The Covenants

Here's our outline with respect to the covenants. So we're looking at the major covenants of Scripture. The first question, of course, we have to answer is, what is a covenant? Now, we've been through some of this, so that's going to be a quick review. The next question we're going to answer is, what are the major covenants?

And then last week we covered distensations, and we saw at least at least in the three-dispensation model, we looked at those three dispensations. Now the question is, how do covenants relate to dispensations? How do they all fit together? So we'll look at that this morning.

Then point number four in our outline is the misunderstood covenants. You hear very little about the eternal covenant. There is very much confusion in theology today with respect to Israel's New Covenant and the Church's New Covenant. Most theologians say that the Church's New Covenant is equivalent to Israel's New Covenant, and they kind of equate the two. So we'll look at that. If we ever get to the summary, that'll be a miracle. Okay. First question.

What's covenant? And if you remember back this far, whenever we covered it, the word in the Greek is diatheke, for the word covenant, consists of a compound word, Theia is a little preposition, and it means between two. Theia is from the verb tsemi, which is to put or to place. So covenant is simply to put or place something between two.

And so as you go through Scripture, there are two parties, always in the covenant. what is put or placed between the two is an agreement or a binder, something that binds the two together, the two parties together. So, in a marriage relationship, you're bound together in a marriage relationship. You have this binder, this covenant between the two of you. There are different types of covenant, or I should say there are two different types of covenant. As you go through Scripture, there's a conditional covenant. Conditional covenant just means what it says is that one party, say party number two, has to fulfill certain conditions before party number one has to fulfill his or her conditions. So that would be a conditional covenant. An unconditional covenant would be where, say, God makes promises and it's independent of what party number two does. Those promises are unconditional. God is going to fulfill them independent of what party number two does, what man does.

Then there's the durations of the covenant. as you look at covenants in scripture, two durations. Either the temporal, the duration is for a limited period of time, or they're eternal. Either they start in eternity past, go to eternity future, or they have a start and a point in time, and they're for all eternity.

So those are basic overview of covenants. All right, so now what we want to take a look at is what are the major covenants? And as you can see, I'm starting to get a hang on PowerPoint. Boy, it's an excellent tool. What I've listed here are the major covenants. So there's 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7? I thought there was 8. I thought I had 8. 3, 6, 7. Seven major covenants that are listed.

The key is there is one foundational covenant. And that foundational covenant on which all covenants that God makes, it rests upon the Eternal Covenant. The Eternal Covenant, if you remember, we went through some a month or so ago. And I don't want to go through it, but just basically, in Hebrews 13, 20, it talked about the covenant between, does anyone remember who the two parties were in the Eternal Covenant?

This is a test now. And what the covenant was all about, without looking at your notes? The two parties, God and Jesus Christ. And if Jesus Christ would shed his blood for the sins of the world, then the Father would raise him up again from the dead, resurrect him. So basically, that is the eternal covenant. And you have all the references on your chart here to that eternal covenant. So based upon that eternal covenant are all of the other covenants. Let's go back in time in terms of the Abrahamic covenant.

So I want you to turn, if you will, in your Bibles to Genesis chapter 12. Genesis chapter 12, starting at verse 1. Now the Lord had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house unto a land that I will show you. Now notice the words in here, and notice that he is God is telling him to go into a land which He's going to show him.

And I will make thee a great nation. So here's a promise. I'm going to give him a land and He's going to make him a great nation. And, another promise, I will bless thee and make thy name great and thou shalt be a blessing. Verse 3. and I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curses thee. And in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed." In verse 3, the end of verse 3, who do you think all the families of the earth are? All the nations? including us in this room here this morning.

So through Abraham, there is these promises that are made. He basically says it's going to be a great nation, and being part of a great nation is going to give him a land, and all nations are going to be blessed. Now, it doesn't say in those first three verses how those nations are going to be blessed. We don't have a clue in how those nations are going to be blessed. So, we know, though, that all nations are going to be blessed. We also know that he says in verse 2, I will bless thee, you Abraham, talking about Abraham and his seed, the Jew.

Okay. So, the basis of the Abrahamic covenant. the foundational covenant. Now, as time goes on, and you have progressive revelation, and God progressively reveals things through his word, and as he did, he revealed the Palestinian covenant, which was an amplification, if you will, or even an explanation of the great nation and the land portion of the promise. And that's what the Palestinian covenant did. And then the second part of the Abrahamic covenant, where all nations are going to be blessed, we find that that's the seed part of the Davidic covenant.

