A New Covenant

Although the covenant concept is quite central in the Old Testament, it is remarkable that Jesus rarely uses this term. Rather, he seems to talk nearly all the time about the Kingdom of God. He came to restore God’s rule in all humanity, so that in the end God would once again be the rightful centre of his own creation. 

When Christ came to the climax of his ministry, he announced that he, through his death, would bring about a new covenant. By his sacrifice he would fulfill the covenant with Abraham and his seed (that is: Israel), so that his Kingdom -in undisputed power and glory- could finally fill the whole earth. 

There appears to be some tension here: there is continuation in the covenant (the relationship between God and his creation and humankind to bring about the new creation), and yet the old form has been fulfilled in Christ and has –in a sense- become obsolete.  What are some of the differences between the old and new covenants?

The old covenant had been a covenant of blood: many of its rituals involved the cutting into live tissue to produce blood: males had to be circumcised, animals had to be sacrificed, and blood had to be sprinkled.  Already in the covenant with humankind this was true: After the Fall, Adam and Eve had to be clothed with the skins of animals.  Ever since Jesus’ blood flowed at Golgotha, however, blood is no longer a central theme. When we celebrate (!) his death, we look back to his sacrifice, and we look forward to the “wedding feast of the Lamb”.  Water seems to be the symbol now, as his disciples are to be baptized in water.  So, the new covenant involves a new people of God and a new sign to mark one’s belonging. 

In the new covenant, the Good News that was first heard in Israel must go to all the nations. Finally the son of Abraham brings his blessings to all the nations.  As they hear the Good News, people everywhere are called to give up their idolatry and turn to the Living God.  The old covenant was for Abraham’s children so that they might walk with their God (and to be a light to attract the nations!); now the Word of God must go to all people groups so that they would turn to the True God, who is also their creator and provider. (More about this in the next blog).  We know from the Bible that many of the Hebrews did not trust or obey their God as their father Abraham had done. In fact, most of them refused to put God into the centre of their lives.  Jesus later calls their leaders: “illegitimate children of Abraham”.  The Hebrews were called to be a kingdom of priests (Exodus 19:6), but only a righteous remnant actually lived in covenant relationship.  Today, the gathering of Christian followers -the church-, is (called to be) the new kingdom of priests as they are to offer their lives in sacrificial service to God. (1 Peter 2: 9).

Most NT references to the new covenant and its relationship with the covenant with Israel are found in the letter to the Hebrews.  Obviously, it was especially the Hebrews, Abraham’s seed, who had to understand the new reality in relationship with their former understanding.  This letter is first of all a pastoral address of warning and encouragement (first addressed to the Jewish Christians), but it also lists some major themes on covenant transition or fulfillment: In Moses, God made a covenant with the Hebrews: he saved them from slavery to the evil empire, he gave them his law, and he led them though the wilderness to the Promised Land.  Yet, Moses was not perfect, and he could not complete his calling, and so he was taken away before the Hebrews entered the Promised Land.  But now we have ‘Super-Moses’, for in Jesus Christ God has given us a new covenant.  And He will not fail, for he will certainly bring his people home, where he will dwell with them in the New Jerusalem!  In the old covenant, there was the tabernacle (later the temple) where the High Priest presented the blood of lambs to make symbolic payment for the sins of Israel.  Now, we have Super-Melchizedek, the only true “king of righteousness”, who has brought the perfect sacrifice by giving up his own body as “the perfect Lamb of God”. 

Central to the covenant concept is God’s revelation.  It is because of God’s revelation that we can know God.  In “religious studies” people investigate how humans seek to know God in their quest for understanding, but knowledge of God is only possible when humans begin to listen to Him.  For “God” is not an object for human investigation, He is our creator and provider, and He has revealed himself to humankind.  Even in modern theology this is often misunderstood.  I remember in Hermeneutics class, the professor stressing that Scripture is all about human authors (living in their culture and worldview) and human readers (immersed in their own culture).  When I heard this, I challenged him, “Where is God in this scheme of things?”  The professor replied, “He will come later!”, but somehow it seemed that God was consistently left out of the picture.  The course seemed to me a scientific approach to the human quest for God.  In a scientific approach we use closed systems where –apparently by definition- there is no place for God. 

In the beginning God spoke directly to humankind, but after the Fall humanity depended on the stories of their ancestors- until Abraham.  In Abraham’s offspring God’s presence and revelation were expressed first in the Law of Moses and in the tabernacle rituals.   Later, God gave his prophets and the tabernacle service was renewed in the temple in Jerusalem.  But finally, God came down in Person.  So, today the focus is no longer on the temple, for Jesus is the Temple:  He is the Immanuel!  But it got even better!  After Christ ascended into heaven, He returned in His Spirit to dwell in his church, his followers.  So, now we who are His disciples are called (and called to be) temples of God! 

⁷ But to each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it. ⁸ This is why it says:

“When he ascended on high, he took many captives and gave gifts to his people.”

⁹ (What does “he ascended” mean except that he also descended to the lower, earthly regions? ¹⁰ He who descended is the very one who ascended higher than all the heavens, in order to fill the whole universe.) ¹¹ So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, ¹² to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up ¹³ until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.

(Ephesians 4, NIV)

Ephesians 4 quotes Psalm 68.  The quoted passage, as several scholars have pointed out, in Jewish tradition was seen as reference to Moses.  Moses who went up the mountain to meet God, returned with God’s gift for his people: the Law of God.  If this is what Paul has in mind, he continues: Now someone greater than Moses has gone up to God (in Heaven), and he has returned in His Spirit with gifts for the church.  So, in a sense the function of the Law (of Moses) has been replaced by the Spirit, who interprets to us the teaching of Jesus.  Since we have the Spirit of Christ, we are no longer under the Law of Moses.  Yet, we are called to walk with His Spirit in obedience to the teaching of Christ.  The Ten Commandments used to be at the heart of OT worship (in the centre of the temple), because in them God had revealed Himself most clearly: his holiness and his holy will for his people.  But now Christ has come, and he has fulfilled the Law.  And He says, “If you love me, you obey my commandments.  His teaching does not essentially differ from the Law (read: teaching) of Moses, but it gives us a much better and clearer understanding of who God is, and how He wants us to live.  If we still focus on the Ten Commandments as God’s rule for us, we are like people staring at a big billboard or an artistic drawing that give us a picture of some great construction project.  Now the building exists, the billboard and the drawing lose their function, for they could only give an impression of what is now a greater reality.  So, on this point I disagree with John Calvin (Institutes 2.7.1) that the Law (if indeed he uses the term to refer to the OT commandments) functions like a whip that must drive us into action (or acts of holiness).  In the NT setting it is the Spirit (i.e. God’s will, written on our hearts) who urges us to live in thankfulness to His amazing grace!

So, although there is still ‘a people of God’, who have received God’s revelation and who are called to walk with Him, a lot of things have changed in Jesus Christ.  Today we have a better revelation and a clearer view on greater gifts.  Let us focus on these greater gifts, while we still treasure the OT.  Because the Old Testament shows us how the same God, our God, prepared a people walking in darkness for the great light that has come.  But let us not pretend that our work is done.  Even though Christ has accomplished everything, He still calls us to walk with Him, to persevere in faith, and –in thankfulness for His amazing grace- to live a life of loving sacrifice.