Topical Studies
Old Covenant, Problem with
(From Forerunner Commentary)
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Jeremiah 7:22-23 (Go to this verse :: Verse pop-up)
Jeremiah says that God never commanded offerings and sacrifices when the Old Covenant was made! He is talking about the generation to whom God gave His law and with whom He made the Old Covenant. It is easily understood why no other sacrifices are given in the Old Covenant except for the Passover (see Exodus 23:18). God does not mention them because He did not require them under the terms of the Old Covenant. All He wanted Israel to do was to keep the Ten Commandments, the statutes, and the judgments that He had already given to them with one exception—the Passover, the only sacrifice that He required! This is one reason why the New Covenant did not perpetuate the other sacrifices, even though the Old Covenant became obsolete: The sacrifices were never a part of it in the first place. In terms of Passover, the symbols changed to bread and wine, but we still keep it. There are three reasons why true Christians keep Passover even though it is also part of the Old Covenant. First, like the Ten Commandments, they preceded the making of the Old Covenant. Passover was commanded in Exodus 12, enforced, and practiced before Israel ever got to Mt. Sinai. Second, it is commanded in the New Testament and shown by the example of Christ and the apostles. Third, Passover is included within the statutes of God as a corollary of the fourth commandment. It is a festival and therefore to be kept.
John W. Ritenbaugh
The Covenants, Grace and Law (Part 17)
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Romans 8:3 (Go to this verse :: Verse pop-up)
The context of Romans 8 is somewhat different than the context in Hebrews 8, but the principle Paul deals with is similar. Flesh in Romans 8:3 refers to people. The problem with the Old Covenant was not with its laws, but with one of the parties who made the covenant—"them" (Hebrews 8:8). Obviously, he refers to the people who made the covenant. They would not keep its terms! This is confirmed by the Old Testament record, which shows that Israel never kept the Old Covenant except for brief periods of time. This is why there are so many references in the Old Testament to their being stiff-necked, being fornicators or adulterers, or filled with iniquity. It was not that Israel could not keep the terms of the covenant but that they would not. God's intent in making the Old Covenant was limited. Israel should have been able to keep its terms. To think otherwise is to accuse God of being unfair in His proposition and having taken advantage of Israel's ignorance. Human nature is always looking for ways to shift blame. We must be careful, or we might be guilty of doing the same thing under the New Covenant. We could say that it is too hard, and use our complaint as a justification for our failures and bad attitudes. Jesus anticipated this. In the Parable of the Talents in Matthew 25, He gives five talents to one, two talents to another, and one talent to a third. The response of the person to whom He gave one talent is, "I knew that You were a hard man, and that You reap where you do not sow. And therefore I hid it" (Matthew 25:24-25). He is saying, "God, You were too hard!" He essentially shifts the blame to God. Jesus understood that human nature never changes: It always wants to shift the blame!
John W. Ritenbaugh
The Covenants, Grace and Law (Part 10)
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2 Corinthians 3:5-9 (Go to this verse :: Verse pop-up)
The subject here is not the doing away with laws but the change in administration of existing laws. Remember that Jesus said not one jot or tittle will pass from the law (Matthew 5:18). In Hebrews 8:10, where the context is the Covenant, the New Covenant is shown to have laws, which will be written in our hearts. Paul is making a comparison, showing the superiority of the ministry's responsibility under the New Covenant to the priesthood's responsibility under the Old. He compares ink with spirit, stone with flesh, letter with spirit (or intent), and death with life. The "ministration of death" was Israel's civil administration for punishing violations of civil law. The laws were not done away, but the Old Covenant administration and enforcement of the law was set aside because the church does not have civil authority. It is that simple. The church does not have civil authority over the state. However, the ministry has the opportunity to play a large part in the ministering of life to those God calls—through teaching and administering God's Word. Thus, the letter killed because the Old Covenant could not provide for life. Words—even of divine origin—cannot produce life. A vitalizing Spirit must be present to charge the words with transforming power. Under the Old Covenant, God did not promise His Holy Spirit, forgiveness of sin, access into His presence, or eternal life. Jesus raised the civil law from its merely carnal application to the nation of Israel to its spiritual application to the church, which would be drawn from all of mankind, including, of course, the Gentiles.
John W. Ritenbaugh
The Covenants, Grace and Law (Part 18)
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Hebrews 8:6 (Go to this verse :: Verse pop-up)
Jesus is the Mediator of a better covenant, which is established upon better promises. It was not established upon law changes but upon better promises. Some changes of terms were made, but the focus is on changes in the promises. Why were the promises changed? Being in context with "for if that first covenant had been faultless" and "finding fault with them," the changes had something to do with the fault, and the fault was with them. Them is a plural reference to the multitude of people who anciently made the Old Covenant with God.
John W. Ritenbaugh
The Covenants, Grace and Law (Part 10)
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Hebrews 8:7-8 (Go to this verse :: Verse pop-up)
There indeed was a fault: "finding fault with them." Them is a plural pronoun, so it cannot possibly refer to the singular noun covenant. It would have to have read "for finding fault with it." God's Word is telling us—not completely yet—that the fault was with a plural them.
John W. Ritenbaugh
The Covenants, Grace and Law (Part 10)
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Hebrews 8:8 (Go to this verse :: Verse pop-up)
Note the plural pronoun "them." To this time, there was only one covenant, so if he were referring to the covenant, he would have had to say, "for finding fault with it." But God did not find fault with the Old Covenant. Everything that God does is of the highest order, and the covenant He gave to Israel was more than adequate for His intention at the time. It was not the covenant that failed. It was them—the people—who failed. They did not live up to what the covenant stipulated. Everything God does is pure, right, and true. People who say the law is done away and the Old Covenant was a failure imply that there was something wrong with what God gave the people to do. God does not do things like that! We cannot afford to allow that kind of thinking to get into our minds because it puts us on the trail to error and will not help us in our relationship with God. It will greatly affect the way we approach the Bible—the Word of God. The Old Covenant is part of the Word of God, and Proverbs 30:5 says, "Every word of God is pure." Therefore, the problem was not with the covenant but was in the people. Specifically, the problem was in their hearts; they were uncircumcised, to use the Bible's term. Their hearts were filled with self-will and therefore rejected what God had to say.
John W. Ritenbaugh
The Covenants, Grace and Law (Part 8)
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