Here's what I want you to do before we get there. So the question is, how are all nations going to be blessed? How do we know that it's going to come by a seed? So I want you to turn over to Genesis chapter 22, and we don't have a clue in the first part of Genesis chapter 12, but in Genesis chapter 2, Look at verse 15. We'll start at verse 15.

And the angel of the Lord called unto Abraham out of heaven the second time, and said, By myself have I sworn, saith the Lord, for because thou hast done this thing, and hast not withheld thine son, thy only son, and if you remember, he asked Abraham to sacrifice Isaac. And Abraham was going to do that. So he didn't withhold his son. Abraham did not.

So in verse 17, that in blessing I will bless thee and in multiplying I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven. Question. What seed is he talking about here? Okay? Because it's Abraham's physical seed. He's going to multiply them as the stars in heaven. So, looks like physical seed, the Jew.

Okay. back in the middle of verse 17. And I'll multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, as the sand which is upon the seashore. And thy seed shall possess the gates of all his enemies. In verse 18, And in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because thou hast obeyed my voice. Now, question. In verse 18, what seed is that? What does it look like? It doesn't look like the same seed in verse 17? As you're reading that, you wouldn't see any difference?

But here's the amazing thing. You get to the New Testament, and the New Testament unravels some of the things in the Old Testament. So you get to the New Testament, and Paul is writing to the Galatians. Turn over to Galatians chapter 3. Galatians chapter 3, look at verse 13.

Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us. For it is written, Cursed is everyone that hangs on a tree, that the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ. Notice that says all nations are going to be blessed. That the blessing of the Gentiles might come through Jesus Christ. That we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith. Brethren, I speak after the manner of men.

Though it be but a man's covenant, Yet if it be confirmed, no man annulleth or addeth to it. Now, in verse 16, Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. And look what it says, He saith not, and to seeds, plural, as of many, but as of one, and to thy seed, which is Christ. You see the connection there?

That all nations are going to be blessed through a singular seed. The singular seed is Jesus Christ. So, this is how all nations are going to be blessed. Through the Lord Jesus Christ, which comes through the seed which is promised, which is amplified then, in the Davidic Covenant. Theologians today say that all nations are going to be blessed by the blessing of the New Covenant. They don't make this distinction between the Abrahamic Covenant and Galatians, that all nations are going to be blessed through a singular seed, Jesus Christ, and that seed is then amplified in the Davidic Covenant. And the Davidic covenant amplifies it to say that there's going to be not only a seed, but that seed is going to be king, and he's going to have a throne, and he's going to have a kingdom.

The Davidic covenant. And we receive no blessing through the new covenant made to Israel. So let's take a look at the new covenant that's made to Israel. So you have just a feel for what that new covenant is all about. So turn to Jeremiah chapter 31 and verse 31.

In Jeremiah 31, it says, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. Now, at this time, the nation of Israel was divided. You had the ten northern tribes, Israel, and you had the two southern tribes, Judah. And so, Jeremiah is writing, now to all of Israel, which there was a division in the 12 tribes. But so that we know that this covenant, the new covenant, is made with all of Israel, he includes the 10 northern tribes and the two southern tribes.

Okay. Verse 32, not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers, in the days I took them out of the land, which covenant was that? Okay. Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them out of the land, to bring them out of the land of Egypt, what covenant was that? I made a covenant with them. Boy, we've got the Davidic, Abrahamic, and Mosaic. All right. All those in favor of the Abrahamic? No. But when they came out of the land of Egypt, remember, he brought them to Mount Sinai, right? And Moses went up onto Mount Sinai and saw the glory of the Lord. And the Lord gave him what?

Two tables of stone, right? And he came down with the law. These are two tables of stone. The Mosaic Covenant. So it's not as the covenant that he made with their fathers when he took them out of the land of Egypt, which is the Mosaic Covenant, which consisted of 634 commandments or whatever. I mean, there were the basic Ten Commandments plus There was the whole law of government and worship, etc. Over 600 total. In the middle of verse 32, Which my covenant they broke, although I was a husband unto them, saith the Lord. Isn't that neat? Here's the Lord God saying that He was a husband to the nation of Israel. And I like, it's fantastic. And what are we? What are we to Christ? As Israel is a, we're His bride. We're the bride of Christ. Israel is the wife of God. Isn't that incredible?

So, in verse 33, But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord. I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts. Let's just stop there for a minute. This is the new covenant now. He's going to put his law in their inward parts, write it in their hearts. Question. When we become believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, does God put his law or write his law in our hearts? No? Okay. How many? No. What does He do? He does something totally different.

