The Biblical Covenants

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Alright, well, for those of you who are new, or don't know me, my name is Keith.
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I'm the pastor of Sovereign Grace Church, which is down the road, and I teach systematic theology.
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That's my main focus.
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And we are between our classes.
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We have a 12-week course in systematic theology that I teach here, a 12-unit study that I give.
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But right now, I'm on a little break from that, because I said for a couple of weeks I'm going to do Bible basics.
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And I do this portion in between the systematic theology, because some of you guys are new, and even those who are not new, let me finish my sentence and I'll ask you a question.
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Those of you who are not new, some of you don't have a background in the Bible, didn't grow up in church, didn't go to Sunday school when you were kids.
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So things like books of the Bible, who wrote the books, those foundational things are important, and that's what I go through, and that's what we're going through right now.
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I don't know what theology is.
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Is that the study of theories? No, theology is the study of God.
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The study of God? Yeah, the word theology, that's a good question.
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Thank you for asking.
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The word theology comes from the word theos, which is the Greek word for God.
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Logos is the word for word or study.
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So theology is the study of God.
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Make sense? When I say I'm a systematic theologian, what that means is I take the study of God and put it into parts or a system to be able to understand the various things the Bible teaches.
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So I teach about God and His nature.
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I teach about Jesus and who He is and what He did.
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I teach about the Holy Spirit, who He is and what He does, and those things.
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That's systematic theology.
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I break it down into its parts and we look at what the Bible says about each part.
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Thank you.
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Yes, sir.
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Thank you for asking.
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Alright, but today we are going to, like I said, go back to the basics.
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Last week we talked about some of the basics of the Bible.
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We talked about the books of the Bible.
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How many books of the Bible are there? Sixty-six.
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Sixty-six.
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How many are in the Old Testament? Thirty-nine.
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Thirty-nine.
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How many in the New Testament? Three times nine is 27.
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There are 27 in the New Testament.
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That's just a good little way to remember.
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It's not a magic trick.
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It just so happens to work out that way.
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Thirty-nine books in the Old.
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Twenty-seven books in the New.
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The Old Testament was written between what time period? Aha.
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Good.
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Alright.
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So we say the Old Testament starts with Creation.
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We don't know when that was.
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Some people believe it was billions of years ago.
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Some people, like myself, believe it wasn't that long ago.
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Maybe about 10,000 years ago.
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But we don't know.
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So we just put an X here.
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We don't know how long ago it was.
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And from the Creation until...
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No.
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The Old Testament.
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The Old Testament is written from the Creation to Jesus.
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Right? So that would have been about...
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From the time of Abraham to the time of Jesus, we're looking at a 4,000 year...
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I'm sorry.
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Adam.
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Adam.
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Adam.
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From Adam to Jesus.
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To Jesus is about a 4,000 year time period.
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Okay? In between here, we have Adam, Noah, Abraham.
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We have Moses, David, Saul, Solomon.
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All those, right? They all fit into this line.
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After this, we have the New Testament.
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How long is the New Testament period? 4,000 years.
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Well, that's where we are now.
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What's about to take us to now is 2,000 years.
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That's right.
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So 2 plus 4 is basically 6,000 years.
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But how long was the New Testament period? When I say that, how long was the New Testament writing period? Less than 70.
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Less than 70 years.
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So we would have said 70 AD was the end of the New Testament written period.
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It began with the time of Jesus, death, burial, and resurrection, which would have been around 30.
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So between 30 AD and 70 AD is the writing period, a period of about 40 years.
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It was when your New Testament was written.
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So your Old Testament was written from the time of Moses.
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Moses was about here, about halfway point.
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So the Old Testament was written over a period of 2,000 years.
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The New Testament was written over a period of 40 years.
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That's why when you look at your Bible, the vast majority of it is Old Testament because that's a much longer period of time.
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That's much more information historically.
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The New Testament was written over about 40 years.
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Okay, so that's just the basic breakdown of when the Bible was written, how the Bible was written, and about who it was written.
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Is that helpful? Are we good so far? Am I going too fast? This is just an overview of last week.
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Well, today we're going to go into the narrative structure of the Bible.
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The narrative structure of the Bible.
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So let's say you go to a play.
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You guys ever go to a play? What happens when you go to a play? They give you a program, right? You look at the program.
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It tells you who the characters are, and then it tells you the acts of the play.
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Act 1, scene 1.
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You've got the starting point.
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Then you've got the plot.
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Act 2, scene 1.
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It tells you the story.
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And then you build up to the climax.
