Inauguration of the New Covenant

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I invite you to take out your Bible and turn with me to 2 Corinthians chapter 3.
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And we are going to read this morning in just a moment 2
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Corinthians chapter 3 beginning at verse 4 and we're going to read down to verse 13.
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On my way in this morning as I was sitting in my truck as I do have a 30 minute drive door to door from my house to the church door and making that drive in I am always listening to something whether it is a sermon or a podcast or a book.
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Very rarely listen to music interestingly enough. But what I was noticing is that I don't remember the last time
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I used my radio. In fact my radio in my truck is really nothing more than an annoyance.
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Because where my phone sits it happens to every once in a while when I hit a bump my phone will touch the radio and turn it on and it is inevitable that the last time it was on it was up to a thousand.
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So when it turns it on it scares me because it just blasts in my ears some random channel.
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But it is interesting to consider that when I was a teenager and I received my first automobile a
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Dodge Daytona. One of the first things that I did was
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I went out to purchase a new radio. Because I was so excited to have my own automobile to have my own radio and many men remember maybe ladies too you put the speakers in the back and you make it really a cool car because it has a cool sound system.
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All that's gone away now. Again I don't remember the last time I purposely used my radio because when
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I get into my car I listen to my phone. And so this illustration is simply meant to remind us that there are times where things become obsolete and they're replaced with something else.
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Now, not every time something is replaced is it replaced with something better and as I was considering this week the word new covenant
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I began to think of the word new and I began to think of the fact that new doesn't always mean better.
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Somebody says I have a new husband that doesn't always mean better. But in the use that we will see today in the use of the new covenant the word new doesn't just mean different but it means better.
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In fact we're going to see today as we examine and dive deeper into the concept of the new covenant we're going to see the writer of Hebrews is going to call it a more excellent covenant.
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So it's not just new. It's better and just as when new technology comes along it makes the old technology obsolete and probably very few of you have an 8 track player in your car.
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When the new covenant came it rendered the old covenant obsolete because we have something better now.
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So let's stand together and let's read how Paul describes this new and better covenant to us in 2
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Corinthians and again he begins in chapter 3 verse 4 with where we were last week and we're going to read down to verse 13.
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Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us but our sufficiency is from God who has made us sufficient to be ministers of a new covenant not of the letter but of the spirit for the letter kills but the spirit gives life.
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Now if the ministry of death carved in letters on stone came with such glory that the Israelites could not gaze at Moses face because of its glory which was being brought to an end will not the ministry of the spirit have even more glory for if there was glory in the ministry of condemnation the ministry of righteousness must far exceed it in glory indeed in this case what once had glory has come to have no glory at all because of the glory that surpasses it for if what was being brought to an end came with glory much more will what is permanent have glory.
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Since we have such a hope we are very bold not like Moses who would put a veil over his face so that the
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Israelites might not gaze at the outcome of what was being brought to an end.
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Let's pray. Father as we examine today this text and even more so Lord dive even deeper into the idea of the new covenant and the ways in which the new covenant is better the ways in which the new covenant has given us a better priest and better sacrifices and even better promises.
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Lord I pray that you would give us eyes to see and ears to hear all that your spirit has to teach us today.
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I pray that you would keep me from error. I pray that you would forgive my sin.
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And I pray that my lack would be put away and Lord that your abundance shine through.
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I pray Lord that the believer in the room would understand even better today what it is in which he believes.
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And I pray Lord that the unbeliever would recognize the need of their heart to turn from their sin and trust in the
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Lord Jesus Christ for there is no salvation outside of him and no hope outside of his covenant.
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We pray all this Lord in Jesus name and for his sake amen. Every four years we have to sit through yet another presidential election.
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And it's coming and I already begin to feel the looming pain of ads and debates which often are not real debates but just shouting fests and foolish talk.
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But we all know what we have to look forward to for the next coming year. But at the end of this year one man for better or for worse will be elected president of the
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United States for another year and then we will face another inauguration.
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Now the word inauguration simply means the instituting of something new.