He indwells us, the Spirit indwells us, no question. But what He does is He identifies us with the person of Christ. He puts us in a living union with the Lord Jesus Christ. He doesn't write His law in our hearts. He puts Christ in us, and us in Christ. We're in Him, He in us. Something totally different. than writing his laws in our hearts. Totally different. Let's continue on with verse 33. The last part of 33.

And will be their God, and they shall be my people. Notice that this is all future. It's shall and will. It's yet all future. So the promises of the new covenant haven't happened yet for Israel. Because we're talking about Israel's covenants here now and it hasn't happened yet. This is all future. That God is going to write the law in their hearts and they're going to be his people. Let's continue on.

Verse 34, And they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord. For they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more. Do you ever wonder about verse 34? He says, I will forgive their iniquity and remember their sin no more. Is God omniscient? Can He ever forget? If He's omniscient, it's impossible for Him to forget. So what does it mean when He says, I will remember their sin no more."

Okay, very good. So he's not going to hold it against them unto judgment. Because it costs him a lot, right? It costs him a lot in terms of sending his son to the cross to forgive their sins. And he's not going to remember them for judgment, because they've already been judged, or they will be judged from this point.

It was yet future. OK? OK. Now, that's some of the aspects of the New Covenant. Writing their law in their hearts, being their God, forgiving their iniquity and not remembering their sins anymore. It sounds pretty good, doesn't it? I mean, it sounds pretty close to what's happened with us, doesn't it? And so the mind tends then to think that, yeah, this has all happened with us, but notice that the covenant is between two parties.

Party number one in this covenant and The New Covenant is God, and party number two is Israel. It's Israel, it's not the Church. So we've got this wall of separation, we've got to separate Israel from the Church. Because when we get into the New Testament, we're going to see the New Covenant, in the New Testament talking about the church. And so many people want to take this new covenant to the church of the church and equate it to this new covenant over here.

Any questions so far? Perfectly clear? Very good. When it says to Israel It means Israel. It doesn't mean anybody else. Okay. Now, you've been wondering how does... The one thought I had this week as I was going through this is you just look at this and all the building blocks and the perfect order and you say, wow. You know, God has an eternal purpose, and in order to carry out His eternal purpose of declaring His glory, sharing His glory, revealing His glory, and then in turn being glorified, He has that purpose, but He has a plan. to carry out that purpose and that plan. You find in the dispensations and you find in the covenant that his plan from back from eternity past is all going to be carried out.

And it's all pre-planned. This was all pre-planned. Nothing ever caught God by surprise. This was all pre-planned. Incredible. And so what you see is you see the sovereignty. You see the sovereignty of God. So now, how do these relate to the dispensations? OK. Interchangeable. Everlasting, eternal.

Let me look up, Sue, would you look up Hebrews 13.20 to see if it, I put, I used to have everlasting, I changed it to eternal because I thought the word eternal was used in Hebrews 13.20. Ah, I messed up. Alright. Let me have a new American standard. Eternal. All right.

In terms of then putting together all of the covenants and the dispensations and trying to understand how they all go together, and basically if we use the three dispensation model, which last week we said we thought was best. You have the Gentiles, God dealing with peoples, the Gentiles, Israel, and the church. And he starts out with the Gentiles and he makes a covenant with Adam in the garden. You know, you can freely eat of every tree in the garden, but of the one tree, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you can't eat. thou shalt surely die, or dying, thou shalt surely die, is it the way it's said in the Hebrew.

Dying, the first dying, spiritually, thou shalt surely die, physically. So that, we don't know how long that covenant lasted. We don't know if it lasted for two hours, or for two days, or 20 days, or whatever. We just, we don't know. how soon after Adam was created that he fell, that he sinned.

Then there was the Adamic covenant after his fall where he promises both Adam and Eve that there's going to be a seed. And that seed in Genesis chapter 3 verse 15 is speaking of the Lord Jesus Christ. that he's going to come and he's going to bruise, or, what is the words? Satan's seed shall bruise, or Satan shall bruise his heel, but Christ shall crush his head, or something to that effect. but fulfilled then at the cross. Then there's the Noahic covenant, covenant made with Noah, several aspects of that covenant, but the one highlight here is the fact that there's going to be human government, that man is going to govern himself. And so that goes on through the tribulation period, And then in the Millennial Kingdom, the Lord Jesus Christ is going to rule and reign.

Okay. Then with Israel, you have the Abrahamic Covenant, Palestinian, Davidic, and the New Covenant. And the Palestinian, Davidic, and the New, all are amplification, if you will, of the Abrahamic Covenant. Then there is the Mosaic Covenant, which I should have mentioned this as I went through it. Abrahamic covenant as you read in the Old Testament is, in terms of the type of covenant, what would you think?

