Today we continued our in-depth study of Ezekiel 37:15-28, focusing on the prophecy of the End-time Reign of "David" (Messiah) and starting our study of the Covenant of Peace, also known as the New Covenant:
Eze 37:24 And David My servant shall be king over them; and they all shall have one shepherd: they shall also walk in My Judgments, and observe My Statutes, and do them.
Eze 37:25 And they shall dwell in the land that I have given unto Jacob My servant, wherein your fathers have dwelt; and they shall dwell therein, even they, and their children, and their children's children for ever: and my servant David shall be their prince forever.
Eze 37:26 Moreover I will make a Covenant of Peace with them; it shall be an everlasting Covenant with them: and I will place them, and multiply them, and will set My Sanctuary in the midst of them for evermore.
Eze 37:27 My Tabernacle also shall be with them: yea, I will be their God, and they shall be My people.
Eze 37:28 And the heathen shall know that I Yahweh do sanctify Israel, when My Sanctuary shall be in the midst of them for evermore.
What is the Covenant of Peace, also known as the New Covenant?
It is certainly a dividing point in Christianity today. Most believers
consider themselves to be New Covenant Christians. What does this mean? When
does this Covenant go into effect? Does it really matter?
At first, it
may not seem significant whether someone believes himself to be a New Covenant
Christian, or a seed of Abraham and partaker of the Abrahamic Covenant. Who
cares? We all believe in Messiah...
We all claim
His precious Blood in cleansing and forgiveness for sin. So, what’s the big
deal about the Covenants? The teaching of contemporary believers being New
Covenant Christians is actually a thinly-veiled attack on Torah-keeping.
In fact, the
belief that we are all part of the New Covenant actually appears to be a
righteous justification for nailing the Law of Yahweh to the Cross. This
teaching even appears in a number of modern Bible versions. The following is
the Interpreter’s Bible definition of New Covenant: “A promise of redemption by God to
people as individuals rather than as a nation and on the basis of God’s grace
rather than a person’s adherence to the Law...” Let’s see
what the Bible says about the “everlasting Covenants”...
Most believers have been taught that the Old Testament Covenants are no longer in effect today. This is because most believe that when a biblical Covenant is put in place it only endures until another Covenant replaces it.
With this belief
firmly in place, studying the terms of Yahweh’s Covenants with Noah, Abraham
and Moses becomes nothing more than a dry study of historical trivia.
Christians today do not believe themselves to be partakers of these Covenants.
Rather, we are all now called to be partakers of the New Covenant—which is
believed to have replaced all of the former, biblical Covenants.
To support this belief, Christians cite the fact that the human partakers of these Old Testament Covenants all broke their terms of the Covenants through repeated failures, sin, and rebellion against Yahweh. But while it is true that the professing people of Yahweh have broken His Covenants—repeatedly, it is quite a stretch to conclude that human failure nullifies a divinely-instituted Covenant.
This is especially true since Scripture plainly states that Yahweh’s
Word stands forever. Additionally, there were three Old Testament Covenants
which were called “everlasting”...
Popular
belief suggests that there are seven Covenants mentioned in the Bible.
This is because many confuse a Divine Promise with a Covenant. But not all
Promises are also Covenants. Additionally, there are times when a Covenant is
being refreshed—renewed—which are commonly believed to be completely separate
and unique Covenants.
Stripping
away these common mistakes, we find that there are actually only three
Covenants in the Bible. Notably also, in Hebrew, the gimel is the third
letter and representing the number three. It is also one of two Hebrew letters
which signifies “Covenant”. There are three braids in the challah
bread, representing the Covenant Yahweh made with Abraham, Isaac
and Jacob.
Eating of the
braided bread symbolizes being the spiritual seed of Abraham, and thereby being
a partaker of the Covenant. Marriage is a Covenant. When a husband and wife are
married, they seal their union before the Heavenly Father, the marriage
Covenant is a three-way relationship and a holy joining between husband, wife
and Yahweh.
In Hebrew,
the word for the number three conveys the message of the Covenant. “Three” is salos,
which is written, in Hebrew as:
שלש
The first
letter of salos, is the shin. Shin ש
is a symbol of the Tree of Life, burning Bush, fire and the Spirit of Yahweh.
