Sunday, 08 February 2009

  • Team 4 sharing     February 8, 2009

     

     

    Nick: What I enjoyed about the New Covenant is through it we are all able to come to the Lord. In the OT there were rules God set up for His people to come to Him, but all through the OT, it was proven to not work. It was a failure. Therefore Jesus came to shed His own blood so we could all come to Him. Only through the blood can we have the covering necessary to come to the Lord. Why did God chose Abel’s offering over Cain’s? Noah wasn’t perfect, but he found favor. Abraham also offered blood sacrifice. In the New Covenant, however, is built upon the Lord’s blood. By means of the blood, we are able to enjoy the grace of the New Covenant.

     

    Melissa: The covenant was never something I got my mind around. I find more appreciation that Jesus established it for us. We could not do the old way, the Law. When you see who we are, you realize it isn’t even really worth trying! I am thankful that the Lord was able to fulfill the Law on our behalf and then offer Himself for us so we might enter into another, new covenant with God based upon His blood.

     

    Eric: I had no clear idea about what the Old Covenant was, as opposed to the New Covenant. The idea of sacrifice being necessary wasn’t apparent to me. Now I somewhat understand that God, who is so great, requires something from us that we might enjoy Him. In Jeremiah 31, God said we would no longer need to teach each other to know the Lord, for we all would know Him, from the least to the greatest.

     

    Bethany: (will try to get, couldn’t hear!)

     

     

     

    Raymond:

    We need a real understanding of the blood of Christ and its relationship to the New Covenant between us and God. God’s desire from the very beginning was that He could have a relationship with man. If you have read the Bible, you see this from the beginning, even in the creation of man. But something happened to interrupt this relationship, for God is also a righteous God. God told man he could freely eat in the garden, except from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and that on the day he would eat of it, he would die. God is bound by His word. Even if everything else may pass away, but God’s Word will not. He cannot say, “That’s OK. Forget about it.” God’s throne is based upon righteousness (Ps. 89:14). He is a righteous God. So when man partook of the tree, God had to do something, even though He loved man.

     

    God called to man, “Where are you?” God wanted man to see something. Man had tried to cover his problem with something he came up with. God wanted a relationship and never gave up on man. He provided a way for man, clothing him in skins of animals. We can infer there had to be some innocent blood that was shed because of man’s sin.

     

    Throughout the Bible, you will find parents are told to tell their kids. So Adam must have told his kids about what happened, and perhaps even instructed them in the matter. God came to talk to Cain, “If you do well, there will be no problem. Do what is needed. If you don’t, however, sin is crouching in wait for you.” We need to love one another, but we also need to be righteous with one another. If you love a person, you need to love and be fair. You need to “speak truth in love” to one another. God never gave up on man, but instead gave man a way. In the OT, God came to the point where He realized He had to destroy flesh, for it had become so corrupt. Noah was chosen to keep mankind alive. After the ark landed, Noah made sacrifice. After this, God took another step and made a covenant. To Noah he said the rainbow would be a sign for mankind that He would never destroy the earth like that again.

     

    Like a young man courting a young lady, God wants a relationship with us. He is not going to let it go. He wants this relationship to be set, so He made a covenant. It is a contract that binds two parties together.

     

    Read Gen. 9:8-9, 11; Luke 22:20: Jer. 31:31-34; Heb. 9:14-16

     

    God’s desire is to have a relationship with man. We cannot miss this. But man has a condition he contracted since the fall that separates him from God. God always provided a way for man to come to Him, however. If man chose to take God’s way, he could still find favor in God’s sight. But the real “rescue package” didn’t come until God Himself came as a man to die for us on the cross.

     

    If you know you have done something that displeases someone you care about, it brings in a distance. You may even avoid that person. My father was a loving person, but not someone I wanted to be around if there was a problem I had with him that had to be taken care of. Until it was, there was some distance, until I apologized or did what it was that was needed. I knew what he didn’t like, and I know what I should do.

