During this season of Lent, I have focused my Sunday messages on covenant. God creates covenants because He loves us. So what do God’s covenants have to do with Lent?
The covenantal story began when God created humans in his image to partner with him in spreading goodness throughout the world. The word “covenant” isn’t explicitly used in Genesis 1, but the details of the relationship are similar to later covenants in the text.
God invites Adam and Eve to be priests and represent his generous rule on Earth. They could enjoy and reproduce blessings of eternal life as long as they continued to trust and partner with him. But as God lays out the terms of their relationship, he warns them not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil because it would bring the curse of death on humanity.
And in their first test of covenant faithfulness, Adam and Eve failed. They ate from the tree, fracturing the human-divine relationship and plunging humanity into corruption and death. We’d still be stuck in the wreckage if God never intervened. But the rest of the Bible is all about how God is repairing this broken partnership with humans.
There’s no consensus on the exact number of covenants between God and humanity. However, there are five foundational covenants that God makes with Noah,
Abraham, Moses, and David, before establishing the new covenant through Jesus. After Adam and Eve’s exile from Eden, the biblical narrative appears grim. In Genesis 4-6. Evil rapidly advances, so that by the time we come to the story of Noah, sin has enveloped the whole world, sending it back into pre-creation chaos. In response, God sends a flood, making way for a restored creation that will begin with Noah and his family. God enters a formal relationship with Noah and all living creatures, promising that, despite humanity’s corruption, he will never again flood the earth. He will instead preserve the world as he works toward keeping his promise to rescue humanity and creation through the “offspring of the woman.”
After God makes a covenant with Noah, evil continues to ruin the world. Genesis 9-11 traces the downward spiral of humanity, and we’re left to wonder: How will God restore his good world? God’s rescue plan continues, and he calls Abraham into a covenantal relationship. This redemptive partnership between God and Abraham is developed progressively. He promises Abraham a huge family that will inherit a piece of land in Canaan and bring universal blessing to all humanity. Similar to the covenant with Noah, this covenant is also accompanied by an outward sign, a reminder to Abraham and his ancestors. God commands the men to be circumcised, a symbol that sets Abraham and his family apart and shows that their fertility and future lay in God’s hands. God tells Abraham to leave his land and follow wherever he leads, train his family to do what is right and just, and practice circumcision in every generation.
God’s people enter Canaan (the promised land) and eventually demand a king, stoking their desire to be like other nations. (Already, we are seeing the people lose sight of their covenant at Mount Sinai.) Saul is anointed as Israel’s king, but he fails to obey God and is rejected. God then chooses David as king over Israel. David becomes a successful leader, overcoming Israel’s enemies and restoring order, and he wants to build a temple for God to dwell with his people again. God responds to this desire by making a covenant with David, promising to make his name great and raise up a descendant from David’s line, whose throne and kingdom will last forever. David and his descendants must remain
faithful to God, following the covenantal laws. However, despite David and his sons’ failures, God keeps his promise to provide a faithful descendant of David to reign.
After God’s covenant with David, we are left waiting the Messiah from David’s line, who will make right the fractured relationship that began in the garden. For generations, Israel ignored the terms of their covenant with Yahweh, breaking commands and living by their own definitions of good and evil. Amidst rebellion and exile, the prophets spoke of a new covenant, saying that God would one day fulfill all of his promises, repairing his relationship with his people and blessing the nations through them, This new covenant is to be everlasting. God will write his law on the hearts of his people, bring complete forgiveness of sin, and raise up a faithful king from the line of David who will restore all that has been broken.
The anticipation of this covenant pushes the story forward into the pages of the New Testament, where we are introduced to Jesus. Do you notice how the covenants progressively build upon one another, forming a complete redemptive storyline? God preserved the world through Noah, initiated redemption through Abraham, established the nation of Israel through Moses, promised an eternal shepherd-king through David, and then fulfilled all of his covenants through Jesus. With each covenant, God’s promises and plans to save the world through the seed of the woman become clearer and clearer until we finally see that redemption can only come through Jesus. The New Testament authors present Jesus as the offspring of Abraham who trusted Yahweh, even to the point of death, and became a blessing to all nations. He is the greater Moses, leading us out of bondage, and he is the obedient Israelite who perfectly follows the laws of God. He is the royal son of David who inaugurated God’s Kingdom in his life, death, and resurrection, and who now sits at God’s right hand forever reigning as the one true King. Jesus perfectly succeeded at every point where humanity failed. He is the guarantor and mediator of the new and better covenant. Now people from every nation, tribe, and tongue who trust Jesus can become a part of God’s covenant family. In the new covenant, we receive the forgiveness of sins and God’s empowering Spirit to help us live lives full of self-giving love. Because of Jesus, we can live righteously and partner with him as he renews the world.
So, as we travel through the rest of these forty days of Lent, may the history of the covenants of God encourage us as we connect more deeply with God and personally reflect to prepare our hearts and minds for Good Friday and Easter.
Blessings,
Pastor Nancy