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And then you've got the aftermath or the post-log, the ending, right? So you've got a story of the text.
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Okay? And the Bible has that too.
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The Bible has what we call an overarching metanarrative.
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The word metanarrative is a big word.
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It simply means it's the big story.
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The big story of the Bible.
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And I gave you four words last week.
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I said the whole Bible can be broke down to four words.
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If you know what it is, you get 100 cool points.
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They're worth nothing.
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But I like them.
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What was the four words? Creation, redemption, restoration.
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Creation.
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Missed one.
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Fall.
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Redemption.
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Restoration.
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That's fine.
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That's why I want you to write your notes.
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That's good.
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The whole Bible can be broken down into four words.
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Creation, fall, redemption, restoration.
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And that's the whole history of man.
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We were created by God to be His image bearers.
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We were told to obey Him and to be obedient to His command.
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We fell from that by disobeying His command and therefore bringing sin, destruction, death, and depravity into the world.
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After the fall, God chooses not to leave us in a state of corruption, but rather He chooses to save us.
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He begins that through the process of choosing a line of people through which His Son would come.
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The line begins with a man named Abraham.
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Remember Abraham? And Abraham was given a promise by God.
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He says, Go from your country and from your kingdom and from your father's house to a land that I will show you.
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And I will make you a great nation.
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And I will bless you and I will bless those who bless you and I will curse those who curse you.
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And through you, all the nations of the world will be blessed.
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That statement, that last statement, is the most important.
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He said, Through you, all the nations of the world will be blessed.
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Later on in the book of Galatians, the Apostle Paul will interpret that statement.
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He will say, God preached the Gospel to Abraham by telling him, through him the whole earth will be blessed because it's through the seed of Abraham, through Jesus, that the whole earth will be blessed.
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So Abraham is the father of everybody who believes in Jesus.
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That's why we sing the song, Father Abraham.
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Father Abraham had many sons.
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And I am one of them and so are you.
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Why? Because we believe in Jesus.
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We become sons of Abraham through faith.
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So the story of the Bible and its big picture is creation, fall, restoration, I'm sorry, redemption, restoration.
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Now, just like a play, God has his scenes or acts within the play.
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And that's what we're going to talk about today because this story, this four part story can be further broken down into what we call a covenantal structure.
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Now you said five.
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What are you talking about? Five covenants.
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Five covenants.
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Okay, that's what I thought.
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I just wanted to make sure I didn't know if I was missing something.
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Alright, so you guys have done this before? No, sir.
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Okay, you have done it.
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Okay, alright.
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Like I said, I don't want to repeat too much.
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If you know it, we can move on.
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I don't know it.
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Okay, you don't know it.
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Alright, the covenantal structure of Scripture is really the subject of today.
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Like I said, this is all just bringing us to today.
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So let's talk before we go into it.
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What is a covenant? Anybody? Contract.
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Okay, we're going to talk about comparing it to a contract, but a contract is the closest thing that we have today to compare to a covenant.
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So yes, we see that word in the Bible a lot.
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The word covenant comes up a lot.
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It's not a word we use often today.
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Normally today, if you hear the word covenant, it's usually only in religious conversation.
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Or I've noticed it's starting to come up in some secular settings like the homeowners associations.
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Do you all know what a homeowners association is? A little bastion of socialism where everybody has to obey the little small group within the home association.
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And they have what they call home covenants where you enter into an agreement with everybody in the neighborhood that you're going to keep your grass cut, you're going to keep your yard clean, you're going to keep your house painted.
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And they call that a covenant community.
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Of oppression.
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Yeah, I agree.
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Oppressive covenant community sometimes.
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For sure.
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And throughout the Bible, we see these covenants.
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In the Old Testament, we saw Jonathan made a covenant with David.
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He said because he loved him like he was his own flesh.
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Loved him as his own soul.
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So he made a covenant with David.
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That's a relationship.
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We see in the Old Testament...
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Yes, but covenant is...
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It's a binding agreement and it establishes a relationship.
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That's the part that we really need to get.
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What a covenant does that's a little bit more intensive than a contract is that a covenant creates a relationship that should not be easily broken.
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And really, in a perfect world, would not ever be broken.
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The best example of a covenant...
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I'll get to you in a second.
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The best example of a covenant would be marriage.
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Marriage isn't supposed to be broken, right? You get married till death, do you part, right? So you're supposed to be married forever.
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That's the goal.
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What was you going to say, brother? Well, the oath is the statement that you make.
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The covenant is between the two parties.
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The covenant is about bringing two parties together.