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It means to put something in place. It means to introduce a new term or a new idea or a new thought or in this case a new president.
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We're going to all look forward to the inauguration of the new president. When I say look forward maybe I should change that.
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We're all going to tolerate another inauguration of the president.
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Well the reason why I bring up this word inauguration is because last week I gave you an outline.
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If you remember I didn't finish the sermon. Last week we began to discuss the new covenant that Paul mentions here in 2
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Corinthians chapter 3. And I said that I wanted to give you four aspects of the new covenant and I ended up only giving you one.
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I only gave you the first one. Our time was spent all last week looking at the promise of the new covenant.
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You'll remember we went back to Jeremiah and we saw how Jeremiah is the only place in the Old Testament where the phrase new covenant is used.
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But it does tell us there's a promise coming and it's a promise of a new covenant. We looked at Ezekiel and how
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Ezekiel talked about what was going to happen in this new covenant. God was going to take out the heart of stone and give us a heart of flesh.
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We went back and looked in other passages, Isaiah and Deuteronomy where it pointed us to a new promise and where God would change the hearts of his people.
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And we even went all the way back to the garden where after the fall of man God promised that he would crush the head of the serpent through the seed of the woman.
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The new covenant is a promise that goes all the way back to the beginning.
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And I would contend it was the very purpose of God from the beginning.
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To glorify himself through the work of his son Jesus Christ. That that has been the goal.
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That has been the telos as the word telos means the purpose of all of history.
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So that when we consider Christ we consider that all things are from him and through him and to him.
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To him be glory and honor forever, Amen. That is the wondrous truth of the
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Bible and the wondrous promise of the new covenant. Well today we are going to look at the inauguration of the new covenant.
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When did the new covenant begin and in what way did it begin and out of that what changed?
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Now I must say we read this morning verses 4 through 13 of 2nd
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Corinthians and I will be making some comments as we go. But I also want to tell you that this particular section of 2nd
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Corinthians is considered by many scholars to be one of the more difficult sections of Paul's writing and the reason being that Paul uses in this section some terms regarding the old covenant calling it a covenant of death and things like that and some people say well in other places he talks about the blessing of the law and the goodness of the law and certainly we go back to the
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Old Testament and it talks about the glory of the law and the law of the Lord is perfect and we see all these things praising the law and yet here he comes and calls it a ministry of death and people take great offense to Paul's words.
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Also he uses an example from Exodus 34 where he talks about Moses putting the veil over his face and he seems to draw a much different application from that than what we find in the text in Exodus 34.
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In fact Paul's application seems somewhat unique and almost as if he's imposing upon Exodus 34 something that's not there and so we have to consider that.
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So as I said there's a lot in this text that in the weeks ahead we're going to expound on and I'm not going to finish today either just so you know because I've just been considering how important the new covenant is and if I spent the rest of this year preaching on the new covenant and what it means and what it brings and the changes that we have and the blessings that it beholds that we would never once have wasted a moment because the new covenant is worthy of our time.
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So what I wanted to do again looking at today and I will be examining a few things that Paul said here but I want to look at this question and that is the question of when did the inauguration of the new covenant take place and you know the word testament also means covenant so I could have said that I could have said the inauguration of the new testament but what do we think when we think new testament?
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We think the new testament scriptures and of course we should because the new testament scriptures are scripture and they're important but when we think new covenant we don't think when did the new testament come?
