Turn back in your scriptures
with me to Luke chapter 1 verse, and we'll start at verse 72. This is the performance. To perform
the mercy promised to our fathers and remember his holy covenant. It's interesting how words Words
define things in remarkable ways and words understood differently
would be so different. Wouldn't it be remarkable if
that book that you held in your hands was divided into the old
covenant and the new covenant? Then people would say, what is
the new covenant? Because that's what the word
means. Testament means a covenant. It's a covenant. It's one of the sure markers
of, and a simple way of finding out whether someone has actually
been taught of the Lord in their church, is to ask them what the
covenant is. Aaron can go back to school tomorrow
and ask the teachers. They're all claiming to be Christian
teachers in a Christian school. And he could ask them, can you
explain the eternal covenant to me? It's not a hard question,
it's all through the scriptures. In fact, Zechariah makes a fundamental
point, doesn't he? At the very centre of this message
is the eternal covenant and it's performed, it's a mercy performed
to remember his holy covenant, the oath which he swore to our
father Abraham, that he would grant unto us that we being delivered
out of the hand of our enemies might serve him without fear.
That word serve can also be translated worship. So there is a freedom
that God brings to his delivered people. We might serve him without
fear in holiness and righteousness before him all the days of our
life. And thou, child, shall be called
the prophet of the highest, for thou shalt go before the face
of the Lord to prepare his ways, to give knowledge of salvation
unto his people by the remission of their sins, through the tender
mercy of our God, whereby the day springing on high has visited
us, to give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow
of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace." So we have
in this remarkable sermon, we have both the description of
our God and his activities, and then the performance of that
in the hearts of people. That's the wonder of the new
covenant, the eternal covenant, isn't it, as mercy is promised
and mercy is performed by our God. The old covenant, and what
courses through your veins in all situations, is do this and
live. Any time you're put under any
pressure at all, you think, well, I must do something. I must do
something to earn my way out of this. Our God has a holy covenant. It's a holy covenant. And isn't
it remarkable, just to note as we've gone through Acts, we've
seen in no way in any place thus far are people put back under
a law of works, the Mosaic law of works or anything else. And
here's Zechariah. Remember the situation. He's
an old man. He's a priest. He goes into the
temple according to the law of Moses. He knew it off by heart.
He'd been practising it all his life. He knew the obligations. He knew the blessings and the
curses. He witnessed them in the history
of Israel and he'd seen them in the lives of people around
him. And there he is. What does he do? What does he
do when he opens his mouth from God? He doesn't say in this prophecy
a single thing about Moses' law, does he? Not a single word is
mentioned about Moses' law. He goes back. He goes back to that extraordinary
foundation, doesn't he, that our God remembers his holy covenant,
and it's the oath that he swore to our father Abraham. And you
can read that story from Genesis 12 through into Genesis 22, and
you'll see that covenant, that promise that Abraham would be
blessed, and all the families on earth would be blessed through
him, and all the families on the earth would be blessed through
his seed. The seed is the Lord Jesus Christ. Galatians 3 and
other places in the scriptures make that abundantly clear. Lord
willing, we might look at some of that a little bit later on.
But Abraham had a promise from God. And the wonder and the glory,
the wonder and the glory of this covenant is that it's a covenant
made between God and God. And it's a covenant in which
all of the children of God are represented in and by the Lord
Jesus Christ. to remember His Holy Covenant. Before we think too much about
this Holy Covenant, we've got to remember that this Holy Covenant
is just another description of the Lord Jesus Christ. Just turn
quickly in your scriptures to Isaiah 42, and if you're quick
enough you can put your finger in Isaiah 49. Before we start
talking about the Covenant, we have to talk about the fact that
the Lord Jesus Christ, according to God the Father, according
to the Holy Spirit, is the Covenant. Isaiah 42 is just a remarkable
description of our great God and Saviour. He is titled at
the beginning of Isaiah 42 as Mine Elect. So to disagree and
to argue with God about election, then you're actually talking
about the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. We've got to keep remembering
that every issue of doctrine, every issue of truth, is in one
way or another saying something directly and personally about
the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And if God would
give you biblical understanding of things, you would take every
issue and you'd take it back. And what's this saying about the Lord Jesus
Christ? What's this saying about him? Lord Jesus Christ, in verse 6
of chapter 42 of Isaiah, I the Lord have called thee in righteousness
and I will hold thy hand and will keep thee and give thee
for a covenant of the people for a light of the Gentiles. What will he do? What will he
do? Verse 7, to open the blind eyes
to open the blind eyes, to bring out the prisoners from the prison. You might recall these are the
words that Lord Jesus, some of these words are similar to the
ones Lord Jesus used in his first sermon in Nazareth. And to them
that sit in darkness out of the prison house, I am the Lord,
that is my name, and my glory will I not give to another, neither
my praise, to graven images. Behold the former things are
come to pass and new things do I declare, before they spring
forth I'll tell you of them. It's just a wonderful, you read
this chapter, it's a wonderful description of the Lord Jesus
Christ and his work. I love verse 4 while you're there
on that page. What does it say? He shall not
fail. Write it down, brothers and sisters.
