The New Covenant

Baby Dedication

Invite Henry family to come up front. (Jacnel, Yanique, Yadelky, Hayline, Kervens)

It is my great joy to formally introduce you to one of the newest members of our church family: Kervens Henry. Kervens is the newest addition to the Henry family who have been worshiping with us ever since they moved here from Haiti. In Haiti one of the main languages is French and so instead of “Happy Sabbath” they say, “bon Sabba!” I haven’t seen them as much over the last several months, but last week they came with Kervens and it all made sense. Kervens was born this year on February 28th. He’s just three months old and now he’s able to come to church.

When Jesus was just 8 days old Mary and Joseph brought him to the priest to be dedicated to the Lord. While we don’t stick with the 8 day idea, we believe that it is important to dedicate our children to the Lord. Today Jacnel and Yanique are bringing Kervens to Jesus, recognizing that he is a special gift from God. You are giving him back to God and asking that God would help you be good stewards of this precious life He has given you.

There is a two-fold purpose for this ceremony:

The first purpose relates to the parents. They are pledging themselves to train and disciple their children to fear God and love His Word.

Moses gave this admonition to the parents in Israel which you can find in Deuteronomy 6:4-9

Deuteronomy 6:4–9 ESV

“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.

The second purpose is for the child, recognizing that he is truly God’s possession—God’s child.

Let us now dedicate Kervens to the Lord.

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PASTOR JASON:

Today we bring Kervens Henry to dedicate him to the Lord.

PASTOR JASON:

Jacnel and Yanique, do you commit, by God’s grace, to help Kervens know God as his Father and to grow up in faith?

Do you dedicate yourselves to do as the Bible commands, to “raise up your child” to follow Christ?

Do you promise to give him every spiritual advantage in your home, your church and through Christian education?

And do you dedicate yourselves to Kervens to share all his good times and bad times, and to love him always?

JACNEL & YANIQUE

We do.

PASTOR JASON:

Will you, members of Kervens spiritual family, give him every opportunity to grow in Jesus and become a good citizen of this world and the next?

CHURCH FAMILY:

Yes, we will.

PASTOR JASON:

May the Lord bless him and keep him. May the Lord lift up His face and shine upon Kervens and give him peace.

As a momento of this moment, our church family has a gift for you. It has a little board book that you can read to Kervens to teach him that God loves him very much.

**Family all sit down**

Introduction

Canada promises

In the most recent election In Canada the liberal party was promising that if they were elected they would make sure the government would build 500,000 new homes a year and make housing more affordable—a promise that gave hope to many struggling to buy a home. They also pledged tax relief for first-time buyers. But now that the election is over people are wondering if those promises will be kept. The government’s latest plans fail to provide clear steps to fulfill those promises.

How often have we felt the sting of a promise made but not delivered—whether it’s a politician’s pledge, a friend’s commitment, or even our own plans that fall through? Sometimes it seems like promises are held together with ropes made out of sand.

Unlike human promises, Hebrews 6 tells us that God’s promise is unchangeable, backed by His own oath, giving us a ‘steadfast anchor for the soul.’ While governments may struggle to deliver homes, God has secured an eternal inheritance for us through Jesus.

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Turn with me to chapter 6 as we continue in our study through the book of Hebrews.

God’s Unchangeable Promise: The Anchor of Our Hope (Hebrews 6:17-20)

Our study today is exploring the New Covenant which is featured from Hebrews 6 all the way to Hebrews 10. We’ve been reading large chunks of Hebews in this sermon series, but I won’t be read that much scripture today. Let’s start by reading Hebrews 6:17-20

Hebrews 6:17–20 ESV

So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us. We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain, where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.

Hold onto those words, “a steadfast anchor for the soul, a hope that enters… behind the veil.” This is all about God’s promise—His covenant.

And to understand the covenant we need to go back to where the promise was first made.

The first time God made a covenant was with Adam and Eve in the garden when he promised the snake that one of Eve’s children would crush it’s head. He was talking about Jesus crushing Satan and taking back the rulership of this world.

He made similar promises to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob.

In Genesis 15 God made a promise to Abraham and swore by himself that He would fulfill His promise at the cost to his own life. This is an unbreakable, unchangeable promise. Not held together by ropes, but by the very life of the everlasting God.

Jesus, the Guarantor of a Better Covenant (Heb 7:22, 8:6-13, 9:11-15)

And yet, Hebrews 7 introduces an interesting twist:

Hebrews 7:22 ESV

This makes Jesus the guarantor of a better covenant.

While human promises, like building homes or cutting taxes, often fall through, Jesus is the guarantor who ensures God’s covenant is fulfilled. His sacrifice secures our forgiveness and eternal inheritance.

But wait, Paul just talked about a better covenant? Better than what? Better than the covenant made with Adam or Abraham?

No, God’s covenant was good. In fact, it is that covenant that Jesus came to fulfill. So what is it better than? It’s better than the covenant made with Israel on Mount Sinai.

Don’t get me wrong; God’s covenant with Israel was perfect and good, but the means to fulfill that covenant that the Israelites practiced day in and day out was completely insufficient. In the same way that a shadow is an imperfect representation of a human, or an emoji is an imperfect expression of an emotion. The old covenant that Paul describes in Hebrews was incapable of accomplishing God’s promise to Adam and Abraham.

Hebrews 9 describes the old covenant.

old covenant

It calls it the “first covenant” and says that it involved regulations for worship and an earthly place of holiness. It describes the earthly tabernacle with the altar of sacrifice, the laver, the golden altar of incense and the ark of the covenant with manna and Aaron’s rod and the ten commandments inside. It talks about how the priests offer sacrifices and regularly go into the first apartment with their ritual duties, and once a year into the Most Holy place with the ark of the covenant.

