Ancient Words—A New Covenant Sealed with Blood

The book of Hebrews provides the most excellent reasoning for why a new covenant was needed and how a new covenant was established. Remember, God is a covenant maker and of course he, as Creator, has that very right. Why should not a creator have the desire and privilege to establish covenant with that which he has created? The Creator has established covenant with his creation over the course of time in various ways. Adam and Eve were given covenant to not eat of the tree of knowledge—good and evil—but broke that covenant. Death then entered a perfect garden of life and changed the human race for all time. About 1,500 years later the entire human race, save Noah and his family of 8, broke covenant with their Creator through rampant wickedness and sexual immorality, so God just started all over again. Today’s rainbow in the sky remains as God’s covenant, to man and all creation, that never will he destroy the entire earth again by water. God makes new covenants with Abraham and then about 400 years later with Moses. The well-being of men and women is always the ultimate purpose for God when he makes covenant. He is Creator and the Creator wants prosperity, joy, peace, and order for all of his creation.

Jesus, God’s Son, enters earth’s scene over 2,000 years ago to usher in the greatest and final covenant for all of earth’s inhabitants. If there had been nothing wrong with the previous covenants, no place would have been sought for another covenant (Heb 8.7). “But the ministry Jesus has received is as superior to theirs (of former covenants) of which he is mediator is superior to the old one, and it is founded on better promises….By calling this covenant “new”, he has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and aging will soon disappear (Heb 8.6,13). “For this reason, Christ is the mediator of a new covenant, that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance—now that he has died as a ransom to set them free from the sins committed under the first covenant (Heb 9.15). Without blood there can be no remission of sins. Without remission of sins there can be no holiness. Without holiness no one will see God. For this covenant to come into effect, please take note of Heb 10: Here I am, I have come to do your will. He (God) sets aside the first to establish the second. And by that will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all….Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, his body, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward good deeds. Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching…. If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God.