(Part #1)
Many Christians I converse with rightly acknowledge that
there is some relationship between the New Covenant and the Abrahamic Covenant.
The basis, however, for this acknowledgement is often incorrect.
As is plainly written, the New Covenant was promised, not
to Gentiles (i.e. non-Jews), but to “… the house of Israel and to the house of
Judah …” (Jer 31:31). Consequently, the common assumption which sidetracks many
non-Jewish Christians as we reason through Scripture is that that we Gentiles
were/are smack-dab in the center of God’s redemptive agenda and that the New
Covenant was made with us. This assumption is incorrect.
I will show from Scripture that, although there certainly
is a provision in the Abrahamic Covenant for God’s blessing to Gentile believers,
the Jewish people were and remain at the center of that blessing, providing a
conduit through which God dispenses His promised blessings to non-Jews.
Furthermore, the Mosaic Covenant, ratified at Mount Sinai with the
then-combined “… house of Israel and … the house of Judah …,” was not mere
scaffolding or some "plan B" in God's redemptive economy. No, the
Mosaic Covenant, and the consequent gift of the written Torah/Law, were the
planned and purposed highway for which the Abrahamic Covenant was the onramp,
therefore a necessary part of God's goal in Christ. I will demonstrate that the
New Covenant retains its focus on “… the house of Israel and … the house of
Judah …” (Jer 31:31) and augments the Abrahamic Covenant, the New Covenant
running alongside (but not *yet* replacing) the broken Mosaic Covenant, in
order to provide for the Jewish people the five-fold Covenant provisions of:
(1) Land, (2) Greatness, (3) Blessing, (4) Protection, and (5) Global Purpose.
The Mosaic Torah/Law, rather than being discarded under the New Covenant, as
many Christians assume, remains as a core component of the New Covenant.
Here is the first occurrence of the Abrahamic Covenant
and its provisions of: (1) Land, (2) Greatness, (3) Blessing, (4) Protection,
and (5) Global Purpose:
"Now YHWH had said to Abram: Get out of your
country, from your family and from your father's house, to a (1) land that I
will show you. (2) I will make you a great nation; (3) I will bless you and
make your name great; and you shall be a blessing. (4) I will bless those who
bless you, and I will curse him who treats you lightly; and (5) in you all the
families of the earth shall be blessed” (Gen 12:1-3).
Paul makes more explicit in several of his letters the
relationship of the Abrahamic Covenant to what believing Gentiles enjoy
"in Christ," i.e. we non-Jews who have (somehow; I’ll explain later)
been included in the New Covenant. His letter to the Galatians is perhaps the
most specific:
“And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the
Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel to Abraham beforehand, saying, ‘In you
all the nations shall be blessed.’ So then those who are of faith are blessed
with believing Abraham …. that the blessing of Abraham might come upon the
Gentiles in Christ Jesus, that we [Jew and Gentile] might receive the promise
of the Spirit through faith” (Gal 3:8-14).
The promise of the Abrahamic Covenant is being, and will
ultimately be fulfilled, through the promised Seed, Jesus Christ. There is
certainly more yet to come according to the five-fold promises made to Abraham
and to the people of Israel in the various reiterations of the Abrahamic
Covenant (Heb 11:39).
I emphasize that the Mosaic Covenant was not mere scaffolding
or some "plan B" in God's redemptive economy. It was the planned and
purposed highway for which the Abrahamic Covenant was the onramp, therefore a
necessary part of God's goal in Christ. And it is still in force for
unbelieving Jews to this day! That is why Gentile circumcision was such a big
deal to Paul (Gal 5:3). He did not seem to conceive of a way for a Gentile to
enter directly into the Abrahamic Covenant without it leading one straight into
the still-in-force Mosaic Covenant ... and into the curse brought upon Israel
for their apostasy from that covenant (Lev 26:14-16).
So, enter the New Covenant in Jesus' blood. Around 33
A.D. Christ took upon himself "the curse of the Torah/Law" due to
Israel for their apostasy (Lev 26:14-16). Therefore, the five-fold promises of
the Abrahamic Covenant and their expansions in the Mosaic Covenant find their
ultimate fulfillment in Christ, which promises will still be literally
fulfilled for the people of Israel. Furthermore, through the New Covenant to “…
the house of Israel and to the house of Judah …” (Jer 31:31), the blessings
promised to the nations in point # 5 of the Abrahamic Covenant, are graciously
applied to believing Gentiles via what Paul termed "the mystery [of the
gospel]" (Rom 16:25, 26; Eph 3:1-12; 6:19, 20; Col 1:24-26). The New
Covenant *did not* annul the specific promises made in the Mosaic Covenant
(E.g. the promised parcel of land, the special royal-priestly status of the
entire people of Israel among the nations, the Levitical priesthood operating
within Israel's national priesthood, Jerusalem as a unique [capital] city in
the world, etc). Instead, the New Covenant in Christ's blood ensured those
promises of literally coming true.
This same principle -- of one covenant not annulling another
covenant and of one aspect of a subsequent covenant not annulling promised
benefits of previous covenants -- is argued for by Paul in Gal 3:15-17
regarding the planned later addition of the Mosaic Torah/Law to the Abrahamic
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
.... And this I say, that the law, which was four hundred and thirty years
later, cannot annul the covenant that was confirmed before by God in Christ,
that it should make the promise of no effect."
Paul is arguing from the lesser to the greater, saying
that if it is true of human covenants that one cannot annul them or add
unagreed-upon (by both parties) stipulations to them, then how much more is it
true of God's covenants! YHWH does not change the covenant rules mid-stream.
Even if the other covenant party is unfaithful, God will fulfill His part of
the bargain. Literally!
Note then what God said to Moses about the then-future
apostate Israel’s full restoration. Both the Abrahamic Covenant and the Mosaic
Covenant are specifically alluded to:
"But if they confess their iniquity and the iniquity
of their fathers, with their unfaithfulness in which they were unfaithful to
Me, and that they also have walked contrary to Me ... if their uncircumcised
hearts are humbled, and they accept their guilt -- then I will remember My
covenant with Jacob, and My covenant with Isaac and My covenant with Abraham I
will remember [i.e. the Abrahamic Covenant]; I will remember the land .... Yet
for all that, when they are [dispersed] in the land of their enemies, I will
not cast them away, nor shall I abhor them, to utterly destroy them and break
My covenant with them; for I am the LORD their God. But for their sake I will
remember the covenant of their ancestors, whom I brought out of the land of
Egypt in the sight of the nations, that I might be their God [i.e. the Mosaic
Covenant]: I am YHWH" (Lev 26:40-45).
(Part #2 to come) …
-Michael Millier
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