THE GOD OF COVENANTS
Daniel Webster, who was born in New Hampshire in 1782, became one of the most eloquent orators ever to grace the American scene. His orations helped to launch him upon a career of public service which carried him to the United States Senate, and made him Secretary of State under three presidents.
On one occasion, Mr. Webster was asked to state the most important thought that ever occurred to his mind. His reply was simple and pointed. "The most important thought I ever had," he said, "was that of my individual responsibility to God."
If this was the most important thought to lodge in such a brilliant brain, perhaps all of us should ponder it carefully and honestly. It would be well for us to explore the nature of God's relationship with man as revealed in the Bible. This will help us to understand the mercy of God, and why we are not under law, but under grace.
In the orderly process of creation, when God had formed the material universe, He said, "Come now, let us make man in our own image." It is apparent from subsequent Scriptural disclosures, that this statement was addressed to the Living Word who was with God and was God (John 1:1). Concerning the Word it was said, "All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made" (John 1:3; RSV).
The "image of God" had no reference to man's physical frame. Man bears the image of God because he is a rational, intelligent, and creative personality. It is the spirit, not the clay dwelling of the spirit, which bears the imprint of the divine image. When man was created, God declared that it was not good for man to be alone. By his very nature man is a social being. His personality develops best by association with others of his own kind. So God made a helpmeet worthy of man and presented her to him as a companion.
At the same time the family relationship was instituted by a divine decree. God said, "For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh" (Matthew 19:5; KJV). As a place for the pair to dwell a garden was created eastward in Eden, and man was assigned the task of overseeing it and keeping it trim and neat. It was here that God placed the first limitation upon the primeval pair. He granted them permission to eat of the fruit of every tree in the garden except one. The tree of knowledge of good and evil was off limits. God said, "You shall not eat of it, for the day you eat of it you will die."
The rest of the story is well known. Satan, adopting the form of the serpent, enticed the woman by the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life. She ate of the forbidden fruit and gave it to her husband, who also ate of it. Sin thus entered the world. The effect was seen immediately. The man and woman, enveloped in a sense of shame, sought to hide from the presence of God. Several thousand years later Paul summed up the consequences by saying, "Sin came into the world through one man and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all men sinned" (Romans 5:12; RSV).
In order to preclude the possibility that man would eat of the tree of life and live forever in a state of alienation and disgrace, God ejected Adam and Eve from the paradise in which He had placed them. But even at the beginning there was a ray of hope penetrating the darkness of despair. In pronouncing a sentence of degradation upon the serpent, God said, "I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel" (KJV). The head of the serpent is the seat of his power. The venom in his fangs produces death. The time would come when the seed of the woman, although bruised by the serpent, would destroy or crush the one who had power over death.
The world of mankind had to pass through stages of development similar to those of the individuals who composed it. The world had its infancy, childhood, and adolescence, before it attained maturity. Just as parents must accommodate their instruction, training, and discipline to the state of their children at a given time, so God likewise had to adjust His requirements to the condition of humanity in progressive phases.
A realization of this fact leads to certain inevitable conclusions. Things that might be condoned in one age could not be continued in another. We smile at the antics of a little child, but realize that the same actions on the part of an older person would be an occasion for regret and reproof. The principle of human responsibility is stated by the apostle Paul to the Athenian philosophers in the statement, "The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all men everywhere to repent" (Acts 17:30; RSV).
God has never required of man in any age what he is unable to perform. He has always adjusted His mandates to meet the needs and abilities of man in the circumstances in which he is found. A good illustration of this is found in what may be termed "the evolution of the demonstration of worship." Certainly the God who is "over all, through all, and in all," has the right, and even the obligation, of revealing what is acceptable as worship of His majesty at any time.
When man lived in a nomadic culture, he was required to offer sacrifices upon an altar consisting of an earthen mound. When certain geographical spots became hallowed because of significant events, a more permanent altar of field stones was permitted. However, to avoid any temptation to idolatry, all engraving or carving upon the face of the stones was forbidden (Exodus 20:24, 25). Later, when God separated a people from bondage to form a nation, He provided for them a tent, or tabernacle, suitable to their wandering life for forty years in the wilderness.
When this same people settled in a land that was to become their own, God selected a city where He inscribed His name. Here they were permitted to erect a house, the magnificence of which was unsurpassed in its day. In spite of its lavish beauty and splendor, it was to provide only a temporary place for adoration of God. At the dedication service, the king who supervised and financed its erection acknowledged that it could never qualify as a dwelling for God (2 Chronicles 6:18).
