Do you remember that story? How many of you remember that story? It's referred to as the accursed thing. And it brought down problems, because when they attacked the next city, Israel was routed instead of being able to defeat the next nation. So this was the accursed thing. Well, in that particular story, again, Achan represents his entire family, and that represented who the covenant was ratified with. And in that case, Achan and his entire family were stoned and burned. Now, again, our modern sensitivities that may bother some of us realize that God will most certainly resurrect his children and any other physical human beings who were part of his family. Achan's on his own. I'll leave that between God and Achan. I'm not going to make any judgments. But certainly, anyone else who died within that situation will be resurrected and will be given a chance to live in a much better world and to be able to reach their full potential far more than they would have in a limited Bronze Age culture like this was.

But again, I want to emphasize that male representation was what that covenant was all about. It was about a covenant of families. It was the covenant of the community. It wasn't a covenant about each and every individual having the precious opportunity of having unique relationship with God. You want me to support that some more? Let's see how this covenant was ratified. Let's go to Joshua chapter 5 and verse 1. Let's see how one could become part of the old covenant. Let's see how many women could qualify for this. Joshua chapter 5 and verse 1. So it was. They were on the verge of entering the Promised Land, by the way. Joshua and tribes. So it was when all the kings of the Amorites, who were on the west side of the Jordan and all the kings of the Canaanites, who were by the sea, heard that the Lord had dried up the waters of the Jordan from before the children of Israel until we had crossed over, that their heart melted and there was no spirit in them any longer because of the children of Israel.

So the gossip mill went around pretty quick and these other people are terrified. This is the God who brought them out of Egypt. This is the God who helped them destroy Jericho and the other cities. So they're terrified. Verse 2. At that time the Lord said to Joshua, Make flint knives for yourself and circumcise the sons of Israel again the second time. And he says this because everyone alive then had not been circumcised. You will recall the original people who came out of Israel were disobedient. They all died in the wilderness. They had been circumcised.

But this generation who was born and grew up in the wilderness had never been circumcised. So Joshua had made flint knives for himself and circumcised the sons of Israel at the Hill of Foreskins. How would you like that job? Sometimes it's tough being God's servant.

Verse 4. And this is the reason why Joshua circumcised them. All the people who came out of Egypt who were males, all men of war, had died in the wilderness on the way after they had come out of Egypt. For all the people who came out of Egypt had been circumcised, but all the people born in the wilderness on the way as they came out of Egypt had not been circumcised.

So how many women were able to participate in the covenant? Ratification of the covenant. You drop down to verse 10. They observe the Passover. God instructed, before you keep the next Passover, this is something that you have to do. It highlights again that males represented their entire family. The values and the cultures of the family were represented in the male.

It was rare for a woman to have a one-on-one personal relationship with God. And yes, there are some. Miriam, Sarah, Ruth, Hannah, perhaps Esther. But in all fairness, it's also rare for men to have a personal one-on-one relationship with God. He gave his Holy Spirit rarely in the old covenant. Not like him giving it as rivers of water to everyone the Father calls as part of the new covenant.

It was a covenant with Israel as a community more than an individual personal covenant. So let's contrast this with the new covenant. Let's go to Galatians chapter 3 and verse 21.

Galatians chapter 3 and verse 21.

Paul was particularly upset about the fact that circumcision keeps coming up wherever he goes. Frankly, he's angry when he writes this letter. It shows, it comes through, he says things that are not very kind.

But he's kind of had it up to here with this topic of circumcision needing to be circumcised to be saved. So he begins this discussion. He says, and 44 years ago when I took a class at Ambassador College, this law was defined as the rituals. But you know what? I'll be honest with you. It doesn't matter what law you're talking about. The rituals or the Ten Commandments, none of them can save us.

None of them can give us righteousness. Only faith in Jesus Christ can make us righteous. So you could apply any law that exists to the statement about law here. So is the law then against the promises of God? Certainly not, Paul says. For if there had been a law which would have given life, truly righteousness would have been by the law.