Christ is represented in the Tree of Life as well as the burning Bush.
The second
Hebrew letter in the Hebrew word for “three” is the lamed. Lamed
ל is a symbol of the Staff, the Word of God and the Covenant. So, the word for
the number three in Hebrew is centered with Covenant surrounded on both sides
by Messiah, whose Blood ratified the Covenants and by whose Spirit we may be
partakers of it.
In fact,
including the number three in Hebrew, most Hebrew words are rooted in three
Hebrew letters so that the entire language symbolically reminders us of our
Covenant relationship with Yahweh.
Having
examined the significance of three “everlasting” Covenants, let us now look at
the meaning of the word itself. The Hebrew term בְּרִתי bĕriyth
for “covenant” is from a root which conveys a sense of “cutting”, a shedding of
blood. This is because Biblical Covenants were made by passing between cut pieces
of flesh of an animal sacrifice.
Literally, in
Hebrew, entering into a Covenant is called “cutting a Covenant”, since a
Covenant must be ratified in blood— all of which pointed to Messiah’s Blood,
which is required for all Heavenly Covenants to be binding. Thus, by
definition, an everlasting Covenant is ratified in blood and is a perpetual
Promise made between Yahweh and His people—applying to all who are saved, but
being first initiated between Yahweh and a human representative, such as Noah,
Moses, or Abraham.
Bearing this
in mind, let’s take a look at the word “everlasting” in the Bible, paying
special attention to when this word is used with “Covenant” ( בְּרִתי bĕriyth).
“Everlasting”
is translated from the Hebrew word olam (Strong’s Concordance
number H5769). In Scripture, this word predominantly means “eternal” and
“without end”. But it can also mean “lasting for a long time”, in which olam
isn’t eternal.
The following
Scriptures illustrate these meanings of olam:
Olam is
“Everlasting/Eternal” in the following Scripture:
• Exodus
15:18—refers to Yahweh, Who will reign “forever” (H5769, olam). Clearly,
Yahweh’s Reign is Eternal.
Olam is “lasting
for a long time, but not Eternal” in the following Scriptures:
• Genesis
6:4—refers to an ungodly group of “mighty men”, who “were of old” (H5769, olam).
These dominating, evil men are no longer living. Clearly, in Genesis 6:4, olam
is understood to mean that these giant, mighty men “lived for a long time”, but
would not live for all Eternity.
• Exodus 21:6—refers to a bondservant, who, indicated his commitment to serving his master for the rest of his life by voluntarily having his ear pierced against the master’s doorpost with an aul. This piercing left a dot of the bondservant’s blood on the door, sealing his life-time service commitment.
Exodus 21:6 tells us that, from that point onward, “he shall serve him”, “forever” (H5769, olam). This didn’t mean that bondservants were immortal beings, rather, here olam indicates that the bondservant would remain, serving in the master’s house for the rest of his lifetime.
Since olam can mean either “eternal” or “long-lasting”, how can we rightly determine which meaning applies in our study of the Covenants? And how can we determine which Covenants are given by Heaven to stand eternally?
The only way is through examining all the Scriptures pertaining to a Covenant—learning by context and cover-to-cover Bible study whether a Covenant is eternal. With this in mind, let’s carefully examine each Scriptural Covenant, to see which of them are truly Eternal, thereby identifying the three everlasting Covenants.
Some suggest that the Marriage Covenant is the first “everlasting” (eternal) Covenant. Adam and Eve were the first married couple, and indeed marriage is a sacred Covenant, instituted by Yahweh, as it says in Malachi 2:14. Certainly, the institution of Marriage fits the Biblical requirements for a Heaven-ordained Covenant:
“...She (is) thy companion, and the wife of thy Covenant.” Malachi 2:14
Clearly, Marriage is a Yahweh-ordained Covenant, but the Hebrew word olam does not appear in the references to the Marriage Covenant. So, while the Marriage Covenant is a divinely-ordained Covenant, we will not be including it in the list of the everlasting Covenants, as given in Scripture.
Unlike
the Marriage Covenant, which must come to an end with the death of the couple,
“everlasting” Covenants continue from generation to generation, remaining in
effect long after the initial human—named in the Covenant—is laid in the grave.
- Worksheet #1: coming soon...
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