What is the covenant?

[Daniels]

why the covenant?

There are eight major covenants in the Bible.


Your thoughts .

 

[Macca]

Covenants were serious stuff, in OT times.
Not like today where there is usually a clause to get you out of an agreement; back then the only way out of a covenant was death.
Every person that God made a covenant with understood that if God broke a covenant, then God had to die.
It's very convincing when God says "I'll make a covenant with you and if I break it I'll die and cease to exist."

 

[billwald]

There are many covenants. Only ones that apply to gentiles are the Noahic and NT covenants.

 

[Macca]

There are many covenants. Only ones that apply to gentiles are the Noahic and NT covenants.

Even though the covenant with Abram caused him to be the father of all those who "believed", it was not for us?

 

[Iosias]

http://www.prca.org/pamphlets/pamphlet_49.html
http://sb.rfpa.org/printarticle.cfm?article=173
http://sb.rfpa.org/printarticle.cfm?article=163

 

[PreciousMessage]

why the covenant?

There are eight major covenants in the Bible.


Your thoughts .

The Covenant question is synchronous with the gospel. It's important to remember that we need the Old Testament to bring us down along the line to the New Testament, which does not take the place of the Old Testament, but more distinctly reveals to us the plan of salvation.

In Galatians 4:21-31 only two covenants are explained. The covenant and the promise are clearly seen from Galatians 3:17, where Paul states that to disannul the covenant would be to make void the promise. God's covenant is a promise.

Hagar and Sarah are the two covenants. They both exist today. They are not matters of time, but a condition of the heart. The difference is between a free woman and a slave. Works or Faith. Only the Abrahamic Covenant brings us salvation.

The New is based on God's promise since the beginning. The Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. The Old is based on man's promise and works.

John

 

[Messianic Jewboy]

Gal 3:15 says no covenants of God annuls a previous covenant.
Brethren, I speak in the manner of men: Though it is only a man’s covenant, yet if it is confirmed, no one annuls or adds to it.

When God made a covenant with Abraham is that a new covenant? Did the covenant with Noah go away? That’s it! No more rainbows and floods are now are allowed? Just because He made another covenant? Well Abraham was a decendent of Noah so did that annul it? The covenant with David? Ok all bets are off all those previous covenants no longer apply?

It’s silly to believe that a covenant made by an eternal God replaces a previous covenant. One would think if it as true or if it was possible God would have given very clear direction to the very people that would have heard that. And maybe He would have done in somewhere in Deut 13 where He said By the way if you guys mess up I’m going to change the rules completely. Instead in Deut 13(He said the opposite), If anyone comes and teaches you something different ignore him or better yet stone him. God’s covenants do not replace eachother.

Marc

 

[PreciousMessage]

Gal 3:15 says no covenants of God annuls a previous covenant.
Brethren, I speak in the manner of men: Though it is only a man’s covenant, yet if it is confirmed, no one annuls or adds to it.

When God made a covenant with Abraham is that a new covenant? Did the covenant with Noah go away? That’s it! No more rainbows and floods are now are allowed? Just because He made another covenant? Well Abraham was a decendent of Noah so did that annul it? The covenant with David? Ok all bets are off all those previous covenants no longer apply?

It’s silly to believe that a covenant made by an eternal God replaces a previous covenant. One would think if it as true or if it was possible God would have given very clear direction to the very people that would have heard that. And maybe He would have done in somewhere in Deut 13 where He said By the way if you guys mess up I’m going to change the rules completely. Instead in Deut 13(He said the opposite), If anyone comes and teaches you something different ignore him or better yet stone him. God’s covenants do not replace eachother.

Marc

Hi Marc ( I hope you take a few minutes to read this, it may be helpful).

“Brethren, I speak after the manner of men; though it be but a man’s covenant, yet if it be confirmed, no man disannulleth or addeth thereto. Now to Abraham and his seed were the promise made. He saith not, and to seeds, as of many; but as of one, and to thy seed, which is Christ.” And this I say, that the covenant, that was confirmed before of God in Christ, the law. . . cannot disannul, that it should make the promise of none effect.” Gal. 3:15-18. From the above scripture we learn that the seed to whom the promise was made, is Christ,—the same that was promised at the time of the fall.

He makes the positive and unquestionable statement that if a covenant be once confirmed it cannot afterwards be altered. Now the covenant was confirmed to Abraham by “two immutable things [God’s promise and his oath] in which it was impossible for God to lie” (Heb. 6:15-18); therefore, as is stated in verse 17, the law given from Sinai four hundred and thirty years after, cannot make the promise void, nor destroy the fact that the inheritance is solely by promise. This is the main idea of the chapter, that God’s grace as manifested in Christ is man’s sole hope, is kept prominent.

God is not a man, but it is sometimes allowable to use human things in illustrating the divine. God is not a man, that he should lie or change. Man is changeable, yet even a man’s covenant, if it once be confirmed, can not be disannulled or added to. No change whatever can be made in it. How much more, then, must this be the case with God’s covenant? “Whatsoever God doeth, it shall be forever; nothing can be put to it, nor anything taken from it; and God doeth it, that men should fear before Him.” Eccl. 3:14.

