Here is your answer. I could have retyped it, but as I agree with Brother Worthen I will just post it.
HEB 8:10 "This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after that time, declares the Lord. I will put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people."
This is what God always had in mind. He was never looking for people who are robots or who simply program themselves to follow a set of rules and regulations with the intent of earning favor with God. No the law was given to show us how short we fall from God's perfection. But there is a new law at work in the lives of people because it's a new life which only Christ can give.
This is precisely what Christ spoke of when He had the supper with His disciples in that upper room. He was proclaiming that the new covenant was upon them and they would no longer need to be limited to just shadows and copies. They now had the reality in their presence as each believer from this time forth would have.
1CO 11:23 "For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you: The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread,
24 and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, "This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me."
25 In the same way, after supper he took the cup, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me."
26 For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes."
This should have been the greatest celebration in all of Israel. The New covenant was soon to be inaugurated. But it could only come about as the Old covenant had foreshadowed it. A sacrifice must take place; a perfect lamb must be slain. The High Priest must bring this sacrifice into the tabernacle in God's very presence.
This is exactly what Jesus did as our High Priest and sacrifice at the same time. This new covenant would bring about a new life. A life where God would change the heart. "I will put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people."
The prophet Ezekial had the same message given to him by God in EZE 11:19 "I will give them an undivided heart and put a new spirit in them; I will remove from them their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh.
20 Then they will follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. They will be my people, and I will be their God."
This new life in Christ is just that. God has given you and me, in Christ, an undivided heart. A heart which is one with Him. That heart of stone which was unable to be molded is now a heart of flesh which has a heartbeat which beats after God.
He molds and shapes us in a way where His desires become ours. His truth is placed there and we walk after Him, not under compulsion or fear of following a particular law, but out of love which follows Him and pleases Him because He is our God and Father and we belong to Him.
This is what we see in HEB 8:11 "No longer will a man teach his neighbor, or a man his brother, saying, 'Know the Lord,' because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest."
It won't be a matter of finding the perfect instruction as to how you can earn favor with God through a set of rules. No, God says, 'all men everywhere will now be able to know Me personally, not simply know about Me. And that will come as I give them life through the death and resurrection of My Son according to that same law which could not bring life in and of itself.'
HEB 8:12 "For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more." (Jer. 31:31 -34)
13 By calling this covenant "new," he has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and aging will soon disappear."
You and I have a great promise given to us. God says to you and me, "I will forgive your wickedness and will remember your sins no more." Actually a better translation would be "For I will be merciful to their iniquities." Mercy is what characterizes God's grace to you and me. Even in the Old Covenant mercy was at the heart of God's message.
It is God's mercy we fall upon because in His mercy we have forgiveness and our sins are remembered no more. Christ has fully paid the price. And because the penalty has been paid in full there is no more condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. That's what he means by "I will remember their sins no more."
It's not as though God has a lapse in memory. It's not as though God doesn't see our sin. If that were the case He would not be able to discipline those whom He loves. It would not be possible to grieve the Spirit if the Spirit of God were unable to know our sin.
But the promise is that our sin will not be put to our account. He no longer sees our unrighteousness as the basis for our fellowship with Himself, He sees His Son's perfect righteousness given to us as we receive Him by faith.
The promise is given to assure us that nothing will separate us from the love of Christ. David knew of this love because he saw the promises from afar and embraced them by faith as did Abraham who believed God and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.
David could say with confidence in PSA 103:11 "For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him;
12 as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us."
For the Christian Jew it was vital to understand this so as not to be tempted to go back to the old ways. HEB 8:13 "By calling this covenant "new," he has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and aging will soon disappear."
We have new life in the new covenant which Jesus Himself gave us through His life, death and resurrection. The first covenant is made obsolete by the new one. It's obsolete and as far as the Jew was concerned in the first century it would soon disappear. This letter was written before the destruction of the temple. Though it was obsolete the remnant of the old remained. It would soon disappear taking away any hope which could be placed in it.
God destroyed the old to give us the new. This is what Paul meant in ROM 7:6 "But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code."
2CO 3:6 "He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant - not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.
2CO 5:17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!" |