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Right? And so it can include oaths.
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It can include vows.
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That's what a marriage is.
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I'll be performing a wedding Saturday and I'm going to look at the husband and I'm going to say, Do you, Hank...
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That's his name.
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Do you, Hank, take Regina to be your lawfully wedded wife to love her and to keep yourself only to her and do all things for her till death do you part? He's going to say yes.
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Or he's going to run.
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He's going to say, I do.
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And then I'm going to say the same thing to her because that's creating a relationship.
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Yes, sir.
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Yeah, I think that's fair.
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That's fair.
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And it's different.
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Here's how I say it differs from a contract.
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And again, a contract is a good example, but I think there is one big difference.
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Let's say you...
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I have a house that I own that we rent.
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Right? Let's say you come to rent my house and we have an agreement.
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I say, okay, you're going to rent my house for 12 months.
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I'm going to rent it to you for $1,000 a month.
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You're going to pay $1,000 a month.
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At the end of 12 months, the lease is over.
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You can either release or you can move out.
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But we're going to agree to one year.
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Now, let's say in six months your job takes you to New York City and you have to leave.
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Well, we'll have something in that agreement that is designed to allow you to get out of it.
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Maybe you pay $500 and you can break the agreement and there wouldn't be any moral issue with it.
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There wouldn't be any moral problem with you breaking the agreement.
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That is the distinction with a covenant.
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Covenants always have a moral component.
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You know, with a marriage, you can't just pay $500 and get out.
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Now, you kind of can with no-fault divorce, but there's still a moral problem, right, with marriage.
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If you break a marriage covenant, it's not just something you pay money and walk away.
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Especially if you've loved this person and they love you and now that relationship is broken.
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There's a lot of moral component to a covenant that isn't necessarily in a contract.
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And that's why I say a contract is the best example that we have today of a covenant, but it's still not exactly the same.
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Covenants are about relationships and bringing two people together, two parties together, sometimes two groups.
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There can be covenants between nations, right? Nations come together.
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But it's about the relationship.
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So, I would say this.
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A covenant is like a contract, just weightier.
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It's weightier than a contract.
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In fact, here's how covenants were made in the ancient world.
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You guys may know this.
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They would take animals and they would cut the animal in half.
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Like let's say you took a bull and you cut the bull in half and you would lay the bull's parts on one side and the other.
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And then both of you would walk through the middle.
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It would be all blood on the ground.
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It would be gross.
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But you would both walk through the middle of that bull.
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That was called cutting the covenant.
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In Hebrew, very specifically, to make a covenant was to cut the covenant.
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And the reason why you walked through the middle of that animal was to say symbolically, may it be done to me as has been done to this animal if I break this covenant.
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You're giving your life oath essentially.
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May it be done to me as has been done to this animal if I break this covenant.
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So you see the weightiness of it.
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You see the heaviness of it.
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And this is why covenants are important.
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Because they're serious.
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And God has chosen, according to Scripture, to enter into covenant relationships with His people.
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And so, you've heard people ask the question, do you have a personal relationship with Jesus? People ask that question all the time.
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I don't particularly like that language because not that it's wrong, but it's just not my favorite language to use.
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Do you have a covenant relationship with God? Are you in covenant with God? You see, the people who knew God in Scripture were in covenant with God.
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That's the difference.
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No man knows the Lord if he is not in covenant with the Lord.
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I'll give you a quote from Andrew Murray.
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He is a Scotsman, a Scots preacher.
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He said this.
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He said, one of the words of Scripture which is almost out of fashion is the word covenant.
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There was a time when it was the keynote of the theology and Christian life of strong and holy men.
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We know how deep in Scotland it entered into the national life and thought.
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It made mighty men to whom God and His promise and power were wonderfully real.
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It will be found still to bring strength and purpose to those who will take the trouble to bring all their life under control of the inspiring assurance that they are living in covenant with a God who has sworn faithfully to fulfill in them every promise He has given.
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So what's he saying? What is Andrew Murray saying? He's saying what gives us strength in our Christian life is to know that we are in covenant with God because covenant entails promises.
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So we are living under the promises of God.
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Covenant is about living under God's promises.
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Abraham left Ur of the Chaldees and went to Canaan.
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Why? Because he had the promise of God.
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Moses led the people of Israel out of Egypt.
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Why? Because he had the promise of God.
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This is the way holy men live.
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They live by faith in the promise of God.
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And God has made His promise to us through covenant.
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So that leads us to the next question.
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What covenants do we find in the Bible? You mentioned five.