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The new testament writings actually did not begin until somewhere in the late forties not 1940s
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I know some of you remember that but the first forties the early early forties and in that first century the first writings were written by the apostle
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Paul they were written somewhere in the late forties 48 49 somewhere we would imagine and it was probably either
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Paul's letter to Galatians to the Galatians or Paul's letter to Thessalonica that was first I contend it was
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Galatians some scholars think it was the letter to Thessalonica which was first and we'll we get to heaven we'll ask him but I don't think anybody's going to really care but I care now because I have a reason why
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I think Galatians was first Galatians is Paul's treatment arguing against the
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Judaizers the Judaizers were the ones who were claiming that if you are a
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Christian you have to bring in the old covenant ceremonial law and you must apply it within the new covenant context and if you're not circumcised you have to be circumcised and if you're not living according to the dietary restrictions you have to live according to the dietary restrictions and if you're not obeying all of the
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Mosaic law if you're not taking the old covenant and applying it to the new covenant then you are not pleasing
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God Paul calls that a false gospel in fact the very first thing he says in Galatians is that they have fallen prey to a false gospel and he says there is no other gospel he says there's one gospel and if any man comes to you and preaches another gospel contrary to the one that I have preached to you let him be anathema which means to be cut off or accursed he says if anyone comes even an angel from heaven comes preaching another gospel let him be accursed well
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I believe Paul is dealing with a very similar situation in 2nd Corinthians as I said last week
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Paul is here defending his ministry as a servant or a mediator or a minister of the new covenant he compares himself to Moses who was the minister of the old covenant
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Moses brought a law written on stone I bring a law written on hearts
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Moses brought a ministry of death you know what happened when the people of God made the golden calf there was death that happened as a result and out of that flowed death how long did the death last why did they spend 40 years in the wilderness beloved it was so that every person who was above the age of 20 would die no person other than Joshua and Caleb who were above the age of 20 when the spies went in and spied out
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Canaan and they came back what'd they say oh we can't go there they're
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Giants we're like worms in their eyes we're you know we can't go Joshua and Caleb said no we can go and after that God's judgment was leveled and not one lived who was over 20 years old the next in fact that's what
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Deuteronomy he's written for Deuteronomy was written the word Deuteronomos means law
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Deuteronomy means second or the second giving and so Deuteronomy means the second giving of the law why is there need to be a second giving of the law because it never because a different generation because the first generation is gone
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Deuteronomy is is Moses giving the law again to the generation that's about to go in and receive the promise because the first generation is dead so Paul in his writing and that's why
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I say this part's a little difficult because he begins to he begins to describe the two companies because this was a ministry of death we have the ministry of life this was a ministry of the letter we have the spirit and Paul's making a distinguish or distinguishing rather between the old and the new but not in any way to say the old was wrong and not really to say that the old was bad but more so to say that the old has served its purpose and has come to an end that's the key to this he doesn't argue from the bad to the good he argues from the good to the better he said if there was glory in the old covenant if there was glory in the covenant which brought death how much more glory will there be in the covenant which brings life by the spirit see it's a it's not a bad to good it's a it's a good to better or a great to greatest from one glory to a greater glory
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Paul is describing here but when did that glory come when did the glorious new covenant have its inauguration well unlike the presidential inauguration there was not a time of national solemnity where everyone came together and recognized the change there was not a brass band which came together and played hail to the chief there was not a gathering of dignitaries leaders but rather it happened in a quiet upper room as Jesus sat with his
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Apostles celebrating his final Passover with them on the night before he went to the cross so if you have your
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Bibles turn with me now to the gospel of Luke and find your place at Luke chapter 22 and go to verse 14 now it's interesting that outside of Paul Luke is the only one who uses the word new covenant in Jesus's institution of the table you can go back and look in Matthew and Mark and John you won't find the phrase you'll find the same idea but again this phrase new covenant does not come up a lot but when it does it's hugely important and Luke's gospel is the one that records for us
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Jesus using the phrase new covenant notice what it says beginning in verse 17
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I'm sorry 14 and when the hour came he reclined at table and the
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Apostles with him and he said to them I have earnestly desired to eat this
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Passover with you before I suffer now keep in mind the
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Apostles still don't know about what's going to happen the next day Jesus knows he's he's been telling them
