WHAT IS THE NEW COVENANT?

WHAT IS THE NEW COVENANT?

                This may seem like a silly question to ask. Every time we take communion we know that we are taking into ourselves the body and the blood of Christ. (Mt. 26:26-28)That which was once external and unable to actually save us or to restore us to the glory of God has now moved into us making us into temples of the Holy Spirit. The New Covenant then is superior to the Old Covenant in every way for it comes with the power to transform us into His image. It turns us from hired hands to sons and daughters. It adopts us into the heavenly family so that Jesus is not ashamed to call us brethren. (We have become brothers and sisters in His royal family.)

                We also know that this New Covenant is no longer based upon the Levitical priesthood, or upon the blood of animals, or of the laws and ordinances that went along with Old Covenant worship. Everything in the Old Covenant served as a type or a shadow or a template of that greater Covenant that was to come through Jesus Christ.

                In recent years there has been a renewed fascination with things Jewish, with Old Covenant Feasts and the Tabernacle and such… and while this may be a good thing in terms of deepening our understanding of the New Covenant, it doesn’t in any way become a part of the New Covenant.

                Paul spoke out adamantly against those who were trying to bring Old Covenant laws and practices back into the New Covenant community. To do so is an affront to Jesus who died for us and it grieves the Holy Spirit when we try to please God with our own works.

                The book of Galatians is the book where Paul most directly confronted the early Christians that were trying to return to the Law. He said: “Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit are you now being perfected by the flesh?” Gal. 3:3. And rather than avoiding the book of Galatians, we should study it and study it until we fully understand what Paul is saying, because the book of Galatians stands at the great divide between Old Covenant Law and New Covenant Spirit.

                As our great High Priest after the order of Melchizedek, the first thing that Jesus did after sprinkling His blood upon the true Mercy seat in heaven, was to send down His very Spirit to empower us and to do in us and through us that which the Law could never do. The New Covenant then is a covenant based upon the body and blood of Jesus and the Spirit of Jesus. That is to say that we by faith enter into the death of Jesus thus dying to self and to the world, and we are born again into His kingdom to walk by His Spirit and truth and we overcome by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of our testimony. (Rev. 12:11)

                In many ways over the centuries it has been the tendency of mankind to make dead religion out of living things. We tend to unplug from the power of the Gospel and then try to imitate it with our rituals and doctrines and institutional power. In time we find ourselves returning to Old Covenant Law because it is more tangible and in many ways easier than walking in the Spirit. (Which requires being dead to self and to the world and fully alive unto Christ.)

                “But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things to come, He entered through the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands, that is to say, not of this creation; and not through the blood of goats and calves, but through His own blood He entered the holy place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption. For if the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling those who have been defiled, sanctify for the cleansing of the flesh,  how much more will the blood of Christ who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God. And for this reason He has become the Mediator of a new covenant…” Heb. 9: 11-15a

                I have often wondered why in this most critical of subjects, the writer of Hebrews fails to distinguish between the holy and Most Holy places in the tabernacle. For instance, in Hebrews 9:6-8 He is obviously talking about the Most Holy place because he is talking about the once a year entry of the High Priest into the Most Holy Place on the Day of Atonement. So why does he fail to say “Most Holy Place? And why, for that matter does he seem confused about the tabernacle furniture by placing the altar of incense in the Most Holy Place? (Heb. 9:4)

                Is the writer of Hebrews really confused or is there a greater lesson to be understood here? After all, the veil into the Most Holy Place was torn from top to bottom when Jesus died on the cross, indicating that we had been reconciled to God and that the veil is removed in Christ. Therefore the two rooms have been made into one. Our prayers are no longer blocked by a veil and so we have direct access to God. As such, the altar of incense now stands in the Most Holy Place since there is no longer a dividing wall.

                In many ways we tend to fall far short of the living and vital connection that is ours in the New Covenant. We tend to begin to rely upon our good works as a substitute for His infinite work on the cross. It can be a subtle thing. After all, don’t we feel good when we stop to help a little old lady change a flat tire, or give to the poor? Don’t we feel a little bit more justified at that moment than we do on a featureless day?

                If the truth were to be known we should never be like the Pharisee who stood in the temple thanking God that he was not like the publican, while the publican beat on his chest and said: “God be merciful to me a sinner.” Luke 18:10-14

                In truth, except for the blood of Jesus and His presence in our lives, we have no righteousness of our own and even the best we can do is as a filthy rag. We stand in need of His righteousness every moment and every second of every day and while His is transforming us into His image and making us into overcomers, we are still housed in a body of sinful flesh that hates God’s laws and is incapable of pleasing God in any way apart from Christ doing His work of righteousness in us.

                “For God, who said, “Light shall shine out of darkness” is the One who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ. But we have this treasure in earthen vessels that the surpassing greatness of the power may be from God and not from ourselves… we are always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body.”  Cor. 4: 6, 7, 10.

                We have been given a new and living covenant through the blood of Christ and He has sent His Holy Spirit into our lives so that we may live by His Spirit and not by our flesh. Every day as a Christian represents a day of dying to the flesh in order to live unto God. Only a small percentage of Christians actually enter into or dwell in the secret place of the Most High. Most often we find ourselves slogging it out trying to please God as if in our flesh we can do anything… we can’t and Jesus said so.

                Jesus said: “Abide in Me and I in you. As a branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the Vine and you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit; for apart from Me you can do nothing.” John 15:4, 5

                So stop beating yourself up when you find yourself falling short. Instead come to Jesus and cling to Him and draw your strength and righteousness from Him. He knows that we can’t do anything apart from Him, so why try to impress Him? Only in Him can we keep the commandments in the way that God intended them to be kept and that is by loving God with all of our hearts and loving our neighbor as ourselves.

                In Galatians 5:22 we can see the kind of fruit that Jesus wants to produce in our lives and we see it again in 1 Cor. chapter 13. But it all takes place in us as we by faith are crucified with Christ, so that it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me and this life that I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and delivered Himself up for me.” Gal 2:20.

                Until that day when we are glorified, we are better off to pray the publican’s prayer rather than the Pharisee’s prayer, for apart from Christ we cannot do one good thing. There is not one person alive on this planet today that does not need to say, “God be merciful to me a sinner.”

                We have a New Covenant with new laws and a new High Priesthood. In this covenant we have been transformed from slaves into sons and daughters. We live by the Spirit and the Word so that all is fulfilled in us who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. Rom. 8:1-4

                Rev. 12:11 doesn’t say that we overcome by our good works. It says that we overcome by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of our testimony. Let us ponder these things today.