But Christ did something different. He entered into a tabernacle that was not made with human hands, or even part of this earth. Christ entered once for all time into God’s tabernacle in heaven. And He didn’t take the blood of goats and sheep and cows, but he brought his own, sacrificed blood.

Paul argues that Jesus’ sacrifice was sufficient because he did the work one time. He brought one, perfect sacrifice and entered into the heavenly tabernacle one time. This perfect sacrifice and ministry is what accomplishes our salvation for all eternity. And that makes Jesus the guarantee of the new covenant. The priests in the old covenant experience had to offer sacrifices again and again in a never-ending cycle, but Jesus did it just once and it was sufficient.

In addition, the Old Covenant couldn’t do anything to change your heart. It was a play-act of the real thing that God must do inside us to save and transform us. It is Jesus’ ministry that does the real work that the blood of goats and cows could never do. He washes us clean from sin with His blood, and He sends us His Spirit to write his character in our hearts.

Paul quoted from Jeremiah 31 when he described the New Covenant:

Hebrews 8:10 ESV

For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my laws into their minds, and write them on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.

The transformation of our heart that the New Covenant promises wasn’t possible with sacrifices and incense and tithes and fasting and ceremonies and festivals. And it still isn’t possible with candles or communions or prayer rituals or scripture marathons or church participation. The ritual part of religion is not the guarantee of God’s promise to save us and write His law of love in our hearts.

But Jesus is. His death and His power make the new covenant possible.

Living with Confidence in God’s Presence (Hebrews 10:19-23)

Hebrews 10 makes it clear why the old covenant had to pass away.

Hebrews 10:1–4 ESV

1 For since the law has but a shadow of the good things to come instead of the true form of these realities, it can never, by the same sacrifices that are continually offered every year, make perfect those who draw near. 2 Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered, since the worshipers, having once been cleansed, would no longer have any consciousness of sins? 3 But in these sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year. 4 For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.

In the system of sacrifices that the Israelites practiced they had the daily ministry of the priests where a person would confess their sins and the blood of the lamb would cleanse them. And then then the high priest had a yearly ministry at Yom Kippur, or the day of atonement. This was a day of judgment because all sin that had gone into the sanctuary was taken out and sent away from the camp. That yearly ceremony was a reminder that sin wasn’t solved. The problem still existed. Even though the earthly sanctuary was symbolically cleansed for that year, they would do it again next year.

But Jesus came to do something greater, something more permanent.

Hebrews 10:5–7 ESV

Consequently, when Christ came into the world, he said, “Sacrifices and offerings you have not desired, but a body have you prepared for me; in burnt offerings and sin offerings you have taken no pleasure. Then I said, ‘Behold, I have come to do your will, O God, as it is written of me in the scroll of the book.’ ”

Jesus came to fulfill all righteousness, to make atonement and bring us into the presence of the Father, behind the Veil, all the way into the most Holy Place of heaven. Right now, you and I can come to our Father in heaven and pray, but one day soon, Jesus will finish the work in the Most Holy Place and he will take off his priestly robe and come and get us. In that day all who have loved God throughout all of human history will rise up out of the grave and Jesus will take us to live in His house where we will not only get to talk to God in prayer, we’ll get to live in His house.

No earthly ritual or symbol could do that, but Jesus can!

In the New Covenant, we are not bound by guilt or rituals. We are free in Christ.

I had the privilege of working with a young lady who struggled with guilt. She was the kind of girl who could light up a room with her smile, but she didn’t smile nearly enough. At seventeen she had gotten pregnant. It was one of those situations where her parents didn’t even allow her to date, so she chose to have an abortion to hide that part of her life. From that moment on, every aspect of her Christian experience was viewed through the lens of guilt. She felt unworthy to be loved by God. Even though she never talked about it, her guilt was like a sticky film that coated every emotion and relationship and experience in life. And nothing she could do could wipe that memory or its guilt from her mind.

But Jesus can.

He can take the broken, shattered, dirty, sticky pieces of our lives and cleanse and health and put us back together. He can take our guilt and remove it from us as far as the east is from the west.

Jump forward to verse 19

Hebrews 10:19–23 ESV

19 Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, 20 by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, 21 and since we have a great priest over the house of God, 22 let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. 23 Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.

The earthly sanctuary had a veil that you had to go through to get inside. You could only come into the tabernacle from that one side of the fence where their veil was. And when you did walk through it, you could only go just inside that veil, close to the altar of burnt offering. Only the priests could go further, and even they were still restricted to just the Holy Place. It was only the high priest could go into the Most Holy place where God’s glory was. But you and I are given access “behind the veil” because Jesus, our high priest has entered and sat down at the Father’s side. We can now come in with confidence, marching past the altar of burnt offering, through the holy place and into the throne-room of God saying,

Matthew 6:9 ESV

“Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.

This is the new covenant, not because the promise is new, but because the means by which we receive the promise is superior and sufficient.

Conclusion

While human promises, like those for affordable homes, may be broken again and again, God’s promise in Christ is reliable. It’s an anchor, a guarantee, and an invitation to draw near to Him.

Will you let him clean off your sticky guilt? Will you let him take your broken rituals? And just come.

Trust God’s promise. Take one step closer to Him. Spend some time in prayer this week. Open the bible and remind God that He has promised to give you wisdom and understanding. And as you come, be bold and invite someone else into the presence of our Heavenly Father too.

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Will you stand with me as we sing a song of faith — My Hope is Built on Nothing Less, hymn 522.