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We're going to talk about them.
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Open your Bible to Genesis 6.
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Open your Bible to Genesis 6.
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Genesis 6 verse 18.
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It says in verse 18, But I will establish My covenant with you, and you shall come into the ark, you, your sons, your wife, and your sons' wives with you.
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Alright, who is in view here? Noah.
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Right, he's talking about the ark.
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So this is the first time you may want to write this in your notes, this is the first time the word covenant is used in the Bible.
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The first time the word covenant is used in the Bible refers to Noah.
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And what does verse 18 say? I will establish My covenant with you.
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Right? Now, turn to chapter 9.
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And look at verse 9.
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It says, Behold, I establish My covenant with you, and your offspring after you.
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So what did chapter 6 say? I will establish My covenant.
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Now He's saying I establish My covenant.
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So He made a promise He was going to do it in chapter 6, and it was prior to the flood.
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The narrative of the flood goes from chapter 6 to chapter 9.
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It begins in chapter 6 with the call of Noah, and it ends in chapter 9 with Noah coming off the ark.
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It's two whole chapters.
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Chapter 7 and chapter 8 are all about Noah being on the boat.
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So, God promises before Noah gets on the ark, I'm going to establish My covenant with you.
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When He comes off the ark, He establishes the covenant with Noah.
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And what does the covenant include? Well, according to the text, it includes a specific promise about the preservation of the world.
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I will never again flood the world as I have in this judgment.
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Right? That's the promise, right? So we call the Noahic covenant, and by the way, that word Noahic, this is Noah when I see, call this the Noahic covenant.
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Also call it the covenant of preservation.
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Covenant of preservation.
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How does he feel that? We're getting there.
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This is the promise.
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The promise is preservation.
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And then He gives a sign of the promise.
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The sign of the promise is what? It's a rainbow.
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What's interesting about the rainbow is the word in Hebrew is not rainbow because there is no Hebrew word for rainbow.
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The word in Hebrew is the word for bow, and it's the word that we think of like an archer's bow.
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And the word what? That? Genesis 9 beginning at verse 9.
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And following talks about the covenant.
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But if you think about it like this, and I read this a few months ago and it really just struck me.
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The way that the rainbow is is it aims up.
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If you think of an archer's bow, it's like God who had just brought judgment on the world, and He did.
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He brought judgment through water.
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He destroyed all the people of the world except for eight people.
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And then He lays His bow down.
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He's brought His judgment.
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Now He's laying down the bow and He shows it.
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This is My promise.
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I'm not going to do that again.
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I'm not going to bring that level of judgment with water again.
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And so there's a promise of preservation and a picture of peace.
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The rainbow is a symbol of peace.
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God has laid down His bow.
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And the Noahic covenant establishes really the rest of our world because we now live in a world that's under the Noahic promise.
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We live in a world that we don't have to worry that the earth is going to flood again.
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I know there's a lot of people who believe that climate change is going to flood the world.
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And I don't believe that.
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I'm not saying I don't believe that there are some things happening with the climate that are kind of strange, but I don't believe we're going to flood again.
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Now that doesn't mean that the shores might not be a little different in a few hundred years or whatever, but we're not ever going to be completely underwater again because God made the promise.
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And I live by what? I live by the promise of God.
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So that promise is universal and forever.
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If you read through that covenant, God says, I make this promise with all your offspring.
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Guess what? Everybody's offspring of Noah.
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You are all Noahites.
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Whether you're white or black or brown, you're all sons and daughters.
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Well, sons because there ain't no women in here.
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You're all sons of Noah.
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You're either a Shemite, which that's where we get the Semitic people, you know, like the Jews and the Arabs.
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They're Semites.
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Or you're a Hamite, or you're a Japhethite.
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Typically the Japhethites are the northern hemisphere, specifically western, northwestern hemisphere.
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So typically European would be Japhethites.
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And the Hamites were the African Egyptian Ethiopian.
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Because if you read Genesis 10, it tells you where the descendants of each of the men went.
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And the descendants of Ham went into Egypt and Ethiopia and Cush and those places.
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The descendants of Shem went into the Arabian Peninsula.
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And the descendants of Japheth went north into Europe and Greece and those places.
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So this is, you know, we can kind of, we can bring our, but we can all bring ourselves back to one family.
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You know, we are distant cousins, brother, for however long it's been, but we're distant cousins.
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We're all sons and daughters of Noah.
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And so when Noah was given this promise, it says to you and all your descendants.
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Well, that's all of us.
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So we're all brought into this relationship of preservation with God that we can all claim this promise.
