Theology Thursday: Christians in Covenant
On Sunday we read our church covenant, reminding and reaffirming the promises we made to one another when we joined this church. Other than marriage vows, this likely the only covenant you’ve ever made. You’ve probably made contracts, which are similar to covenants, but they are based on distrust; whereas covenants are based on trust and love.
The Bible is full of covenants. Our Old and New Testaments can also be called the Old and New “Covenants.” In the Scriptures, a covenant describes how people live in relationship with God. Beginning with Adam, there have been different ways that God’s people lived as God’s people. From Moses to Jesus, God’s people lived in an elaborate and all-encompassing legal system, and for them, it was the only way. When Jesus came, he didn’t destroy the Old Covenant, but he fulfilled it, making it obsolete. He showed that most of its purpose had been to point to him.
As NT Christians, we enjoy the benefits of the New Covenant, which are clearly stated to be “better.” The Old Covenant treated people in some ways like children, telling them exactly what to do. The New Covenant demands that we are more mature. We have more freedom to fulfill the spirit of the law in the contexts where we are. The New Covenant is for all people in all places of the world. In the Old Covenant, there was a veil between the people and God; in the New Covenant, that veil is taken away.
You enter the New Covenant through faith. When you are baptized, you formally enter into the New Covenant, and when you take the Lord’s Supper, you are remembering Jesus’ death, which sealed the New Covenant. Your new life isn’t just a little religion added in. If you are saved and baptized, you have made promises, and you are living in a covenant with God.
Last week we looked at Paul’s overview of the New Covenant in 2 Corinthians. The Corinthians wanted to rely on rituals instead of being mature in the terms of the New Covenant. New week we look at one of the benefits of the New Covenant: beholding Jesus directly and being changed. "And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another" (2 Cor. 3:18). The New Covenant has a transformative power that the Old did not.