Eternal or temporal? Eternal. Everything in the Abrahamic covenant as you go on in from Genesis 12, you'll find out that God keeps coming to Abraham and revisiting Abraham and grounding him in his promises and telling him, Abraham, these promises I make are eternal, they're everlasting.

So the same thing is true with the Palestinian, Davidic, and the New Covenant. They are all eternal covenants. So Israel is going to have the land of Palestine forever and ever and ever throughout, throughout all eternity. And in that land, they're going to glorify God. Same thing with the Gentiles. The Gentiles are going to be on earth glorifying God.

The Mosaic Covenant was temporal. The Mosaic, understand this, covenant was made with Israel. The Mosaic covenant was not made with the Gentiles. The Mosaic covenant was not made with the church. We are not under the law, neither are the Gentiles under the law. The Mosaic covenant was made with Israel. It was a temple covenant and God said to Israel. The thing is this, God didn't want to give them the law. They get out of the land and here's Israel saying to God, now Lord, just tell us what you want us to do. And the Lord is saying, just walk by faith. Walk by faith in the promises that I've given you. I've given you these promises in the Abrahamic covenant. Just walk by faith. Now we're going to fulfill these promises.

And the Jews, I'm paraphrasing a little bit, the Jews said, Lord, you don't understand. It's just like Paul, when he had the thorn in the side, and he asked the Lord to remove it, and the Lord said, no, no, no. And so the Jews come to God and say, no, we want to know exactly what you want us to do. And we'll do it. So God says, OK, Moses, come on up here. If the people want to know what to do, I'm going to tell them. And the only thing that God can tell them is out from His righteousness, everything that God could tell the nation of Israel is out from His righteousness. Thou shalt not. Thou shalt not. Thou shalt not. Thou shalt. Thou shalt. expresses the absolute righteousness of God.

So the Ten Commandments, is there anything wrong with them? Uh-uh. They're the absolute righteousness of God. But they were given to unrighteous man who wanted to live to the righteousness of God. Well, man found out that he couldn't fulfill those commandments because of his basic nature. It's impossible. So the commandments of the Mosaic Covenant was given to show man that he's a sinner.

If you want to know, if you don't think, if a man doesn't think he's a sinner, just give him the Ten Commandments and say, here, keep these, I'll see you in a month, tell me how you're doing. In fact, that's what I do. You know, people say, no, I want to live the Christian life. You do. Well, let me tell you, Harry's made up a list of how many, Harry? 600? Over 600. He went through the New Testament, and he documented all the commands in the New Testament. So I say, here's a list.

If you want to live the Christian life, here's the commands. And you find out that it's impossible. You cannot live, even we as believers cannot fulfill the commands that God tells us. Does God expect us to fulfill those commands? Why would he give them? Why would he give them? if he didn't expect that they should not be fulfilled. He expects everyone to be fulfilled in your life and my life. How does that happen? There's no way. I mean, I can take Harry's list and I've got a room big enough where I can put it around the wall and go off it every day and try to check it off. but you find out it's impossible.

What those commands represent is the absolute righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ, who He is, the way He lives His life. So, if we're walking in fellowship with Him, and abiding in Him, and He's living His life through us, guess what? He's going to fulfill every one of those commands. He's going to be the one fulfilling the command, not us. See the difference? OK. Where are we? So.

So there's that distinction then with respect to the Mosaic law to remember. It's not to the Gentiles, it's not to the Church. Then, with the Church, there is one covenant with the Church, the New Covenant, the New Testament. So turn to 1 Corinthians chapter 11. Look at verse 23 and here's Paul. We talked about Paul last week spending three years in the desert with the Lord Jesus Christ right after he became a believer on the Damascus Road. In verse 23 he says, For I received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you, that in the same night in which he was betrayed he took bread. and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, take, eat, this is my body, which is for you." Now if you have a King James, it says, which is broken for you. In the New American State or NIV, does it have the word broken in there? I've scratched it out of my King James because It's not in the original text, which is for you.

Or let me put it this way. As you go back into the Gospels and you find Jesus Christ on the cross and the Roman soldiers coming up to the cross and breaking the legs of the two thieves, one on each side, and they came to Christ, did they break his legs? No, because they saw he was already dead. Okay.

Which is for you, this do in remembrance of me. In the same manner, he took the cup, which he had stopped saying. Listen to what it says. This cup is the New Testament in my blood. Do this as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me. Okay? Now, does this cup, it says, this cup is the New Testament or the New Covenant in my blood. Does that sound anything like the New Covenant to Israel in terms of to the nation of Israel, I'll write my wall in your hearts, etc., etc., and all those things. This is so totally different. This cup is the New Testament in my blood. So, what does that mean? Let's look at Israel's New Covenant. Israel's New Covenant, in terms of the timing of that New Covenant, in terms of when it's going to take place, it's going to be during the Millennial Kingdom.

