New Covenant

So I have been a parent for about 6 months now and one area I am really bad at is in the middle of the night when Liam is crying I am bad where it takes me awhile to get out of bed.

And because of this Arika is usually the one who gets up and feeds him and all that stuff.

But this past week it was her Birthday and I told her as part of her birthday gift I will get up and feed or change Liam as part of her gift.

And usually Liam is a pretty good sleeper so I didn’t think it would be a big deal.

So I go to bed and finally fall asleep around 10:30 and around 10:40 I hear Liam start crying

and I realized it might be a long night.

then I go to change him first and he is scream crying and won’t let me put the diaper on him.

and then I get to the feeding part and he was fine but he decided he would take like a 30 minute period to eat what he normally eats in 5 or 10 minutes.

So I was a little grumpy.

But at one point during the night I remember looking down at him and he was sitting there drinking his bottle slowly and I remember just going wow I love this child.

and I was thinking how easy it is to take for-granted moments like that. Where its the middle of the night and your just feeding your son probably one of the best gift God has ever given me.

But you know we often take the things we have for-granted. In fact some of the best gifts God has given us we take for-granted.

And if you have grown up in the church probably one area that we often take for-granted is the covenant God has formed with us.

and if you don’t know what a Covenant is really it is how God interacts with His people.

and often times these covenants take form as agreements for a relationship that God has with his people.

and throughout the Bible you can see Covenants made, but often time what happens is God’s people break these covenants

but today in the passage we are in it talks about a new covenant that cannot be broken.

and this covenant changes everything.

So Turn to Jeremiah 31:31:34

because as I mentioned we have been in our series “Fixer Upper” and we have been looking at the book of Jeremiah.

And throughout the book of Jeremiah God’s people have been unfaithful to God. (And really they have broken the covenant God has given them).

and in the letter he tells them what they need to know for this period.

So they end up in this rough period where they have been exiled or kicked out of where they live and taken to another land where they are prisoners and slaves.

and this week Jeremiah he

and last week we talked about how they can get through exile, but this week Jeremiah looks forward to this new covenant that will be made with the world.

and this is really a huge hope for His people and its actually a huge hope for us today.

So turn with me to

Jeremiah 31:31–34 NIV

“The days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and with the people of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them,” declares the Lord. “This is the covenant I will make with the people of Israel after that time,” declares the Lord. “I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. No longer will they teach their neighbor, or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest,” declares the Lord. “For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.”

Jeremiah 31:31–34 NIV

“The days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and with the people of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them,” declares the Lord. “This is the covenant I will make with the people of Israel after that time,” declares the Lord. “I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. No longer will they teach their neighbor, or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest,” declares the Lord. “For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.”

(NIV)

31 “The days are coming,” declares the Lord,

“when I will make a new covenant

with the people of Israel

and with the people of Judah.

32 It will not be like the covenant

I made with their ancestors

when I took them by the hand

to lead them out of Egypt,

because they broke my covenant,

though I was a husband to them,”

declares the Lord.

33 “This is the covenant I will make with the people of Israel

after that time,” declares the Lord.

“I will put my law in their minds

and write it on their hearts.

I will be their God,

and they will be my people.

34 No longer will they teach their neighbor,

or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’

because they will all know me,

from the least of them to the greatest,”

declares the Lord.

“For I will forgive their wickedness

and will remember their sins no more.”

So first off right of the back God says I will make a new Covenant.

and often times what happens is we hear that and we think of a covenant as a contract and we need to understand this because they are very different

Because a contract relationship is kind of what I have with coffee shop in town. I go there and pay for coffee.

If I don’t pay for coffee they will probably kick me out

or if their coffee started tasting bad I am probably am going to stop going there because we have a contract relationship with them

They do their part and ill do mine.

and some of us growing up or event now that might be our view on God. I do good things and you won’t send me to hell.

or you bless me if I do the right things

But a covenant is more relational like I mentioned earlier.

