26 March 2015 - new and eternal covenant

I will maintain my covenant with you
and your descendants after you
throughout the ages as an everlasting pact,
to be your God and the God of your descendants after you.

Thank you for your promise, LORD. You offer us life, hope, and a future. We thank you for the plans you have for us, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future" (cf. Jer. 29:11). You guide us to the promised land to give it to us "as a permanent possession". You remember your covenant forever.



But you do say:

On your part, you and your descendants after you
must keep my covenant throughout the ages.

Uh-oh. You have this wonderful plan to bless us which you promise to never forget no matter what. But we have a part to play. It is contingent on our action. And we aren't good at this. We fail constantly. We all sin and fall short of your glory (cf. Rom. 3:23).  We try to "seek to serve him constantly" but we find "another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me" (cf. Rom. 7:23). What can we do? We want to live up to the covenant but we find that we do not have the strength.

Jesus, your promise to us is greater than the promise to Abraham. You make the new and everlasting covenant in your own blood (cf. Mat. 26:28). You absorb all of the failures which mar the old covenant and block its blessings. Your own obedience unleashes and ensures the blessings of this covenant.

Abraham himself rejoices to finally see the one who can keep the covenant through the ages. Where the best of the human race fails the one who is both true man and the great I AM succeeds. These blessings are no longer tethered to our efforts but are now offered as gift.

Yet you say:

Amen, amen, I say to you,
whoever keeps my word will never see death.

But what is it that you ask of us? "Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me" (cf. Joh. 14:1). You tell us to be perfect as our Father in heaven is perfect (cf. Mat. 5:48). Yet you yourself, because you are I AM, give us the power to do this. You say, "With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God" (cf. Mar. 10:27). And you are true God. With you all things are possible. Through you, because you strengthen us, we can do all things (cf. Phi. 4:13).  "And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God" (cf. Mic. 6:8). And now those of us who walk by the Spirit (cf. Gal. 5:16) can fulfill the just requirements of the law (cf. Rom. 8:4).

Abraham receives the promise but he has no power to keep his end of the bargain much less to help anyone else keep it. You yourself keep the covenant in perfect obediance and offer that very obediance to us as a free gift. Even if we fail to avail ourselves of the grace you freely give you invite us to simply repent and try again.

You remember your covenant for ever, LORD. Help us to put all our hope in your promise. Help us to stake our entire lives on it. If we do, we will live and never see death. You, the great I AM, will be our God, and we will be your people. We receive the promised land as a permanent possession.

Look to the LORD in his strength;
seek to serve him constantly.
Recall the wondrous deeds that he has wrought,
his portents, and the judgments he has uttered.