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God's not going to drown the world again.
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Okay? So that's the first recorded covenant.
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Now, we could and we will discuss that there were covenants before this, but there's no use of the word covenant before this.
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We could talk about Adam being in covenant with God and we could even talk about God being in covenant with Himself.
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There's a covenant called the covenant of redemption where there's belief that God entered into a covenant, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit to create the world and do the things that He was going to do before the world was created.
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So that's called the covenant of redemption.
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We believe that if that happened, it happened before time began.
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But it's not mentioned in Scripture, so that's what we would call an inferred covenant.
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It's not an explicit covenant.
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It's just a covenant of inference.
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If it's there, it doesn't say it.
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But certainly, God had a plan when He created the world.
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The Bible said Jesus was the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.
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He had a plan going in.
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And so we could say if you want to call that plan a covenant, then we call it the covenant of redemption.
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So before Noah, we could talk about Adam.
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And even before Adam, we could talk about the Trinity.
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But the first named covenant in Scripture is the covenant with Noah.
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The next named covenant is with who? Abraham.
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Abraham is the son of Shem.
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Actually, he's not the son.
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He's several generations down.
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But he's the descendant of Shem who is the son of Noah.
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Right? This is why Jewish people call themselves Semites.
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Because they're descended from Shem.
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Shemites, Semites.
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That's where the term comes from.
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You've heard the term anti-Semite? A person who's anti-Jewish.
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That's where the term comes from.
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So Abraham gets a promise.
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What is the promise? That he's the father of many nations.
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The father of many nations.
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God took him out and showed him all the sand and the sea.
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And he says...
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I'm sorry, all the stars and the skies.
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It says, so shall your offspring be.
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Right? You're like the stars of the heavens.
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So shall your offspring be.
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Right? He also receives a promise of land.
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Go from your father's house to the country that I will show you.
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And I will give you the land.
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I will make you a great nation.
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But specifically, his promise is a seed.
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It's a nation.
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But we'll just say the promise is a seed.
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Alright? And what's the sign of the promise? Given to...
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Not quite.
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Close.
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Has to do with that.
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The wife and heir.
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The promise of the son? Circumcision.
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Circumcision.
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That's right.
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The promise is circumcision.
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I always have a hard time.
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Circum...
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Sign.
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Is the sign circumcision? Yeah, that's the sign.
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That's the sign God gives to Abraham.
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Is circumcision.
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You will circumcise all of your children.
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All your males.
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Obviously, you can't circumcise a girl.
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So you will circumcise all your children.
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Now, circumcision is kind of strange.
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I mean, for lack of a better way to describe it.
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It's an odd ritual.
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And it actually existed before Abraham.
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Circumcision was found in ancient Egypt and other places.
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So there is actually history that would say circumcision didn't begin with Abraham, but God uses this picture and says this is going to be...
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I mean, bread and wine existed before Jesus, but Jesus took it and made it the sign of His covenant.
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So the fact that it pre-existed Abraham is not a big deal.
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It's just God uses this thing and He does it a very specific way.
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What was different...
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Here's the big difference.
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Before Abraham, circumcision was only done to royalty.
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But when Abraham came, all of his descendants would be circumcised.
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Why? Because they're all royal priesthood.
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They're all part of God's family.
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And so by this covenant, you're coming into the family.
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So you can see the connection there.
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So circumcision is the sign of the promise that you are part of that covenant family.
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Abraham's family is the covenant family.
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Alright, so now, there are other covenants that come in.
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God reestablishes this covenant with Abraham's sons, Isaac and Jacob, but it's the same covenant.
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He just reestablishes it with them.
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The next major covenant on God's timeline comes with another figure.
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And who is it? David and Elijah.
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Not quite David, not yet.
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Who's the other one? Elijah? No, not that.
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Moses.
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Moses.
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That's right.
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We call it the Mosaic Covenant.
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The Mosaic Covenant is somewhat different than the previous covenants.
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Because if you look at the covenant with Noah, it was about a promise.
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Not going to destroy the world again.
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You look at the Abrahamic Covenant.
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It was about a promise.
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I'm going to give you the land.
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I'm going to give you descendants.
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I'm going to give you a nation.
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But Moses' covenant was the covenant of law.
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Covenant of law.
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Well, it wasn't Moses.
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It was God.
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What does the New Testament say? The law came through Moses.
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Grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
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So in Moses, we have the covenant of law.
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And what is the sign of the covenant of law? Anybody know? This is a good question.
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I would say this.
