THE NEW COVENANT – IN 2023
By: Frank Tunstall, D. Min.
Moses built a worship system to cover our sins that included sacrificing such animals as doves, rams, and lambs, and it endured in Israel for some 1600 years. Think about it, over a millennium and a half.
Jesus in His own Person brought Moses’ Law to an end and replaced it with a New Covenant of righteousness “for everyone who believes” (Romans 10:4). The New Covenant has been alive and well for over two thousand years.
Holy Communion is Jesus’ primary example to remind us of the New Covenant with His body broken for us and His blood poured out to the last drop to cover our sins. (Matthew 26:28; Mark 14:24; Luke 22:20).
May we all discover the meaning and importance of the New Covenant that is showing no sign of diminishing and in fact is still growing with full force today.
The New Covenant in Prophecy
Two Old Testament prophets stand out, Jeremiah and Ezekiel, for predicting the story. Jeremiah wrote: “A new day is coming declares the Lord when I will make a New Covenant…. I will put my law within them, and I will write it in their hearts. I will be their God and they shall be my people…. I will forgive their iniquity” (sin 31:31-34).
Ezekiel penned, “I will also give you a new heart…. I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and you shall keep my ordinances, and do them (Ezekiel 36:26-27).
These profound prophecies sat on the shelf of prophetic history about six hundred years before Jesus began His ministry.
The New Covenant Defined
The New Covenant rests on two pillars. Jesus constructed the first by voluntarily making Himself the sacrifice when He died by crucifixion the death we should have died. In doing this Jesus revealed the measureless height and depth of His love for all humanity (John 3:16). It means the Heavenly Father’s love is available to this day for all who repent and accept Jesus as the Son of God, even if they are sincerely repenting with their last breaths. The love of God for lost humanity who are alienated from the Heavenly Father never changes.
Jesus’ resurrection from the dead came three days after His crucifixion. It guaranteed He has the power and authority in every generation to serve as the sole mediator between the Heavenly Father and unsaved people who live in rebellion against God the Father. This saving grace, defined as the unmerited favor of God, opens the door to bring them into the New Covenant (John 14:6; 1 Timothy 2:5; Hebrews 8:6; 9:15).
Saving grace extends to all mankind, and it comes with an eternal guaranty (2 Corinthians 1:21-22; Ephesians 2:8; Romans 11:6). Jesus gives new believers a new heart and a new birth that launches a new beginning of fellowship with God. “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation,” Paul penned. “Old things are passed away and all things have become new” (2 Corinthians 5:17-18). This salvation comes “by grace through faith,” and is “the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8).
What a gift!
Jesus’ resurrection guarantees the duration of the Covenant is eternal and rewards all believers with everlasting life with God in heaven. Jesus Christ made the final sacrifice with His own blood; another will never be needed.
The Lord proved by His resurrection His authority and power to forgive the sins of all people who repent with Godly sorrow and accept Him as the Son of God (2 Corinthians 7:10).
To use a colloquial expression, Jesus-the-mediator of the New Covenant on the great judgment day will say to His Father, “I have forgiven the sins of each person in this great host. They all in heart-felt repentance have confessed Me as the Son of God and are covered by my blood.”
Such love, such wondrous love!
Their entrance into heaven is guaranteed. It is the grace of God that forgives sin and saves the soul and is the first anchor of the New Covenant.
The second pillar follows. When Jesus finished His ministry on earth, He asked His Father to send the Holy Spirit to take His place. The dwelling place of the Spirit in the New Covenant is the hearts of believers. Jesus told His disciples the Holy Spirit “dwells with you and will be in you” (John 14:17).
Of the many roles of the Holy Spirit in the New Covenant, the primary ministry of the Spirit is to lead people to Jesus Christ, teach them all things about Jesus, and commission, empower, and motivate them to follow Jesus. This includes taking the Gospel message to the nations in every generation. Without question, the disciples had witnessed the power of the Spirit in Jesus’ ministry. They knew what it was like for the Holy Spirit to dwell with them. It remained for them to experience the Spirit in them that came with the baptism with the Holy Spirit. That day of great blessing blossomed on the Day of Pentecost (Acts 11:6;19:2; John 14:17; Luke 4:1, 18; 10:21; John 1:32-33).
The Heavenly Father sent the Holy Spirit to indwell believers and develop the new form of worship Jesus defined as worshipping “in Spirit and in truth.” Jesus described it as the kind of worship the Heavenly Father seeks. The story of the woman at Jacob’s Well illustrates it (John 4:21-24).
The Spirit’s assignment also included choosing the authors to write the New Testament. Jesus said the Holy Spirit “will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you” (John 14:26; 2 Timothy 3:16; 2 Peter 1:16-21). In addition, the Spirit’s assignment included preserving the Scriptures so that all generations will have the same Holy Bible to study.
The New Covenant in 2023.
Please dear reader, absorb this teaching in your heart. Jesus Christ made the New Covenant as a solemn commitment first to His disciples and through them to the whole human family. Yes, Jesus’ blood atones for our sins. He made the final sacrifice. Earning our salvation with our own works of righteousness is a hopeless effort. Jesus’ launch of the New Covenant after Pentecost obviously had a powerful effect on the disciples and can pack the same punch in the church today. May it do so in the hearts of our people around the world.
Jesus is in me, and I am in Jesus. Why would any child of God not want to be filled with the Holy Spirit!
Have you, dear reader, received the Holy Spirit since you believed? (Acts 19:3).
