Introductory Considerations
1. As I looked ahead, thinking and praying about what God would have me preach to you this fall, I sensed we need to work on our relationships - with our spouses, parents, children, families, and with one another in church.
2. But as contemplate this, I though we should first of all look at the most important relationship each one of us have. For it is the understanding this relationship that forms the basis of all of our other relationships.
3. As I told children, each one of us is related to God. This is true for believers and non-believers.
4. As Christians - it is to be basis for life and for faith - for all things. As SS and Catechism teachers, no matter what the lesson is specifically about, remember that the underlying thing you are teaching your class is about their relationship with God.
4. As parents it is imperative we teach this.(Deut 4:9) THEM refers to covenant. Yet the Israelites would fail to do this . The result is recorded in Judg 2:10.
5. They forgot their relationship with God - they did not know Him. We need to understand, teach and live out our relationship with God.
6. And so we will spend a number of Sundays considering the relationship that we have with God. And we will see that we are related to God whether we agreed to be related to Him or not, just as related to parents - we can’t do anything about it - its a fact.
7. The basis of the relationship we have with God is the COVENANT that God has made and continues to make with each one of us. I hope that in a fresh way, we may gain a greater understanding and appreciation for the covenant God makes with us
8. Today we will consider what a covenant is. In future weeks we will look at the specific covenants in the Bible and how they relate to us.
Teaching
1. We use definition given by O. Palmer Robertson - covenant is a "bond in blood divinely administered". To understand this we break it into three parts
2. The covenant is a bond.
a. A bond is something that binds people together into a relationship. (Ezek 20:37) A commitment by two people, two parties to be a related to one another.
b. In the liturgy for marriage we read that marriage is a covenanting or the making of a covenant between two people. The terms of the relationship or covenant or bond are spelled forth in the vows - READ- why NB to remember vows.
c. So also covenant spells out our relationship with God. (Jer 31:33) Our relationship with God is to be His people - significant implications to this.
3. As we will see this bond is established by an oath and/or a symbolic act. Wedding - vows made (oath), rings exchanged(act). With God He makes oaths, gives signs - eg. Rainbow, baptism, Sabbath, Lord’s Supper
a. Each week we see these things - we reminded of relationship we have with God. That is why we do not put table and font away until used - to be visible reminders of God’s covenant with us, ours with Him - of our commitment to one another.
4. A covenant is a bond in BLOOD.
a. We could say a covenant of life and death.
b. Our relationship with God is not a casual relationship like one we may have with someone at work or school. It is a covenant is a serious matter of relationship which has life and death implications.
c. Making a covenant is not just something we do on the surface. The term to make a covenant actually means to cut a covenant.
d. The idea of what this cutting means is seen in God’s covenant with Abraham in Gen 15. God promised Abe that his descendants would be as numerous as the stars of the sky, as well as land. In vs 18, Abram asks "O Sovereign LORD, how can I know that I will gain possession of it?" God responds by saying, "Bring me a heifer, a goat and a ram, each three years old, along with a dove and a young pigeon." In vs10, "Abram brought all these to him, cut them in two and arranged the halves opposite each other; the birds, however, he did not cut in half." Then in verse 17 we read that a smoking firepot with a blazing torch appeared and passed between the pieces.
e. This firepot symbolizes the presence of God. God Himself walked between the halves of the cut-up animals. Why did He do this? God symbolically made a "pledge to the death". The cut-up animals represents the curse that a covenant maker calls upon himself should he not keep his oath - should he break the covenant.
f. It is like two children making a promise and saying "if I lie I hope to die".
5. Friends - do we really appreciate what this means? It means that the God of the universe, the Almighty, everlasting God has committed His very life, existence, His being to the covenant promises He has made to us. (Jer 31:7-35) God is fully committed to us - to His creation and specifically to His people.
a. God cannot ever cease to be, it is more impossible that it is to measure the heavens and so, He has sworn on His own life, His own blood that His promises will be kept. (Pss 145:13)
b. Human promises are broken but God’s are not, they cannot be. Every promise that God makes in His word to us is still in force - to all of us.
7. Not all believers agree on that. Number of churches say that God’s promises relate only to a certain period of times in history - called dispensations. Does God not say in Jeremiah not say there is new covenant which will not be like the old one he had made to their fathers?
a. Yes he did, but.. God makes new covenants but they do not take away the previous ones- they build upon then, refine them, improve them?
b. A builder promises to build house for you. In a month he promises to have it ready in six weeks and then he promises you can move in a week earlier. Each are new promises but they do not break the previous ones.
c. If not so, I’d be concerned. It would mean that God’s promises are only good as long as He doesn’t change them.
d. God promises made long ago were made to you and me. (Deut 29:14-15) That’s why its exciting to look at God’s promises - not just made to Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses and others. They are made to you and me. The promise to Abraham is a promise to Nathan Hystek (repeat - using different names).
e. Human promise fail, change - "I can’t anymore" "Circumstances have changes" - but God’s do not.
8. But the fact that the bond is in BLOOD means more than that God stakes His life on fulfilling His promises.
a. Blood represents life and it is through the shedding of Christ’s blood that God keeps His covenant. We could say that the new covenant is established with Christ’s blood.
b. The covenant carries with it blessings but also curses. To break a covenant is to have a curse put on you. God’s covenant brings life to those who keep the covenant and death upon those who break it. That is why Christ took upon Himself the curse we deserved so we can live
c. Only shedding of blood relieves one from obligations, only through death - and Christ did that for us.
d. Even as we enter a covenant we acknowledge death as the ending of the agreement. Wedding vows "til death us do part" or "as long as we both shall live".
e. Although Christ died for us, blood or death is still part of covenant. Unless we repent and acknowledge need for Christ, we will die to eternal death.
f. And in order to fulfill our obligations in the covenant we must die to ourselves. To admit we could not fulfil obligations of law (which is part of covenant) and that we are sinful through and through. Unless we die to self we will not experience the life we have in Christ. (Mat 16:24-25).
9. The third element of definition is that it is sovereignly administered.
a. It is God who initiates the covenant. He comes to us and commits Himself to us.
b. Some of promises unconditional - such as promise to Noah - He will keep it no matter what. Some conditional - in that how covenant affects us depends on how we respond. We can choose life or death.
c. But the important things is that God is the one who sets the terms of the covenant. He does not negotiate an agreement with us. We cannot choose the kind of relationship we have with Him. We can only come to Him on His terms.
d. That is important today for many come to God on own terms. We decide on the relationship we have with God. Like person praying to God as Father-in-law - doesn’t work.
e. As we go through covenant and delight in promises of God, each of us must ask "Have I accepted God’s terms for our relationship or setting my own?" His terms are the only ones that work and they are the best for us.
10. He is our God and we are our people. Praise His name.