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There are a lot of people in churches today that do not know the answer to this question.
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Sin is not the sign.
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The Ten Commandments are actually the covenant.
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In fact, if you want to write this...
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Let's look at it.
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Go to Exodus 34.
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Go to Exodus 34.
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The Ten Commandments are the covenant, but they're not the sign.
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We'll get to the sign in a minute.
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But let's go to Exodus 34.
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Hold on.
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We'll get there.
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Let's look at what it says first.
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Exodus 34, verse 27.
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It's 27 and 28 actually.
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And the Lord said to Moses, write these words, for in accordance with these words I have made a covenant with you and with Israel.
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So he was there with the Lord 40 days and 40 nights.
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He neither ate bread nor drank water.
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And he wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments.
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So the Ten Commandments are the covenant.
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That's the words of the covenant.
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Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
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Thou shalt not make thyself any graven image.
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Thou shalt not use the Lord's name in vain.
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Thou shalt remember the Sabbath.
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Thou shalt honor your father and mother.
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Thou shalt not kill.
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Thou shalt not steal.
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Thou shalt not commit adultery.
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Thou shalt not lie.
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And thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's house and wife and animals.
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Anything, right? So we have the Ten Commandments, which become...
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That's the law.
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Everything else in the law is based on those Ten Commandments.
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And the sign is the Sabbath.
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The Sabbath.
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Go to chapter 31.
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Go back to 31.
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And look at verse 12.
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And the Lord said to Moses, you are to speak to the people of Israel and say, above all, you shall keep My Sabbaths, for this is a sign between Me and you throughout your generations that you may know that I, the Lord, sanctify you.
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How do the people know that God has sanctified them? Because every week, once a week, they stop everything that they are doing as far as work is concerned, and they focus on the Lord for a day.
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That becomes the sign of the distinction between them and the rest of the world.
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Yes, sir? Do you believe the Sabbath is on Saturday? The Sabbath was on Saturday.
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But the New Covenant, the Sabbath is fulfilled in Christ.
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Therefore, we worship on the Lord's Day, which is Sunday.
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Sunday worship is not the Sabbath.
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Sunday worship is the Lord's Day, the day the Lord was resurrected.
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And the New Testament church sees Christ as the fulfillment of the Sabbath because in Him we have our rest.
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And what is Sabbath? It's our rest.
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So in Christ we rest, and we worship Him on the day He resurrected.
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So that's why in the book of Revelation, chapter 1, it says, John was in the Spirit on the Lord's Day.
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The Lord's Day was Sunday.
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Yes, sir? What about Tuesday? I don't remember.
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Oh, well, midweek services, from a historical perspective, I love to teach church history, so this is interesting.
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The reason why midweek services became so popular, especially in the United States, is because of the Industrial Revolution.
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When the Industrial Revolution happened and factories began to run seven days a week, people couldn't go to church on Sunday because they were working.
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And so churches began to have evening services during the week for people who couldn't come on Sunday.
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And so midweek services were actually a byproduct of change in culture and the way people worked.
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Not necessarily a good thing, but it is a thing.
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It is what it is.
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And we worship, like our church, we worship Sunday morning, and we worship Wednesday night.
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Some churches worship Tuesday, some worship Wednesday, some worship Thursday.
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It is just the middle of the week.
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We do Wednesday, but you all do Tuesday.
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And the reason why I think Brother Mark does Tuesday is because he likes to visit churches on Wednesday that he goes and shares about set free and stuff.
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Most churches meet on Wednesday.
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You all meet on Tuesday to give him the Wednesday nights to go do what he has to do.
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At least I think that is how it started.
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I believe he told me that, but I could be a little wrong on that.
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But yeah, some churches meet Tuesday, some meet Thursday.
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It is a six in one, half dozen in the other.
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It is just the middle of the week.
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There is nothing sanctified about Wednesday, specifically.
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In fact, all of the names of our days are based on pagan mythology.
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You all may not know that.
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Saturday is named after Saturn.
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Monday is named after the moon god.
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Tuesday and Wednesday are based on Nordic mythology.
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Thursday is based on Thor.
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Wednesday is Woden day.
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Wednesday is based on Odin.
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The names of our days are pagan in origin as far as the way we name them in English.
36:59
But English is a hodgepodge, right? Think about English.
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It is the craziest language in the world.
37:08
Because it comes from so many different...
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Why is it that this and this make the same sound? Why does that make the same sound as that? They do.
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F-f-f-f.
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F-f-f-phone.
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F-f-f-foot.
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Right? Same sound.
