Essays in Ephesians #12
For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called the “uncircumcision” by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands—remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. Ephesians 2: 10-12
Most believers today are “strangers to the covenants of promise.” We don’t know about covenants or grasp their significance. Entering into covenant with God is not automatic. It is a choice, a life-giving choice that moves us into the good works God has prepared for us in Christ Jesus. Many believe in God and Jesus without ever experiencing the depths and joy God gives those who surrender their all to Him in covenant relationship. Do you want more answered prayer? More strength to do God’s will? More assurance of God’s faithfulness? If so, learn about covenants and enter into a covenant relationship with your Father in Heaven.
God keeps covenant; the world, the flesh and the devil are covenant breakers. Our worldly culture destroys the foundations of covenant and weakens our understanding of covenant thinking. About one hundred years ago Andrew Murray saw the erosion of covenant understanding and wrote,
One of the words of Scripture which is almost obsolete is the word Covenant. There was a time when it was the keynote of theology and the basis for the Christian life of strong, holy men. We know how in Scotland it entered deep into the national life and thought. It made mighty men to whom God and His promise and power were wonderfully real. It still brings strength and purpose to those who will take the trouble to bring all their life under the control of the inspiring assurance that they are living in Covenant with God. He has faithfully sworn to fulfill in them every promise He has given.
from Covenants and Blessings by Andrew Murray, ©1984 Whitaker House
To be men and women of God, with His strength and purpose flowing through our veins, we must understand covenant. Covenant is based on natural family ties, on blood brotherhood. Where strong, healthy blood-kinship relationships exist, families and clans are joined as one. Destroying or weakening the natural family alliances based on blood kinship erodes the natural foundation for covenant. Historically. where kinship was desired without the ties of natural blood, covenants were “cut” or made to extend the natural relationships by creating “fictional” blood relationships. These blood covenants were legally binding and guaranteed loyalty, permanence, mutuality, peace and wholeness.
The concept of covenant appeals to something deeply intuitive within us. When in grade school, my best friend and I read about being “blood brothers and sisters.” We held the end of a sewing needle into a match flame until it glowed; then we each pricked one of our own fingers and squeezed for a drop of blood. We pressed bleeding fingers together as a sign of undying friendship—blood relationship. Nobody explained it to us. At ten years old, it was easy to accept the mystery. Somehow, we understood—without words.
The earliest historical covenants are versions of the pact that my friend and I made with one another. Those making covenant cut themselves and mixed their blood together in a symbolic giving and joining of one life flow to another. Later on, animals were sacrificed as substitutes and cut in half. The death and division of animals represented the death of the covenant partners to division and separateness. It also symbolized the curse that comes on covenant breakers; ever since Cain killed Able, shedding a brother’s blood brings a curse.
The Old Testament covenants between God and man were never merely ideas, they were real events at decisive points in history between a real God who wanted a real relationship with real men and women. God made covenants with Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses and David. Joshua and the Israelites reaffirmed God’s Mosaic covenant— “as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” The Old Covenant act of circumcision, the cutting away of flesh, signifies a continued covenant with God; it’s a sign of remembrance and reenactment. In the New Covenant, taking holy communion by eating bread and drinking wine, the body and blood of Christ, reenact and remember the sacrifice of Jesus who came to restore Israel’s broken covenant between man and God and to extend it to all men. Taking communion affirms living faith in the covenant relationship between man and God. In communion, whether the partaker believes the bread and wine become the actual body and blood of Christ or believes the bread and wine are symbolic tokens for remembrance, the bottom line remains the same. By faith, Jesus gives Himself to man and by faith we receive Him. He enters us and becomes part of us. We commune with Him.
Historically, God knew His people would break covenant. He knew that the hearts of men would grow hard and that covenants would degenerate away from the strong natural mutual claims of conscience that join bonded loving families. He knew that the heavenly patterns for right relationship with Himself and others would become degraded and grow dim. God knew from the beginning that the Old Covenant, based on outward obedience to law, would fail on earth. He knew that only a New Covenant, an inward one, written upon the hearts of men would succeed forever.
Although God’s chosen people broke covenant and rejected His promises, Jesus fulfilled each one. All of God’s historical covenants with Israel look ahead to Him. The law given to Moses teaches men their sin. The promises given to David and the prophets look ahead to a savior who will free men from sin, cut covenant with God and rule forever. The prophet Hosea’s marriage to a woman who rejected him for other lovers highlights the need for a new covenant and God’s willingness to restore relationship to a people who had broken covenant with Him. By his days, the concept of covenant had lost meaning and the word covenant had lost significance. It described easily broken treaties of self-interest between God’s chosen nation and the worshippers of Baal and other idols. Jeremiah writes with sorrow of the broken covenant and prophesies with joy that a new covenant is coming—God’s covenant with you and me through Jesus Christ, with His laws written upon our hearts.
Basic to the idea of every covenant, is the shedding of blood, the exchange of life for life. Basic to covenant with God is the truth that God keeps covenant.
Know therefore that the Lord your God is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, to a thousand generations. Deuteronomy 7:9.
When we enter into covenant with God, on the basis of the shed blood of Jesus, for God gave His own Son to make covenant with us, we can be fully assured that God will do for us and give to us all that He promised. When we give our life to Him in covenant, He works within us and we become His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus. We give Him us; He gives us Himself, His Son, His Holy Spirit. We enter into covenant with God by dying to the independence of our flesh, welcoming the Holy Spirit and living out God’s life from Him in our mortal bodies. We agree with Him and willingly, intentionally choose to follow Him; He does everything else.
