October 31, 1517, will forever be remembered in church history as the day when an Augustinian monk by the name of Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses on the door of All Saints Church in Wittenberg, sparking the beginning of the Protestant Reformation.
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Christmas According to Scripture
It’s a historical event like no other. When mankind fell into sin through the disobedience of Adam, humanity was cut off from being in a right relationship with God. Sin separated us from our Maker, and we became rebels at enmity with Him. We were lost and without hope in both our unwillingness and inability to be restored in the fellowship that humanity experienced before the Fall.
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The Mosaic Covenant: The Israelites Break the Covenant
As we have discussed previously, the Mosaic Covenant was a covenant that God made with His people Israel. It is evident from the moment of its establishment that this covenant is bilateral in nature, for it was an agreement between God and the Israelites, who pledged that they would do all that is required of them in their keeping of the covenant (Exodus 19:8, 24:4, 24:7). As we will discuss in today’s blog, it didn’t take long for the Israelites to fall into sin, and by so doing, break the covenant.
Keep Reading The Mosaic Covenant Established at Mt. Sinai
When you hear the term “Mosaic Covenant”, what comes to mind? Perhaps you think of the Levitical priesthood, or the Law…and you would be right. Those are most certainly major themes of the Mosaic Covenant. But what if I told you that another theme of this covenant is the relationship between God and His people? In fact, the Bible makes a very clear connection between this covenant and the Abrahamic Covenant, where God chose Abraham to be the one through whom the whole world would be blessed.
Keep Reading Introduction to the Mosaic Covenant
When we read the Bible, one theme that stands out is the holiness of God. To be holy is to be set apart. God, the creator of all things, is indeed set apart from His creation. Creation had a beginning, but God is eternal. God has no beginning or end; He simply is. Also known as the Tetragrammaton, His very name is I AM WHO I AM (Exodus 3:14). God’s holiness is thus linked to His aseity -- but there’s more to it. The holiness of God also encompasses His moral perfection. “God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5).
Keep Reading The Abrahamic Covenant: The Sign of Circumcision
Ask anyone who is outside of Christ what they need to do in order to be saved, and the response is, more often than not, pretty uniform across the board: do good works, and if you do enough of them, maybe the good works will outweigh the bad deeds on Judgment Day and voila…you would be allowed to enter into paradise. In essence, all religions outside of biblical Christianity share one thing in common: a form of works-based salvation.
Keep Reading The Abrahamic Covenant: The Covenant-Cutting Ceremony
When God first appeared to Abraham in Genesis 12, He gave him three distinct promises: a land, a seed, and a blessing of all the nations. We spent the past few weeks exploring all that was entailed in these three promises, and we ended last time with a reminder from Hebrews 11:13, that Abraham never saw the promises truly fulfilled in his lifetime, but rather saw them only in bits and pieces. He lived in the promised land, yet as a foreigner. He had several offspring throughout his life, yet only his son Isaac received the covenantal blessing. Yet even this did not happen immediately after receiving the promise, as it took 25 years for Sarah to finally conceive and give birth to Isaac. It would be during this time of waiting that God would once again appear to Abraham in Genesis 15 to make a covenant with him, but before we dive into the covenant-cutting ceremony itself, we need to take a step back and consider the overall context.
Keep ReadingThe Abrahamic Covenant: The Promise of Land
When it comes to events that change the course of human history, we often think of various wars, natural disasters, famines, and plagues. Certainly, these are major events in and of themselves, but what if I told you that there was a single event experienced by one ancient Mesopotamian man that overshadowed all of these? In the next few blogs, we will be talking about that very event: the day when God appeared to a man named Abraham and promised him a land, a seed, and a blessing for all the nations.
Keep Reading Introduction to the Abrahamic Covenant
As we continue our study of the biblical covenants, a couple of key themes begin to stand out: man’s inability and unwillingness to obey the word of God, and God’s faithfulness in keeping His covenant promises in spite of our sinfulness. Just as Adam and Noah were undeserving of God’s mercy and grace, we will find that theme once again played out in the life of a pagan from ancient Mesopotamia called Abram, whose name would be later changed to Abraham.
Keep Reading The Noahic Covenant: Part 2
Previously, we introduced the Noahic Covenant: where we find it in Scripture and its historical context. To sum it all up, God caused a global flood to occur in the days of Noah to judge the world for its wickedness and wipe everyone out except for Noah and his wife, and Noah’s sons and their wives…8 people in total. God saved the animals by bringing two of each kind into the ark. Then, God made a covenant with Noah and all of creation, promising that He would never again destroy the earth with water. God also chose the sign of the covenant to be the rainbow. Why a rainbow? Thomas Schreiner has a good explanation for this in his book Covenant and God’s Purpose for the World, where he wrote, “The sign of the covenant is that God has withdrawn his bow. He has put his weapons of war down and will not wipe out the human race again.”
Keep Reading The Noahic Covenant
Among all the books that have ever been written, none have been more under attack than the Bible. Yet, it is the best-selling book of all time, as it is by far the most revered book in all the world! It is amazing how even just the extreme polarization of the Bible is in and of itself a testimony of its truthfulness and divine authorship. Entire church splits and denominations have arisen because of how differently people interpret it, and the passages about the Noahic Covenant that we’ll be examining today are no exception.
Keep Reading Introduction to the Covenants
From the covenant God made at the time of creation to the new covenant established by God through the person and work of Jesus Christ, the Bible is full of covenantal language that describes the nature of God’s relationship with His people. The purpose of this series is to explore each of the covenants God established with mankind at significant turning points in redemptive history, how they were fulfilled in Christ, and what they mean for believers today. A study of the covenants helps us better understand how the Bible is one cohesive message about God’s eternal plan to save a people for Himself, so that He would be our God and we would be His people. It reminds us of God’s unchanging faithfulness in keeping His promises, despite our failures and shortcomings. Next time, we will lay the groundwork by defining what a covenant is, some common examples that constitute as such, and why it matters.
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Whenever we study and seek to understand various passages in Scripture, we can experience an array of scenarios. Sometimes, the text is explicit and clear in its meaning and application. For example, in Matthew 7:12, the verse sometimes referred to as the “golden rule”, Jesus said, “In everything, therefore, treat people the same way you want them to treat you, for this is the Law and the Prophets.”