CTG 0018

... continued from previous blog.

COVENANT

The Passover and the children of Israel's exodus from the land of their slavery led to Sinai, where God made a covenant with them through Moses. Ultimately, God helped them to take possession of the land he promised their ancestors.

Disobedience to God resulted initially in the division of their tribes into northern and southern kingdoms. Despite the Lord's patient and merciful warnings through the centuries, both kingdoms were subsequently taken into exile. (Some returned at a later stage.)

They had broken the Sinai Covenant. However, God made a promise to them through the prophet Jeremiah:
"... the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah ... I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more (ESV)" See Jeremiah 31:32-34 & Hebrews 8:6-13.

It was through the sacrificial death of his Son, Jesus Christ/Messiah, that the new covenant was brought to fulfilment and eternally established, superseding the Sinai agreement. Even Moses had foretold his coming (Acts 3:22-23; consider context, verses 1-26).

Following the death, resurrection and ascension of Christ, many Jews believed and were saved, though many rejected the good news. What surprised even the Jewish Christians was that others from other nations who believe in Christ equally experience the new covenant (without becoming proselytes to Judaism). And yet this is exactly what God had promised through the prophets, hidden there in the scriptures.

And the Lord Jesus said:
"... I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd (ESV)." See John 10:14-16.

We, both Jews and Gentiles, by grace and through faith, are in covenant relationship with Christ. All one in Christ (Galatians 3:18-19).

"And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved (Acts 4:12 ESV)."

To be continued ...

FOR FURTHER READING:
1 Kings 11:1-12:33
2 Kings 17:22-23; 25:21
Daniel 9:1-19
2 Chronicles 36:22-23
Acts 10:1-11:26; 15:1-35
Romans 15:4-13
Ephesians 2:1-3:21
Colossians 2:1-3:17
Galatians
Hebrews
1 Corinthians 10:1-11:1
Romans 7:1-11:36
2 Corinthians 3:1-18