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I'm going to be taken by sinful men I'm going to be crucified I'm gonna die and on the third day
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I'm going to rise he's told them that many times and yet they are still in ignorant denial but he says
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I earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer for I tell you
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I will not eat it and I will not eat it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God and he took a cup and when he had given thanks he said take this and divide it among yourselves for I tell you that from now on I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes and he took the bread and when he had given thanks he broke it and gave it to them saying this is my body which is given for you do this in remembrance of me and likewise the cup after they had eaten saying this cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood we can stop there notice what
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Jesus says he says this cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood now right away we have to begin to ask some questions first of all the question of what is the new covenant we have established last week the new covenant was the promise that was given in the old covenant that God was going to bring a change in the hearts of his people you'll remember they take taking out the heart of stone putting in the heart of flesh not every man will have to tell his brother know the
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Lord for they shall all know me and their sins would what be forgiven their sins would be forgiven well
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I am convinced that the hearers of Jesus probably understood something about what
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Jeremiah had written they probably understood something about the promise of this coming new covenant but it likely struck their ears very powerfully when
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Jesus picked up the cup and by the way if you've ever been a part of a Seder there are several cups throughout the meal there is the cup of blessing and there are different times where wine is drunk and while you drink the wine there are prayers that go along with it so this would have been a cup at a certain portion in the meal he picked up that cup which they had been using for something else and he gave it new meaning and he says this cup is the new covenant in my blood it's funny how that word is often becomes a point of contention you ever talked to a
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Lutheran about Jesus's body and blood in the table you will find out that they are very convinced that that word is is pregnant with meaning because Lutherans believe that the bread becomes the body literally and the cup becomes the blood literally even though when
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I say literally even literally is not literal but it's a very interesting belief they believe
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Christ is over under around and through the elements that's the phrase that they use that he is present in the elements is the term that they use and they base that on the fact that Jesus said this is my body so they take the word is and they they they fill that word is with meaning well
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I only bring that up because when we come here to verse 20 it says that the cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood it is the new covenant in my blood is this when the new covenant is inaugurated well let me say this about that the inauguration of the new covenant comes with the sacrifice of Christ and this cup points toward that sacrifice so the new covenant which brings about the change of heart the new administration of the spirit and the forgiveness of sins would actually come when
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Jesus Christ hung between heaven and earth cries out after having been fixed to the tree and he cries out it is finished what is finished the covenant has been inaugurated and we know that based on what he says he says this cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in what in my blood in my blood you see the inauguration of the new covenant comes in the blood of Christ now with that having been said what happened when
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Jesus was on that cross from a celestial perspective
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God is pouring out his wrath on Christ for what purpose and to what end why does
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God pour out his wrath on his son because the wrath that had been stored for our sin and I'll make it very personal the wrath that had been stored for my sin needed to be propitiated the
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Bible says that Jesus died as a propitiation for sin what does the word propitiation mean it means satisfaction it means
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God whose anger burns against sin whose wrath is inflamed towards sin must be satisfied and so as Jesus is on the cross and we have all seen the passion of the
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Christ well maybe not all of us but many of us have seen in the film where Jesus is beaten mercilessly with the flog and as that flog tore the flesh from his body we know all how the anguish must have been and must have and then we see him the cross being placed upon his shoulder where he had to carry it through the town and up the hill and we know that that cross beam was so heavy and and so on say it was so rough
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I was trying to say unsanded certainly they didn't sand the cross beam before they laid it across his back so the open wounds of his back having been laid a rough piece of wood across his shoulders and here he's dragging it to the point where he drops it he can't go anymore
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Simon of Cyrene is forced to come and carry the cross the rest of the way Christ is then laid on this wood he is he is fastened to it with nails that pierce his hands and his feet he is then lifted up and dropped in a hole in the ground where the weight of his body would pull against those nails and the entire weight of all of his flesh would pull down and crush into his into his lungs and he would begin to asphyxiate and death on the cross is death by asphyxiation which would last sometimes days because a man could push up on the the nail in his feet and take a breath that's horrible but that is not beloved the cup that Jesus asked to be removed on the night before the cross remember when
