Jesus, the Disciples and the Church: Jesus: Part 3

A major part of God's plan of redemption for man and Jesus being sent from heaven to earth, is the establishment of the new covenant that God made with His people. To understand the new covenant, there is need to review and understand the old covenant. Though this is a highly controversial subject among Christians, what I have written below describing both the old and new covenants is what I am personally coming to understand and believe by reading the Scriptures, not by popular dispensational teachers. Anyone is welcome to disagree with me and believe what you want. But God's plan of salvation for anyone who believes in Jesus, and that God has only one special people, the church compromised of Jew and Gentile, seems crystal clear and evident to me wherever I read in the Bible. 

The Old Covenant

When the children of Israel were enslaved to Egypt, they cried out to God to save them. God raised up Moses, who came to Pharaoh King of Egypt with signs and wonders. Pharaoh eventually gave in to God and allowed the children of Israel to leave, only after suffering the personal loss of his own son by the hand of God. Not long afterwards though, God once again hardened Pharaoh's heart so that he would pursue the people he had released from Egypt's bondage. However, God protected the people He had led out of Egypt by miraculously parting the Red Sea so that the people could cross through it on dry ground. When Pharaoh and his army began to cross, God lifted His hand and the Red Sea went back, killing all the army of Pharaoh who had tried to cross the sea.

Prior to leaving Egypt, God commanded the Hebrews to plunder the Egyptians, so when they left they had gold, silver and clothing, as well as livestock. They also had unleavened cakes of dough that would be their food until it ran out, at which time God would provide. God had provided everything they needed to leave Egypt and survive in the wilderness. 

When they left Egypt, there were six hundred thousand men, plus children and probably women, as well as "a mixed multitude" who were not of Hebrew descent. Millions of people left Egypt that day, both Hebrew and non Hebrew. God led them and made a covenant with the entire group, calling them all "the children of Israel" and His "kingdom of priests and a holy nation", if they would indeed obey His voice and keep His covenant.

Now therefore, if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be a special treasure to Me above all people; for all the earth is Mine. And you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words which you shall speak to the children of Israel.” - Exodus 19:5‭-‬6 

This means that the special people of God's covenant, Israel, were compromised of a "mixed multitude" of people, not only Hebrews, and they were to be the special people who would compromise His Kingdom, as long as they obeyed Him and kept their covenant with Him. The covenant was not only with people of Hebrew descent, and it was conditional.

All throughout Israel's history recorded in the Bible, God calls them "a stiff necked people" because of their continuous disobedience to Him. God also said that Israel had "prostituted themselves", "played the harlot", and "fornicated" with the gods of other nations. Interestingly, Jesus gave one reason for divorce between a husband and wife: fornication.

Marriage is a binding vow between  husband and wife and God. According to Jesus, nothing can break that vow except unfaithfulness which occurs through fornication. Jesus said that divorce is allowable if one of the marriage partners has been unfaithful to the other by fornication. In Israel's case, God said that they had continuously committed fornication with other gods, thereby breaking their covenant with Him. Therefore, by His own standards, God divorced Israel and made a new covenant with a people who would be faithful to Him.

The New Covenant

God made the announcement of His new covenant through His prophet Jeremiah.

In about 627 BC, God called the prophet Jeremiah to deliver a message to the people of Israel because many had turned away from Him. He warned them that they were going to be conquered, taken into captivity, and Jerusalem was going to be destroyed unless they turned back to God. In about 589 BC, Jeremiah's prophecy of destruction for Israel was fulfilled. Israel was conquered by Babylon, the city of Jerusalem and the Jewish temple were destroyed, and the people were taken into captivity until 538 BC. 

Jeremiah also shared God's message of a new covenant that He would make with His peope since they broke the first one (Jeremiah 31:31-34). The new covenant would be the forgiveness of sins through belief in the sacrificial death and resurrection of Jesus. Because of the new covenant, the old is obsolete (Hebrews 8:13). 

“The days are coming,” declares the Lord,
“when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and with the people of Judah. It will not be like the covenant
I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt,
because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them, declares the Lord.
“This is the covenant I will make with the people of Israel after that time,” declares the Lord. “I will put my law in their minds
and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.
No longer will they teach their neighbor,
or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’
because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. “For I will forgive their wickedness
and will remember their sins no more.” -  Jeremiah 31:31-34

The writer of Hebrews quoted Jeremiah and said that there was fault with the old covenant, therefore a new one was made, making the first obsolete:

For if that first covenant had been faultless, then no place would have been sought for a second. Because finding fault with them, He says: “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah— not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they did not continue in My covenant, and I disregarded them, says the Lord. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws in their mind and write them on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. None of them shall teach his neighbor, and none his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them. For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more.” In that He says, “A new covenant,” He has made the first obsolete. Now what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.

Hebrews 8:7‭-‬13

The apostle Peter wrote to "the elect pilgrims of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father...": 

But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; who once were not a people but are now the people of God, who had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy.

I Peter 2:9‭-‬10

The "elect pilgrims of the Dispersion" who Peter is writing to consisted of both Jews and Gentiles, and the way he describes them sounds very similar to the way God described Israel when He made His covenant with them. He said that if they obeyed His voice and kept His commands, they would be a "special treasure to Me above all people; for all the earth is Mine. And you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’"

But Peter said to the Christians who consisted of both Jews and Gentiles, "God had called them out of the darkness and into His marvelous light. You who once were not a people are now the people of God; a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people".

Who are those who were living in darkness who were called into light, and who were once not a people, but are now the people of God?

Though much of Israel were blind to God and especially Jesus, they were not living in darkness. They had the Torah and should have recognized Jesus as the Christ when He arrived. They were also the people of God.

Gentiles were living in darkness because they did not have God. God was the god of Israel, not of the Gentiles. However, under the new covenant, God would be the god of anyone who believes in Jesus, either Jew or Gentile, and they would be His people, a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation. They would comprise His Kingdom that He sent Jesus to establish under His new covenant.