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It is because words that have a PH come from the Greek language.
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Because Greek did not have an F.
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Greek had a letter called Phi.
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And the Phi looks like this.
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And that was the Phi letter.
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And that Phi, when translated into English, transliterated over not to an F, but to a PH.
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So anytime you see a word with a PH that makes a f-f-f sound, you can know that the etymology of that particular word is Greek.
38:00
So, yeah.
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That is why our language is what it is.
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It is a hodgepodge of other languages.
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I forget where F comes from.
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Maybe Latin.
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Actually, no.
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I forget.
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I have to look.
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But I know the PH comes from Greek because I teach Greek.
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So I tell people, when you see a word, when you see any word that has a PH in it that makes an F sound, it has a Greek origin.
38:29
How old are you, Foskey? Forty-one.
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Oh, I thought you were thirty-four.
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No, why? I don't know.
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He wants something.
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I just turned forty-one a couple weeks ago.
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I'm past the halfway point.
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If I live to eighty.
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I don't know if I'll do that.
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Do you actually know the Greek language? Not perfectly.
38:53
I study it as part of my studying for the Bible.
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The New Testament was written in Koine, which is the common Greek language.
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So I study it, and I have taught basic Greek vocabulary in our seminary class.
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Yeah, you took the class, didn't you? It was fun.
39:11
Just going through it.
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I remember a while back when you passed them out.
39:15
Yeah, and like for me, language is fun for me.
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I like to figure out better ways to say things.
39:24
There's a movie with Robin Williams that came out years and years ago where he was explaining you should never use the word very.
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It says very is a lazy word.
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You're not very tired.
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You're exhausted.
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You're not very happy.
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You're elated.
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You know, very is a lazy word.
39:42
So if you can eliminate using the word very, you'll increase your vocabulary right away.
39:47
Because you'll find better ways to say what you're...
39:49
Especially the song you showed us on the Internet.
39:52
Which one? Oh, yeah, yeah.
39:56
Alphabetic, Amadeth, etc.
39:58
Alright, let's give...
39:59
Yes, sir.
40:00
Like you should replace the word may with will.
40:05
Yeah, depending on the context, right? Yeah, absolutely.
40:09
Alright, so we have the Noahic Covenant.
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We have the Abrahamic Covenant.
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We have the Mosaic Covenant.
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And then we have the Davidic Covenant or the Covenant with David.
40:20
Somebody mentioned David earlier.
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David's Covenant is in 2 Samuel 7.
40:29
Comes through the prophet Nathan.
40:32
So if you want to turn in your Bibles, just look at a few verses.
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2 Samuel 7.
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And verse 12.
40:57
Let's see.
40:58
Yeah, we're going to read verses 12 to 16.
41:02
This is Nathan speaking to David.
41:05
When your days are fulfilled...
41:07
This is 2 Samuel 7.
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When your days are fulfilled and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring after you who shall come from your body and I will establish His kingdom.
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He shall build a house for My name and I will establish the throne of His kingdom forever.
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That's talking about Solomon, the son of David.
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I'll raise up your offspring and he will make a house.
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Solomon built the temple, remember? Before that, the tabernacle was a tent.
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He's going to build a house at the temple.
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I will be to him a father and he shall be to me a son.
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That is a covenant relationship.
41:44
Right? Remember when Ruth was going with Naomi? She said, your God will be my God and your people will be my people and my people will be...
41:53
That's a covenant relationship.
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That's language of relationship.
41:57
And he goes on.
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When he commits iniquity, I will discipline him with the rod of men, with the stripes of the sons of men, but my steadfast love will not depart from him as I took it from Saul, whom I put away before you.
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That, again, if you go to Hebrews 12, what does the Bible say in Hebrews 12? God disciplines those who are his.
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Right? He's saying, your son will be mine and when he does wrong, I'm going to discipline him, but I will not stop loving him.
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Alright? This is a promise.
42:25
And your house...
42:27
This is the real important part.
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And your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me.
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Your throne shall be established forever.
42:39
So the kingdom is the promise.
42:46
That is the promise.
42:50
That's right.
42:51
The forever kingdom is the promise given to David.
42:54
And what is the sign? Here's the trick to this one.
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It doesn't really have a sign, but I like to think I know what it is and I could be wrong.
43:05
The throne.
43:06
The throne.
43:07
Because what is Jesus, the Son of David? He sits on the throne of David.
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Right? So, the throne, I believe, is the Son.
43:17
Even though I readily admit the text doesn't say that.
