Admin
|
The Metamorphosis of the Believers In the Change From Old to New Covenant
Posted : 4 Nov, 2012 08:02 AM
The Metamorphosis of the Believers In the Change From Old to New Covenant
Look first at what the Book of Hebrews says about the New Covenant. It mentions one change in the believers from the transition to the New Covenant. Under the New Covenant, the moral law was to be written in the minds and hearts of those who are in Christ Jesus. This means that the Holy Spirit, who was not fully revealed in the Old Covenant, is now to inspire us to know the moral law and to want to follow the spirit of the law rather than the letter of the law. But being still in the flesh, we cannot follow the moral law perfectly and so, under the New Covenant, our righteousness is the righteousness of the faith of Jesus Christ. We have no righteousness in ourselves, but Christ's righteousness stands for our righteousness.
"Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ,
9. And be found in him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith:" Philippians 3: 8-9
In Romans 10: 1-4 Paul pointed out that those of all physical Israel tried to establish heir own righteousness and failed. In the flesh, they, or most of them, without the Holy Spirit, could not keep the moral law perfectly. "Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is, that they might be saved.
2. For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge.
3. For they being ignorant of God's righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God.
4. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth."
Under the Old Covenant, all physical Israel failed to obey the moral law of God and did not submit themselves to the righteousness of God, but wanted to establish their own righteousness.
"But now hath he obtained a more excellent ministry, by how much also he is the mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better promises.
7. For if that first covenant had been faultless, then should no place have been sought for the second.
8. For finding fault with them, he saith, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah:
9. 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 continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord.
10. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people:" Hebrews 8: 6-10
"For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect." Hebrews 10: 1
The law in Hebrews 10: 1 is not the moral law, which reflects the righteousness of God; it is the ceremonial law.
When the Old Covenant was done away with (Hebrews 10: 9), and the New Covenant was created by Jesus Christ, offered first to physical Israel, and then to those who were not of physical Israel, there was a change, a transformation or a metamorphosis. In Romans 12: 2 Paul uses metamorphoo. "Be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind." A big part of the change was a moving from that which was in the physical to that which is spiritual. In that movement from the physical to the spiritual, entry into the kingdom of God, becoming a son of God, was no longer by virtue of your genetics, your DNA, your chromosomes, with their telomeres at the end, but by your faith, your belief in it is written and by your transformation through the Holy Spirit. In moving away from the physical of Old Covenant Israel, circumcision was done away with, as was the other shadows (Hebrews 10: 1, Colossians 2: 17), and the physical temple building was replaced by the believer as the temple of God (I Corinthians 3: 16-17, I Corinthians 6: 19).
In the transformation to the New Covenant there had to be a change in the individual as Christ told Nicodemus in John 3: 1-7, using the metaphor of being born again from above, from the Spirit. Those in Christ had to become new creations (II Corinthians 5: 17) and came to have some of the mind of Christ in them (Philippians 3: 5) and realize then the hope of glory, which is Christ in you (Colossians 1: 27). In that change, those in Christ are distinguished from those not in Christ, that is, the saved are differentiated from the not saved, by their love of the truth (II Thessalonians 2: 10-12). Those who persist in holding on to false doctrines when the truth is made know to them, and do not have a love of the truth, are in danger of falling into the strong delusion of II Thessalonians 2: 11.
There was another important change from the Old to the New Covenant. Under the Old Covenant members of physical Israel often killed or tried to kill those who did not accept their doctrines, as shown by several examples, such as the plot to kill Christ, the killing of Stephen in Acts 7, and the attempt of the Jews to kill Paul in Acts 21: 31. But in Luke 9: 52-56 when James and John wanted Christ to let them call fire down from heaven on the village which rejected Christ, he told them "ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of. For the Son of man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them." He said in John 10: 10 that "I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly." Christ was talking mainly about giving us spiritual life, but in other texts like Luke 9 :56 he indicated that he would give us physical life also.
The Bible talks a lot about death, and often mentions Death and Hell together, as in Isaiah 28: 15, where it says "We have made a covenant with death and with hell we are in agreement:" And for example in Revelation 6: 8 Death and Hell are said to be the name of him who sits on the pale horse. Physical Israel allowed the killing of those who did not agree with their doctrines, that is, they agreed with Death. Jesus, Christ, however, is Life. And so in the change to the New Covenant, Death was also done away with, in the sense that believers do not try to kill those who do not agree with them.
Study what changes the New Testament says occur in the believers who are in the New Covenant.
Post Reply
|