     

    We have entered into a covenant, a new covenant, and we can now enter into a relationship with God based on better provisions than what were available in the old covenant. In this new covenant we can all know God from the least to the greatest! In the new covenant, our sins have been forgiven. In this new covenant, God Himself becomes our righteousness. We have the highest righteousness now. In the old covenant, everything was outward, but it still allowed man a way to interact with God. In the new testament, the Lord fulfilled the righteous requirement, and now we have this provision that we can come to God. Sin is no longer an issue. The Lamb of God came to take away the sin of the world, and sin is what separated man from God. Now we can fellowship, for if we confess, He is faithful and righteous to cleanse us from all of our sins. Even among ourselves, there should be no problem, because of the value of this blood.

     

    A marriage license between a man and a woman means everything they had separately they now share together. Based on the marriage contract they are entitled. We need to realize what we are given in this contract, or covenant. God has given us Himself in this covenant! Now we need to give ourselves to Him in the same way. Even to one another. We do not have to fight for our own righteousness anymore. We don’t need to do things to appear right or wrong. We don’t have to justify ourselves in God’s eyes. In this covenant, we need to simply receive what God has provided for us. One of the matters the Lord has provided is His own blood. If we try to do something in ourselves to make ourselves appear good enough in God’s presence, is like Cain’s offering or the fig leaves they sewed together. That is not to be living according to the new covenant.

     

    In the new covenant, God gives us a new heart and He inscribes His laws into our hearts. Therefore, we really become His people and He can be our God. We don’t try to do things to justify ourselves. We all are guilty. There is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. You may think some brother may never mess up, but that brother may mess up all the time! He is able to go on with the Lord, however, because of the blood of Jesus. Because of the blood, we can come forward with boldness to God.  We don’t need to come forward to God in fear. We should be aware of what God has done on our behalf in the new covenant, and claim that access to God boldly, based on the blood of Jesus.

     

    We couldn’t keep the Law, but Jesus could and did. For us, the Law showed us who our God was, and exposed our inability to match Him in ourselves. From the youngest to the oldest, we should all know this. We shouldn’t cover things up in God’s sight. He knows. We should appreciate the blood, and confess our sins, and come forward to God. There is no sense in hiding our situation from God. Instead, we need to be those who come forward to Him with a heart full of assurance! This is what God’s covenant is about in our experience.

     

    God paid the ultimate price, but how much of our being are we willing to give? God never gives up, but we give up real quick if we don’t realize or appreciate what has been provided for us. We shouldn’t be ignorant of what is in this new covenant!

     

    It doesn’t matter what we have done; the only thing that matters is that we come to Him. He has given us everything we need to come to Him. Day by day by day, God desires a relationship with us. The more we are in this relationship, the more we are willing to give ourselves to Him. We wouldn’t be so easily removed. He paid the ultimate price for us (read Psalm 22). Yet we are often so clever to try to circumvent Him, and do something to appease our conscience so that we are comfortable without God. O, but our righteousness is but filthy rags in the sight of God! We have nothing. All we need is Christ, and He has been given to us in the New Covenant.

     

    Even the young ones among us need to have a glimpse of what this covenant is about.

     

    TESTIMONIES:

     

    I have come to appreciate the matter of relationship more. We had a problem recently, and decided we wouldn't try to handle it on our own. Instead, we decided to fellowship with a number of saints. Due to that interaction, we really got the help. We need this kind of thorough interaction with the Lord, but we often do not find out what a blessing this could be because we don't come to Him because of some perceived problem. We need to realize the problem is out of the way!

     

    It is not things that built a marriage relationship. My wife appreciates who I AM. Adam could be in the presence of the Lord in the garden. God has done so much on His side to insure this relationship could continue. In the old covenant, the means was of blood of goats and bulls, which had to be done continually. When Jesus died on the cross, however, everything was accomplished and taken care of from that point onward forever. Once we believe and receive it, then God is BOUND. Before the covenant, God could have backed out. He had a choice. But once He made that covenant, He became bound by it, regardless how He felt about it from then out. Why? Because He is, above all, righteous. It was love, however, that caused Him to willingly do this.

     

    I was impressed that God sought this relationship with us, and that we are those who have to MAINTAIN that relationship. In Colossians we read, "Giving thanks to the Father who has QUALIFIED us for a share of the allotted portion of the saints in the light..." There is a covenant between husband and wife. I have to maintain that. My whole being changed when I got married. I had been a single, young lady. Once I became Mrs. Brad Sweet, I had to show honor and respect for him. I think the Lord expects that of us.

     

     

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