Not yet. Not yet here. The place is going to be in Palestine. It's going to be right here on earth. And there's going to be a kingdom where Christ is king. He's going to be ruling on David's throne. So this is Israel's new covenant. And the promises were this. God writes the law of the kingdom in their hearts.

And the laws of the kingdom, by the way, are the very Beatitudes that Christ gives in Matthew chapter 5. Christ came initially as king. He came to fulfill the prophecies of the Old Testament, and he comes as king. And so you find in Matthew chapter 3, 4, and 5, you find Christ coming as king, and he's announced that he's going to set up the kingdom. The kingdom which was promised back in the Davidic covenant. But the Jews rejected him.

When a king comes, or when a king rules, he has principles in which he operates by. So he sets down the principles of his kingdom. When Christ came as king, he set down the principles of his kingdom in Matthew 5, 6, and 7. And so you have the Beatitudes. Blessed are they that mourn. Just go through all the Beatitudes. And what he's expressing there are the principles or the law that he's going to set up during the kingdom. And that's the law that he writes in their hearts. He writes that in their hearts, because when he becomes king, he's going to operate by the principles laid down in Matthew 5, 6, and 7. And the Holy Spirit will indwell Israel. And Israel will receive all these earthly blessings. You can look at all the references in the handout and you'll see all those earthly blessings.

It's an unconditional covenant and it's eternal. Now, as we contrast that to the new covenant of the Church, New covenant of the Church, we have two different parties. We don't have God and Israel, but we have the Lord Jesus Christ and believers. Two different parties, two different covenants. And the covenant, or the things that bind the two parties together, He says, this cup is the New Testament, or this cup is the New Covenant.

And what does this cup represent? It represents His blood, His death, His burial, His resurrection. The bottom line, in terms of the Church's New Covenant, I summarize it this way, that the New Covenant to the Church is the appropriation of the cup of the Eternal Covenant to every believer by God. It's the appropriation of His death to you and to me. Romans 6.

When he died, who else died? You died. I died. What do we die to? No one's willing to go for it. Okay. We died. We were separated from the sin nature. As Roger, when he thought on that, he had that tree, and he had the root of the tree as the sin nature, and all of the fruit was the sins, right? So we died unto that sin nature. You didn't think I was going to get through today, did you? But there's several. Here's one thing I just want to point out which is critical, and that's this.

If you or any theologian equates the New Covenant to Israel with the New Covenant to the Church. Here's what happens to the theology. Theology, instead of having three separate dispensations, you essentially have one, and you have what is called covenant theology. Covenant theology says this, that basically there are two There are the covenant of works, in terms of what happened in the garden, the agreement, or what God commanded Adam to do, not to eat of the tree, but he fell, and when he fell and he sinned, then from that point on, covenant theology says, then we're under the covenant of grace. And at the end of time, when Christ comes again, There's going to be a resurrection and there's going to be a judgment.

So we're operating today, what they say, is under this covenant of grace. Now, two things. Number one, there is no mention in Scripture of the covenant of works. Number two, there is no mention in Scripture of the covenant of grace. It talks about the dispensation of grace. but never a covenant of grace.

And so here's what happens with covenant theology. Now you have Israel and all the promises that were made to Israel through the new covenant and then the law. And then what they say is that since Israel rejected the Lord Jesus Christ, rejected him as his person as to who he was and what he came to do, then all of these promises now we inherit, the church inherits. All those promises are now ours. And so Israel now becomes the church. So the church is now Israel. So this is what covenant theology teaches.

And as opposed to a literal kingdom here on earth, they say that the kingdom is in heaven and Christ is sitting on David's throne in heaven. Scripture is very clear if you go through the Davidic covenant that that throne, that kingdom is going to be here on earth. So this is what happens if we mix them. Okay, there is a lot to cover, but hopefully you have an overview, an overview in terms of understanding, and I think if you want to go into it in more detail, the information is there, and you can go through all of the references that are there in scripture.

Let's close. Our Father, again, we are thankful for your Word. And Father, we just stand in awe as we look at your Word and see your sovereignty threaded throughout your Word. in your eternal purpose and your plan to carry out that eternal purpose. And Father, we are thankful. We are just so thankful that we are in Christ, who is our very life. And our prayer, Father, is that we walk by faith in Him, abiding in Him, that we may grow in the grace and the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.