But that law doesn't exist. Keeping any law and including all the Ten Commandments perfectly will not make you righteous. It cannot save you from your sins. It cannot reconcile us because of sin to God. But the Scripture has confined all under sin. We're all guilty of sin. We're all condemned. We all need a Savior. We need Jesus Christ. That the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe. But before faith came, before Jesus Christ arrived on this earth and introduced the new covenant, we were kept under guard by the law, kept for the faith which would afterward be revealed. Therefore the law was our tutor. This is from a Greek word. The Greek word is pahideogos, and it means an attendant or a custodian. The law was kind of a custodian. The law reminded us that we were sinners. The law reminds us that we need a Savior, that we're guilty of sin. So therefore the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ. Again, to point out our sins, that we might be justified by faith. That is faith in Jesus Christ, that he is the perfect Son of God. Faith that his shed blood alone is able to atone for all of our sins. No law, no law can do that. Verse 25. But after faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor, for you are all sons of God. This is a letter written to the congregation in Galatia. Male and female, you know what? You're all sons of God. And of course, that's a metaphor. He's not trying to be picky here regarding genders. All sons of God, through faith in Jesus Christ. The promises in the Old Testament are always to the firstborn. And he's saying it doesn't matter whether you're male or female. Spiritually, you are the firstborn child of God. Verse 27.

Because of the perimeters of the New Covenant. Verse 29.

That's what the New Covenant has to offer us.

Again, the New Testament, the New Covenant, offers a personal one-on-one relationship with every single individual the Father calls. Cultural, physical distinctions are removed. The New Covenant is not ratified by physical circumcision. Instead, it is ratified by baptism, conversion, and receiving the gift of the Holy Spirit. Let's go to Galatians chapter 5, just a couple chapters forward. Again, he's going to have this discussion. These are pretty strong words, he says. Galatians chapter 5, verse 1.

Indeed, I Paul say to you that if you become circumcised, Christ will profit you nothing. Wow! What's he saying here? He's saying, if for spiritual reasons you think that you're going to be saved because you're circumcised, then you know what? From now on, you're under all the obligations of the Old Covenant. So get that phylactery on your wrist. Start doing all those rituals. Shake it to the left and shake it to the right, because you've basically said that you earn your salvation through a physical action. Let's continue what he says. And I testify again to every man who becomes circumcised that he is a debtor to keep the whole law. If you get circumcised because you think it saves you, because you've been conned by some quasi-brother in the faith to say, Oh, you have to be circumcised to be saved. He says you are now accountable to all of the Old Covenant requirements and standards. Verse 4.

You have fallen from grace. Verse 5.

Working in love. And the reason he says working in love is faith does not require you to tell other people what they have to do to be saved. Verse 7.

None of this should surprise us, what Paul teaches here, because you know what? It was alluded to way back in the Old Covenant. Let's go to our final scripture today, Deuteronomy chapter 30 and verse 1. Brethren, God's understanding is that he's more interested in a positive personal relationship than a physical action. And again, that should not surprise us. He told Moses in Deuteronomy 10 verse 16, Therefore circumcise the foreskin of your heart, you stiff-necked people.

It was always about attitude. It was always about faith and belief in God and his promises. God longed for a deep personal relationship with Israel that eventually became what is now known as the New Covenant. What we're about to read is a prophecy. A prophecy? Let's read it together about the return in the future of the physical descendants of Israel back from captivity. And you know what? What happens to them in the future? We already have. Because we're under the New Covenant today. Right now. Let's read it. Chapter 30 verse 1. Then the Lord God will bring you into the land that your fathers possessed. Again, this is a prophecy about them coming back. And you shall possess it. He will prosper you and multiply you more than your fathers. And the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your descendants to love the Lord, your God, with all your heart and all your soul, that you may live.

And may live even into eternity, not just into an old age. Verse 7. Also the Lord your God will put all these curses on your enemies and on those who hate you, who persecuted you. And you will again obey the voice of the Lord your God and do his commandments, which I command you today. Because God's law at that time will be written on their hearts. They will want to know God.

What God will someday do to the returning physical descendants of Israel, he's already doing. He is already done in the New Testament, New Covenant Church of God. Our hearts have been circumcised due to repentance, baptism, and the gift of the Holy Spirit. Jesus said in Luke 6 and verse 40, A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone who is perfectly trained will be like his teacher. Today you and I are being trained by our life experiences. And we are being trained by God's personal development plan for our lives. And your plan is different than the person sitting next to you. And your personal development plan that God has for you is different than the person in the back of the room, different than the person sitting in the front row. It's different for each and every one of us. That's how well God knows us. That's how closely God is working with his people as part of the New Covenant.

Next time, we will cover part two of the blessings of the New Covenant. I wish all of you a wonderful and profitable Sabbath day.