You know its almost like a marriage (in fact a marriage is a covenant.)

It may surprise you all but I am not always the perfect husband.

I clean very often

Somtimes I get hangry

I don’t even get my son sometimes at night.

But for some reason Arika hasn’t left me (I like to think its because she likes me) but its because we made a covenant that through good times and bad times we are not leaving each other.

And that is what God is saying to us. I have made a covenant with you.

and not only that but this is a new covenant.

The old covenant was something called the Mosaic covenant which laid out rules and how the people should live

It told them how they should treat there neighbor, it told them how to behave in public, How to act alone,

And what would happen is people

and this was great, but the issue was that it was really hard for people to keep and the people kept being disobedient to the covenant.

and because the people kept messing up they messed up they broke the covenant

and really the old covenant being broken made us realize our need for a new Covenant

Because it is impossible for us to live the life of this old covenant because we have sin in our life where it is almost tattooed on our heart and its not coming off.

So God says I am going to make a new covenant with you and this covenant is God sending Jesus to us.

and this new covenant is in place forever.

And look what is so neat here because the middle of verse 33 says I will put the law in their minds and write it on their hearts.

Basically God is going to be speaking to us and moving in us even if we do not know about this covenant.

Its kind of like how animal knows what to eat. In some cases their parents show them, but what they eat is biologically part of who they are.

and in that same way God is saying that I will wright this new covenant on your heart so this is who you are.

And this is so powerful because it means that God is at work with someone long before we are.

So you might have a neighbor you want to reach and your going I have no idea where to even start, but God is already moving before we are.

thats why in verse 34 it says we won’t need to teach people about God or evangelize.

and I need to clarify because its not saying lets cancel all our Bible Studies or outreach events

But its saying first off God is the reason people are going to turn to Him and the reason they grow closer to Him.

and not just that when they do turn to Him He is going to turn that sin that is tattooed on our heart and He is going erase and and tattoo Him on our hearts

And then to make this even better its also pointing to a future hope where God restores the world fully where everything is His will.

Where everyone will have God as their savior.

And look what comes next because it says in this new covenant “I will be their God.

Basically God is saying I am your God and you are mine.

It would be like if I said to Liam I am your father and you are my son.

And nothing is going to change that.

You know no offense to our teens, but I heard as a parent your kids teenage years can be rough because they do not treat you the best occasionally.

Luckily I am a cool dad right?

But in the middle of that I am never going to look at Liam and say I am disowning you.

But I am going to say I am your father and you are my son.

And that is what God is saying to you. You can hurt me or cause pain but you will never get to the point where I say you are not my child.

You can run away and God is saying look I am your God this new covenant is for you.

And then the last part fo this new covenant is probably the best part and it is “I will forgive you” and not only that but won’t even remember your sins.

basically God never views you in light of your sins and mess ups,

He doesn’t go your the person who is a lier

He doesn’t view you as the person who has anger issues or struggles with an addiction

but He views you in light that you are a child of God. redeemed by the blood of Jesus.

and really this entire passage is pointing at Jesus coming and next week we start our Christmas series preparing for the coming of Christ.

and really Christ coming to this earth establishes the new covenant.

Because What He does is because of our disobedience to the old covenant He dies to take our punishment.

And he is resurrected defeating death and because of this there is a new covenant that God has extended to every person where they do nit have to live in sin.

but what we need to understand is God has given us this new covenant and it is amazing.

But we have to respond to it.

I said how a covenant is relational. It takes two people.

and God is saying look I am extending my love and grace toward you regardless of what you do, and all you have to do is respond to that love and grace.

And maybe today you need to respond that.

For some of us that might just be saying I am thankful for what God has done in my life.

I am thankful that God has done something amazing by sending His son to for us so that this new Covenant can be established and now regardless of where I am, I am not defined by my sins but I am defined as a child of God.

For others it might be accepting him in to your life for the first time or even recommitting our lives to him.

But God is right here extending His covenent for you and all you have to do is say yes God.