43:20
That's just an inference that I'm drawing based on what we learn later about Jesus who sits on the throne of David.
43:26
Right? So, these are the four covenants that are specifically mentioned in the Old Testament.
43:34
Right? But, as I said before, we could say there is a fifth with Adam.
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And if we go back to Adam, what would we say was the relationship God entered into with Adam? He created Adam.
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He says, here's the world.
43:53
You're going to be My image bearer.
43:54
And you have one command.
43:56
And what's the command? Do not eat of the tree, for on the day that you eat of it, dying you shall die.
44:02
Right? So, there's a command with a punishment.
44:06
Right? And so, with Adam, Adam is given a specific blessing, but also a specific prohibition.
44:15
The prohibition is the eating of the fruit which brings death.
44:21
And He brings death to everyone.
44:24
Not just Himself, but Adam's sin brings death to everyone.
44:29
He brings death to all his posterity.
44:31
So, through Adam, and whether we want to call it a covenant or not, because the Bible doesn't say the word covenant, but it does speak of relationship.
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By Adam's breaking of the relationship, He brings death.
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First of all, no, He did not.
44:54
Adam chose to sin.
44:55
Now, God's plan included that.
44:58
But the Bible says, God tempteth no man, neither is God the author of sin.
45:04
So, we have to be very careful saying what you just said.
45:07
Now, is God sovereign over every action? Yes, He is.
45:10
But He is never the chargeable author of sin.
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Be very careful.
45:19
Adam had no compulsory compunction to do what he did.
45:23
He chose to do what he did.
45:25
Was it under the sovereign hand of God? Not yet.
45:27
But we cannot charge God with sin.
45:29
We must not charge God with sin.
45:31
For in doing so, we would bring ourselves into a very dangerous situation in Scripture.
45:37
I'm not getting on to you.
45:38
I'm just saying, be careful how you word what you said.
45:44
Who did? In the Bible it says, who did? Eve! I thought you said He, talking about God.
45:51
I'm sorry.
45:52
I thought you were talking about God.
45:53
I heard you wrong.
45:54
That's my mistake.
45:55
I didn't mean to get on to you.
45:56
Yeah, no.
45:57
Eve was tempted by Satan.
46:02
Satan was tempted, or Adam was tempted by Eve.
46:05
But here's the thing.
46:06
God doesn't let him get away with that.
46:09
Because Adam tried that, right? When God comes to Adam in the garden, and what does He say? The woman whom thou hast given me, who did He point His finger at? God.
46:20
He said, the woman whom thou hast given me, she gave me the fruit and I ate.
46:25
Well, God judges the serpent.
46:27
He judges the woman, but He also judges Adam.
46:31
You don't get off just by blaming the person who you sinned with.
46:35
It don't work that way.
46:37
Adam is responsible for his sin, and through his sin, because he was the representative of all mankind.
46:44
We call this federal headship.
46:45
Adam was the federal head or the representative of all mankind.
46:48
In his sin, he brought death to all men.
46:50
And that's in Romans 12.
46:52
Through one man, sin entered the world.
46:55
And death through sin, and death spread to all men because all sinned.
47:02
So Adam brings death.
47:05
So if we want to call that the Adamic covenant, some people call that the creation covenant, right? But again, the word covenant is not used.
47:14
But we certainly have relationship established, and we certainly have a breach of a prohibition.
47:23
Adam was given a prohibition.
47:26
So the final covenant in Scripture, and this will draw us to a conclusion, is what we call the new covenant.
47:36
And the new covenant is Christ.
47:42
Christ who brings what? Life.
47:46
Life.
47:51
The old covenant, if we start with Adam, Adam fails and brings death.
48:01
And the promise is life.
48:03
And all of these covenants point to this one.
48:09
Why does God preserve the family of Noah? To present His Son a bride.
48:16
Why does God give Abram the promise of a seed? Paul tells us the seed is Jesus.
48:24
Why does God give the law? Because the law according to Galatians is the tutor which points us to Christ.
48:33
And God establishes the throne of David because the Son of God will sit upon that throne.
48:41
Everything points to Jesus and the new covenant.
48:45
What Adam lost, God regains through Jesus through a progressive covenantal structure starting with Noah, through Abraham, through Moses, through David, to Jesus.
49:06
That's the overview of the whole Bible in five covenants.
49:11
Make sense? Let's pray.
49:15
Father, I thank You for Your Word and for Your truth.
49:18
I pray, Lord, that You would give us strength to not only understand the truths of Your Word but apply them to our lives.
49:25
In Jesus' name, Amen.