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Jesus was in the garden and he said father if there be any other way take this cup from me the cup was a symbol in the
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Old Testament of God's wrath which was poured out in times of judgment and so when
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Jesus said take this cup from me he's not talking in that moment about the wrath of the
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Jewish Sanhedrin he's not talking about the wrath of Pilate or the foolishness of Herod and his cohort he's not afraid of the nails he doesn't sweat drops of blood because of asphyxiation but he knows in a few moments a few hours he would be enduring the wrath for your sin
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Jesus had no sin of his own from the moment of infancy from the moment of conception he had no sin and he never once sinned and thought word or deed
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I take up all the truths of the Bible that's the one that just flummoxed me flummoxes me the most because I can't imagine being
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Jesus's brother or being Jesus's earthly father to have a son who never fails to have a son who never curses to have a son who never lies and never steals or never cheats this is who
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Jesus is he is the God man he's the perfect man he is the one who did not sin and thought word or deed and now he has been treated as a criminal and those who come against him have to come with him with accusations which are false because he is truly blameless and the blameless one is placed upon the cross and hung between heaven and earth to receive in himself the wrath of God he cries out alohai alohai lea ma sabachthanai which means my
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God my God why have you forsaken me by the way not because God had left him in that moment
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I don't believe that's the right understanding but rather he's quoting from the Psalms a which begins with separation but ends with vindication keep in mind but yet he cries out in the midst of his suffering as he receives the punishment of God and then he says that word many of us know the
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Greek of this has been talked about many times in many sermons the word to tell us die which is the
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Greek word it is a transactional word which means it is finished more rightly put it means paid in full so when he says it is finished and he hangs his head and the
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Bible says that Jesus said before this no man taketh my life from me but I lay it down on my own accord what does it say he he did what no man ever did before after he gave up his ghost as the
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King James says he didn't he did not die at their hands what it were at his will he could still be hanging there
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I don't know I don't think it would be his will but the point is Jesus gave up the ghost and in that moment gave himself as the propitiatory substitute for all who would ever believe in him and beloved what happened in the temple what happened in the temple when that moment came the veil by the way the veil which according to tradition was as thick as a man's hand you think of a piece of cloth usually not being very thick but the veil of the temple which was not one that would be subject to the rending of a man who came in and aggressively pulled at it any more than you or I could rip apart a leather jacket for the strength of the material would be too much for our hands it says that that veil which if you remember separated the holy place from the sanctum sanctorum or the
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Holy of Holies and the Holy of Holies which was only allowed to be entered into once per year only allowed to be entered into by the high priest who when he entered into it had to himself perform sacrifices on his own behalf cleanse himself before he could even go into that space within the temple that place within the temple was then opened and the
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Bible says the curtain the veil was torn from top to bottom again indicating it was not done by the hands of a man because men would not be able to reach up that high and would not have the strength to tear the veil but this is why
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I contend that this is the inauguration of the new covenant because while the new covenant was not
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I'm sorry the inauguration was not accompanied by the type of fanfare that inauguration of a president or the inauguration of some other public figure may be today they didn't have a chorus of brass instruments and they didn't have dignitaries and they didn't have all these things what they did have is they had the
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God of the universe who was indicating what had just happened by his own entrance into this moment and tearing the veil apart as if he were saying the old is over the old is done this has now reached its point of completion in the text in 2nd
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Corinthians it uses the word fading away speaking of the glory of the Old Covenant that is really not a good translation because it's not as if the glory and it's speaking about the glory on Moses's face but Paul's obviously applying it to the glory of the
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Old Testament which would come to an end the glory of the Old Covenant which would come to the end and what it's saying there is not that it faded over time but that it came to an end there was an ending point there was a point at which it stopped and gave way to the new and what point did it stop and give way to the new when
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Jesus Christ died that veil was torn and so we see again in Luke when he says poured out for you it went talking about the cup this cup is poured out for you the new covenant in my blood so here we have visual if this is helpful from the
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Old Covenant to the new we have the Old Covenant under which
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Jesus was in his earthly life you realize Jesus lived under the
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Old Covenant right Jesus fulfilled the whole Old Covenant in Matthew chapter 5 he says
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I've not come to abolish the law but to fulfill the law and he fulfilled every single law that was required again flummoxed how that could be but he did it and in his 33 years of life he and I know