When Jesus came into the world to share the human lot, He made it clear that the worship of God was not to be limited by time or place. "'Neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth'" (John 4:21, 24; RSV). God now has no holy places, holy days, or holy things. All of these belong to a childhood age that we should have outgrown. God now has only a holy people. The only sanctuary is a consecrated human heart. The only temple is the one composed of living stones. Those who dedicate piles of brick and stone, and speak in awed tones of "the sanctuary" are spiritually infantile. They have not "put away childish things."
There is but one more step awaiting. There remains a new Jerusalem to be revealed. John, who was given a preview of the city, wrote, "I saw no temple therein" (Revelation 21:22; KJV). No other observation more fully conveys the difference between life on our material planet and that in the eternal state. There is not a city upon earth that does not contain edifices devoted to worship. In the city of the Ultimate there will be no place of worship. There the temple at last becomes divinely personal: "For the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it."
Responsibility is always gauged by man's ability to respond. God has revealed His will progressively, as man was able to grasp it and fulfill it. Human responsibility was thus judged upon the basis of man's place in history at the time. Yet there is one fact about the divine-human relationship which is always the same. This fact is that God has chosen to relate to man on the basis of covenants. He is a covenant-making God. No one who ignores this fact will ever fully grasp God's plan and purpose in any age.
God's covenants with man are always acts of divine grace. They stem from the fact that God is love, and it is the nature of this love to be ever active and outgoing toward its object. There is no obligation owed to sinful man to compel the Creator to continue to act toward him in such a manner as to promote his welfare. The covenants of God grow out of the nature of God, and not out of the nature of man.
A simple covenant is an agreement between two parties. In a human covenant the party of the first part and the party of the second part are equals before the law. This cannot be the case in a divine-human covenant, however. God always must be regarded as supreme. He is sovereign in the universe. He proposes and man accepts. Man is in no position to bargain with God or to sue for better terms.
While God proposes terms of His covenants, He never imposes them. Man is free to refuse the proffered relationship when it is conditional. In most instances a sign or seal of the covenant is provided. Such a visible token serves as a constant reminder of the relationship. Like a wedding ring, it is a symbol of a covenant in force, to both those who were parties to the covenant and those who were not.
As a working basis for continued study, let us summarize with the statement of two facts that are apparent to every person who is informed in the revelation of God. These will be foundational for all else that is deduced from the sacred Scriptures.
1. Covenant Relationship. God has chosen to relate to mankind on the basis of covenants. All of God's covenants with man have been designed to achieve the good of humanity. God has revealed himself as a covenant-making God. He has entered into agreements based upon His perfect character. He has placed himself on record by making immutable promises. The fact that one covenant supersedes another is not attributable to fickleness or caprice, but to the changing condition of the world of mankind. Our relationship to God must be a covenantal one. We must enter such an agreement freely as the party of the second part. It is a profound truth that the infinite Creator respects the sovereignty of the human will, to the extent that the created may reject the Creator. Finite man may refuse the hand that made him, but he cannot refuse the consequences that follow.
2. Rules or Ordinances. God has arranged that all of the blessings and privileges He confers upon men shall be enjoyed in conjunction with ordinances of His own appointment. This is true in both the natural and spiritual realms. Thus we read of the ordinances of the sun, moon, and stars in Jeremiah 31:35, 36. The same word is employed here for "ordinances" as is used for expressions of worship. One might as well try to secure light in the material realm without the sun and moon as to seek for light in the spiritual domain without God's revelation.
The primitive root from which "ordinance" is derived, literally means "to hack." It referred first to the action of cutting messages and directions in the bark of trees. Then it came to refer to the action of carving in stone slabs or pillars by use of a chisel and hammer. It is significant that the words of the Ten Commandments were written in stone tablets by the finger of God, the Holy Spirit. The word finally progressed until it meant "to engrave." Laws and enactments were originally chiseled in stone, and later scratched or engraved in metal plates. Thus, the term eventually came to mean an enactment or appointment, generally by proper authority. God's blessings are in response to God's ordinances.
With this introductory and background material we can examine the initial covenant God introduced and preserved in the Scriptural record. It will be confusing to refer to God's commandment with Noah as "the first covenant." That term was appropriated by a divine writer and applied to a later covenant enacted to create a special nation out of former slaves. That nation was designed to keep alive on earth the concept of monotheism, that is, belief in one God (Cp. Hebrews 8:7, 11). The initial covenant was made with Noah. It was the first in point of time, but not the first in terms of importance to the purpose of God. A study of it, however, will lay the groundwork for investigation of other covenants of God.