(Chpater 18) The New Covenant   Oftentimes the claim is made, "But we are under the New Covenant now, so we don't have to obey those Old Testament laws." But what is the New Covenant? Is it some replacement for the Ten Commandments? We are often told that it is, but do we really know? Is it possible to know? We have already seen that the Ten Commandments are still binding, so how can the New Covenant be replacing them?   If we were to look up synonyms for the word "covenant" we would find such words as: agreement, bond, pact, promise, contract or treaty. A covenant is really just an agreement between two parties. So what did God promise? He said:   "...I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to Me a people" Hebrews 8:10.   Until Mount Sinai there was no written law. God never intended to write His law. He wanted it to be in our hearts. But eventually, because of the hardness of our hearts, He had to write it down for us. The Old Covenant was the promise made between Israel and God regarding the Ten Commandments back at Mount Sinai. When Moses related to the people that the Lord had promised to bless and prosper them as long as they followed His ways, they naively, perhaps even arrogantly, covenanted.   "...All the words which the LORD hath said we will do" Exodus 24:3.   Israel had vowed to, keep God's law through their own strength. Ironically, even Christ could not do that! He was completely dependent on His Father for the strength to obey, just as we must be. It is interesting that right after they promised to keep God's law in their own power, the very next thing we find the Israelites doing is worshiping the golden calf. This involved breaking virtually all of the Ten Commandments!   How could they fall so quickly? Here is the reason: They were not claiming the strength of God to obey. This is where we also fall, all too often. God saw the problem with Israel's covenant, thus He made a new one, and He invites all to take part in it. This is what God is talking about in our first verse in Hebrews 8:10. He also talks about this new transaction in Jeremiah,   "Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel...Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they brake...But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people'" Jeremiah 31:31-33.   Those who are Christ's, whether they are ethnic Jews or Gentiles, are counted as spiritual Israel (see Romans 2:28,29; 9:6; 11:17-24; Galatians 3:29). So this promise is for all of us, if we are Christ's. The New Covenant is God's same law, but it is written in our hearts. It is God doing in and through us rather than us attempting to do on our own. It is the same law, written in our hearts. The part that changes is the one who is keeping it: either us, in our own strength, or God in us, as we allow Him.

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