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I know you probably got confused this thing because it says 80 30 Jesus was not born on year one or year zero he was probably born a few years before but Jesus when he was born he spent his life that's the green the life of Christ is lived under the
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Old Covenant and as he's living under the Old Covenant he's fulfilling every law that is required so that when he dies on the cross he does not die for his sins but he dies for our sins the cross comes and we might could argue and maybe you may come to me later and want to make this argument understand
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I'm not intentionally leaving this out you may argue that the New Covenant is is inaugurated in the death barrel and resurrection of Christ so it would have been over three days
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I'm not going to argue with you if you want us if you want to include that certainly Paul includes that as the gospel but it is the blood that he says in Luke 22 is the
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New Covenant it's the New Covenant in my blood so that's where I make and the tearing of the veil and all of the other things this is how
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I'm reaching my conclusion that this is the inauguration of the New Covenant because it is on that cross where Jesus died that the wrath of God was satisfied right on every our every sin on him was laid and Paul says he has taken our judgment our legal writ of just judgment and he has nailed it to what the cross so Christ in the cross is the fulfillment of the
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Old Covenant and he is the inauguration of the New Covenant and the
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New Covenant is inaugurated however one says well what happens to the old at this point well beloved the
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Old Covenant ends it's over the
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Old Covenant is done that's why I have a little stop sign the
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Old Covenant ends when is it in it ends at the cross but that doesn't mean people didn't keep trying to maintain it and what happened over the next generation people kept coming to the temple people kept offering sacrifices people kept doing the things that the law required people kept administrating the
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Old Covenant and they did that for 40 years but Jesus made a prophecy when
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Jesus was prophesying what often is referred to as in time prophecies by the way brother
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Andy mentioned already our conference this year is on in times y 'all did it y 'all asked for it a lot of people want to know about in time stuff they want to know what we teach well now you're gonna know if you haven't already known but one of the things we do believe is we believe not everything
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Jesus mentioned when he prophesied was about our future some of the things
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Jesus prophesied are now in our past that's where the word preterism comes from when
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Andy said it this morning if that word was maybe new to you or confusing to you the word preterism means to come before and it is the idea that there were prophecies that Jesus made that were in their future but are now in our past and one of the prophecies that Jesus made was this generation will not pass away until these things are complete now
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I tell you what every dispensationalist in the world tries to twist that up down left right to make that something in the future to make that something about well the generation means
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Christians nowhere else in the Bible can you make that argument they say well that generation refers to every generation of believers can't find that argument either
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Jesus is specifically giving a time frame and his time frame is from now this generation from this point this generation will not pass away until these things have taken place and what's he talking about the destruction of the temple beloved this is one of the greatest fulfilled prophecies if you read it right because this is one of the times where Jesus said something was going to happen and boy howdy did it not happen in spades it happened in the most powerful way possible as Titus rolls into Jerusalem destroys everything melting even the very gold out of the walls themselves because that's the marking 8070 right there 8070 is the fall of Jerusalem and I want to say this that's not the inauguration of the new covenant but that is the final death nail in the old you see see the old ends when
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Christ comes the old ends when the when that veil is rent the old's no longer relevant in the economy of God but it will limp along for a generation it will limp along until God says you've come this far and no more and that's what happened the old covenant limped along for 40 years in fact
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I want to show you something if you'll just very quickly turn over to Hebrews chapter 8
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I want to show you something Hebrews 8 and Hebrews 8
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Paul says and I hear Bible pages turning go to verse 6 and then we're gonna look at verse 13 we're not going to read in between because in between it's simply a quotation of Jeremiah 31 and we read that last week but in fact it is the longest
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Old Testament quotation in the New Testament is the quotation of the new covenant from Jeremiah but notice what he says in verse 6
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Hebrews 8 verse 6 he says but as it is Christ has obtained a ministry that is much more excellent than the old as the covenant he mediates is better since it's enacted on better promises don't forget it now as I said all the time
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I know it's a little funny but it's true it's the Papa John's covenant better priesthood better sacrifices new covenant it's the best it's much better and that's what it says it says that Christ has obtained a ministry that is a much more excellent is much more excellent than the
