Tuesday, December 9, 2008

God Says 'I Will' In The New Covenant

Hebrews 8:10,12 10… "I will put My laws in their mind… I will be their God…" 12… "I will be merciful to their unrighteousness… their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more." 

You may be feeling stressed at work today because your boss just gave you a list of things to do. Maybe he told you, "You have to type this letter. You have to meet this client. You have to write this report. You have to…" Wouldn't it be nice if your boss had, instead, said, "I will type this letter for you. I will meet this client for you. I will write this report for you. I will…"? 

Well, your boss may not be that gracious, but your Father in heaven is! When He found fault with the old covenant and established the new covenant in His Son's blood (Hebrews 8:7–8), His "Thou shalls" became "I wills". 

You see, under the old covenant, the focus is on you - Thou shall not… Thou shall not… Thou shall not… It is about your performance, your obedience, your works.

But under the new covenant, God says, "I will put My laws in their mind… I will be their God… I will be merciful to their unrighteousness… their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more." It is no longer you working for God but God working for you, in you, through you! 

"Isn't there something for me to do?" you may ask. 

My friend, the only thing for you to do is to believe God's "I wills". The more you believe His "I wills" or promises, the more you will see His heart for you and the more your faith will grow. 

It is foolish for me to just tell you, "Come on, man, have faith!" You will still not have faith because I am not giving you anything to build faith in you. But if I were to tell you all about what God says He will do for you, faith will arise in your heart. Faith is a response to knowing what God says He will do for you. 

So the best thing you can "do" under the new covenant is to not focus on what you must do for God, but what God says He will do for you!

 

- TEACHING FROM PASTOR JOSEPH PRINCE (NCC) -

No comments:

Post a Comment