#DailyDevotion Jesus, the LORD, Made A New Covenant With Us
Jeremiah 31:31–34 31“The time will come,” says the LORD, “when I will make a new covenant with Israel and Judah. 32It will not be like the covenant I made with their fathers when I took them by their hand to lead them out of Egypt — My covenant that they broke although I was their Husband,” says the LORD. 33“But this is the covenant I will make with Israel after those days,” says the LORD: “I will put My law within them and write it on their hearts, and so I will be their God, and they will be My people. 34And no more will anyone have to teach his neighbor or his brother, and say, Know the LORD,’ because they will all know Me, from the least to the greatest of them says the LORD, because I will forgive the wrong they did and not remember their sins anymore.”
We might note that Israel broke the covenant the LORD made with them immediately after he made it with him. You know, when Moses went up the mountain to fetch the Ten Words the LORD had already spoken to Israel and they made the golden calves and worshipped them. How many times did the LORD want to wipe the Israelites out before they even made it to the Promised Land as they broke his covenant. The whole history of Israel in the Old Testament is a witness against them breaking covenant against the LORD their God throughout the centuries of their existence. Not only was the LORD their God, but he was as a husband to them and they were his bride. They were to be having a relationship as a husband has with his bride. Israel though was never faithful to the LORD, YHWH, and worshipped and trusted other gods. They were an adulterous nation trusting non-deities as if they provided for all her needs.
So the LORD makes this promise to make a new covenant with Israel unlike the first. The first was written in stone. It was written to people whose hearts were as stone and who necks were stiff and stubborn. In this new covenant he will put his Torah (instruction) in them and write it on their hearts. He will be their God and they his people. They will know the LORD from the greatest to the least. Know here is in the marriage sense of knowing someone. They will be one with the LORD as a man and woman become one when they are married. They will know the LORD because he will forgive them their sins and remember them no more.
It is Jesus who is the LORD who makes this covenant, not just with Jacob’s descendents but with all the people in the world whom he will join to Israel through baptism and faith in his name. The sign and the performance of this covenant is Supper he instituted which makes us participants in the covenant as Jesus says, “This is the new covenant in my blood for the forgiveness of sins.” Here we know the LORD forgives us and remembers our sins no more. Here we participate in our oneness with him in his death and resurrection. Here Jesus the LORD tells us, I am your God and you are my people.” The blood of that covenant was applied to us in baptism. It is applied to us when the pastor speaks the words of absolution. Through these means of grace Jesus puts the Torah (the Holy Spirit) in us and makes our hearts of stone hearts of flesh. Here the Holy Spirit (Torah) is written on our hearts and made his temple to make us living souls who know, fear, love, and trust God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Heavenly Father, you promised a new covenant unlike the old and you fulfilled that promise in Jesus Christ, his death and resurrection. Put your Holy Spirit in us, in our hearts, so we may fear, love and trust in you above all things by your promised means of grace. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.