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Old Covenant because this covenant is better but then look at verse 13 and speaking of a new covenant he makes the first one obsolete and what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away you know why that's written that way because this is written before 80 70 it's ready to vanish away when's it going to vanish away when
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Titus rolls in and it finally receives the death now
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I remember one time many many years ago I was teaching at set free and there was a man there who had been convinced by the
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Hebrew roots movement that we should continue to hold to the Old Covenant law and continue to hold to the
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Old Covenant ceremonies and he and I were talking after class because he wanted to chastise me for saying that the
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New Covenant had made the Old Covenant obsolete and I took him to this passage I said see right here it says the
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New Covenant makes the Old Covenant obsolete and he says oh no he says see right here it says it's becoming obsolete and it's ready to vanish away but it hasn't vanished away yet I said you've got to be kidding me you're really that bad of a
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Bible student I wasn't trying to be ugly but I weren't trying to be nice neither I said what you're telling me is you don't understand that this was written before you were born in fact this was written 2 ,000 years before you were born and you're placing this in your time in your context and that ain't the way you read the
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Bible you need to read this in the context of the people who would have read it the people who would have read this would have seen every day people still going to the temple they would have seen every year this sacrifice that was going on they would have seen all of these things that were continuing even after Christ had ascended and they were watching it and they were saying why is this continuing and the writer of Hebrew says listen man that's the key standard version this we said listen guys it's obsolete and it's ready to pass away and it will it's passing away beloved it did in 8070 the book was closed on the
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Old Covenant and the New Covenant has come and that should not make us sad that should make us rejoice because here's the blessing the
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New Covenant is better the New Covenant is a greater covenant the New Covenant is a better covenant
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Paul is describing for us in 2nd Corinthians and again we're gonna look at this more next week he's describing for us how much better it is it's no longer this ministry of death that gives you a law that shows you that you're condemned but rather now it's a ministry of life that points you to Christ and through whom you may live it's better in every possible way and it has come and it came in the blood of Christ so we're gonna draw to a close but I still only got to the first two
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I gave a little bit of part three but I do want to next week as we continue to look at what says in 2nd
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Corinthians I want to ask this question are you a member of the New Covenant some would say you're not because they would say this the
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New Covenant is made with Israel and Judah and you're not Israel and Judah therefore you're not a member of the New Covenant remember the
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Greek word for that baloney it's made with Israel and Judah but the
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New Covenant is the New Covenant in Christ's blood if you are in Christ you are made part of that New Covenant and we're gonna talk more about that next week but let me say this we're about to do the table we're about to have this time where we come around the table you heard today what it is this table points to the
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New Covenant this table points to the sacrifice that has been made it points to the forgiveness that has been given it points to what
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Christ did on the cross for you so I ask you this are you in Christ today are you in that New Covenant by faith in him you say yes
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I am well praise the Lord we invite you to come whether you're a member of this church or not it's not important what matters is if you're a member of the body of Christ by grace alone through faith alone you might say well
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I'm struggling with some sin in my life well the Bible does tell us that we should examine ourselves but how in what way should we examine ourselves examine ourselves for the need of repentance and then repent and come and receive that which has been given for you to remind you of the forgiveness that comes by knowing
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Christ the Bible says if we repent of our sin he is faithful and just to forgive us and cleanse us of all unrighteousness now you may not be a believer if you're not a believer this morning please don't participate in this table this table is for believers only and the
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Bible says when we eat this bread and drink this cup without knowing Christ we eat and drink damnation upon ourselves don't do that but know this
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Jesus himself said come unto me all you who are weak and heavy laden and I will give you rest what is keeping you from Christ today what thing in this world has fooled you into believing that it will satisfy you more than him what rest has this world promised that is a false rest that is outside of Christ come unto me the
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Lord says and you will find rest let's pray father
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I thank you for your word I thank you for your truth I pray now that as we come to this time around the table that you would in your mercy and grace remind us
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Lord of the blessing that we have in being members of this new covenant I pray
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O God that as members of this new covenant as having been made partakers of it through the
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Lord Jesus Christ we would be joyous that we would be thankful more than all