After the flood God made a “covenant” with every beast of the earth, and with every fowl; but the beasts and the birds did not promise anything in return. They simply received the favor at the hand of God. That is all we can do, receive. God promises us everything that we need, and more than we can ask we ask or think, as a gift. We give Him ourselves, that’s nothing. And He gives us Himself, that is everything. What a great illustration of the Abrahamic covenant. God’s promises!

If we forget that the covenant and the promise are the same thing, even the whole earth made new, and the promise includes the making righteous of all who believe, then we have missed the point of Paul’s conclusion in Galatians 4:21-31. Perhaps a reading of Romans 4 will be helpful as well. It’s all pertaining to the covenant God made with Abraham. This is the whole crux of the matter.

There is only ONE plan of salvation in by which we are saved, not many. Only One gospel.

blessings to you in Christ,
John

 

[billwald]

There are two Abrahamic covenants, or maybe 2 components. One is temporal conerning this life and the other is concerning the next life. Biological descendants get the temporal promises and spiritual descendants, the next life.

Either St Paul didn't know as much about the OT as he claimed, he was misquoted, he was a sloppy writer, or he intentionally wrote to confuse gentiles who he thought would not know any better.

 

[billwald]

mpossoff -

The covenants never go away. They are additive and eternal. This is the main error of dispensationalists and maybe of St Paul's gentiles.

The Mosiac Covenant was God's social contract for the land of Israel. There isn't a single verse in Exo through Deu that applies to gentiles in Chicago. Neither do any of the blessings or curses apply to the next world.

 

[Messianic Jewboy]

mpossoff -

The covenants never go away. They are additive and eternal. This is the main error of dispensationalists and maybe of St Paul's gentiles.

The Mosiac Covenant was God's social contract for the land of Israel. There isn't a single verse in Exo through Deu that applies to gentiles in Chicago. Neither do any of the blessings or curses apply to the next world.

A quote from someone on another board:

Wow, I find this utterly fascinating. For YOU it's not a sin to murder! To thieve! To commit adultery! To commit idolatry! Why you can have a good ol' time and not sin! You have a lawless existence. You just gotta believe the right things. It don't matter what you do.

Marc

 

[PreciousMessage]

mpossoff -

The covenants never go away. They are additive and eternal. This is the main error of dispensationalists and maybe of St Paul's gentiles.

The Mosiac Covenant was God's social contract for the land of Israel. There isn't a single verse in Exo through Deu that applies to gentiles in Chicago. Neither do any of the blessings or curses apply to the next world.

The plan of salvation could not be additive. In other words, there are not "many" gospels. There is not a single verse that says the "covenant" is a contract, yet it is called a "promise." Gal. 3:17. God does not make "contracts" with mere humans who cannot uphold their part of the "bargain." We are nothing, He is everything. Everything we have is gift from God.

A contract entails that each party keeps up his or her promises or end of the bargain. He simply wants us to "believe." John 6:28, 29.

Our part of the bargain, or contract as you would call it is utterly worthless. God's promises are all sufficient. Our promises are like ropes of sand. As a matter of fact, are not God's promises good enough? Our promises, or end of the bargain, only tend to shut out God's promises.

A traditional view of the covenants cannot be sufficient as you state in a general layout. Thanks for thinking through on what a "contract" states in reality.

John

 

[Iosias]

why the covenant?

There are eight major covenants in the Bible.


Your thoughts .

 

[PreciousMessage]

Even though the covenant with Abram caused him to be the father of all those who "believed", it was not for us?

Forgive me for assuming, but I believe you are saying the covenant given to Abraham was for "anyone" who believed, not just literal Israel?

“For as many of you as had been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. . . . And if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” God did not cast off Israel, but simply ordained that not outward circumcision, but circumcision of the heart, that is, a cutting off and putting away of the carnal mind, bringing it into subjection to God. All who will do this were to be Israelites, and those who remained disobedient, even though they could trace their ancestry back to Abraham, were no longer counted as a part of Israel. See Rom. 2:28, 29; 9:6-8.

1. The promise is: “To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame and am set down with my Father in his throne.” Rev. 3:21. Now the word “Israel” signifies, “a prince of God,” or “one who prevails.” It was given to Jacob after he had wrestled all night with the angel, and had gained the victory. The Lord said to him: “Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel; for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed.” Gen. 32:28. Therefore an overcomer is an Israelite; and the promise is that to those who are Israelites Christ will grant to sit with him on his throne.

2. The natural descendants of Abraham were never considered as the true Israel, and heirs according to the promise, unless they were, like him, righteous. When Christ told the Jews that if they believed in him they should know the truth and the truth should make them free, they replied, “We be Abraham’s seed, and were never in bondage to any man.” John 8:33. But Jesus showed them that they were in a worse bondage than any human slavery, namely, the bondage of sin (verse 34); and to their repeated statements that they were the children of Abraham, he replied: “If ye were Abraham’s children, ye would do the works of Abraham. But now ye seek to kill me, a man that hath told you the truth, which I have heard of God; this did not Abraham.” “Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do.” Verses 39, 40, 44.

If we keep in mind that the covenant and promise are one and the same, we shall never be confused. Gal. 3:17.

Blessings in Christ,
John