Commit it to your memory. He shall not fail. This notion that somehow the
Lord Jesus Christ loves everyone and came into this world to make
an offer of salvation for everyone and somehow they're not saved
is exactly what a pastor in this town told me several years ago.
He said he tried and he failed. That's what he said. He tried
and he failed. Why on earth do you go into church
and preach about a failure of a God? He shall not fail, nor
be discouraged till he shall set up judgment on the earth
and the eye shall wait for his law. I love what verse 21 says
while you're on that page. The Lord is well pleased for
his righteousness sake. What will he do with the law
of God? He will magnify the law and make it honourable. He alone magnified the law and
he alone made it honourable. Isaiah 49 has a similar description
of our Lord Jesus Christ. And the Zechariah message is
just an encapsulation of these and thousands of other passages
in the Old Testament Scriptures. All of the Old Testament Scriptures
are encapsulated in this remarkable sermon of his. Verse 7, Thus
saith the Lord, the Redeemer of Israel and His Holy One, in
whom man despises, to him whom the nation abhorreth. Which is
exactly what the Jews did to him. And it's exactly what religious
people do to him today. They're happy to have a Jesus
in any sort of way, shape and form, unless he is a successful,
sovereign, substitutionary saviour. And then they find him offensive.
Kings shall see and arise, princes shall worship because of the
Lord that is faithful and the Holy One of Israel. He shall
choose thee. Thus saith the Lord, in an acceptable
time have I heard thee. In a day of salvation have I
helped thee. I will preserve thee and give
thee for a covenant of the people to establish the earth and inherit
the desolate passages. The salvation of the Church of
God in the Lord Jesus Christ is a covenantal salvation. We
want to speak of it all the time because God says that all of
his ministers will speak of the eternal covenant all the time. All of them speak all the time
about the Eternal Covenant. That's what he says, because
he says he made them. Turn with me to 2 Corinthians
3, and you'll see this is what God makes. If God has made someone
to be a minister, they are going to be a servant of the Eternal
Covenant. And if they are not, that means
to be a table where they hand it around. They say, this is
the Eternal Covenant. This is the Eternal Covenant.
And God's people eat and drink delight in it. He says in verse
6 of 2 Corinthians chapter 3, who has also made us. So if a
minister's been made of God, he's going to be a minister who
speaks, made us able ministers of the New Testament, of the
New Covenant, not of the letter, not of the mosaic law, but of
the Spirit. For the letter killeth, but the
Spirit gives life. God makes ministers. God makes
his servants to be those that delight in the eternal covenant. Lord willing, we will find ourselves
delighting in them. It is this covenant that was
from before the foundation of the world. This is the covenant
that God the Father elected a number of Adam's fallen race and God
the Son agreed to take responsibility, absolute and complete responsibility
in totality for all of their sins and for all of their righteousness. That's what Hebrews 7.22 says.
He's the surety of this covenant. To be the surety is the one that
takes full responsibility for all the debt. Once, as it were,
they shook hands in eternity, God the Father doesn't look anywhere
but his Son for all of the righteousness of all of his people and all
of their sin bearing. And anything less than that is
no gospel. Brothers and sisters, it is no
gospel. The father elected a number,
the son agreed to take responsibility for them, and the Holy Spirit
agreed to come and to give life and peace to the chosen redeemed
ones. It was, he says, it's a council
of peace between the members of the Trinity. Turn over to
1 Timothy, 2 Timothy chapter one, and just listen to Paul
describing the terms of this covenant. I love what Robert Hawker said
while you're turning there. This everlasting covenant becomes the bottom and
foundation in Jehovah's appointment and security of all grace and
mercy for the church here and glory hereafter through the alone
person work, bloodshedding and obedience of the Lord Jesus Christ. He says in verse 8, don't be
ashamed, Timothy. You might be timid, but don't
be ashamed. Verse 8 of 2 Timothy chapter 1. Don't be ashamed of
the testimony of our Lord. We just read the testimony of
the Lord. Zacharias' testimony is giving a testimony of the
Lord. Nor of me, his prisoner. But be thou a partaker of the
afflictions of the gospel according to the power of God. If you're going to bear testimony
to it, you're going to be a partaker of the afflictions. God's power
will determine that to happen. And then look what it says in
verse 9. Who has saved us and called us? What's the order?
What's God's order of salvation? He saved first. He saved first
and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but
according to His own purpose and grace, which was given us
in Christ Jesus when? Before the world began. Before the world began. but is now made manifest by the
appearing of our Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ brought it
to manifested what had been determined in eternity. Which is why when
Zachariah is preaching under the power of the Holy Spirit,
he puts all of those things in the past tense and completed
actions. He's redeemed, he's delivered, he's saved. All of
them are done. This is why it is just the glory of our God. His abolished death, and then
manifest by the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ, who
has abolished death and has brought life and immortality to light
through the Gospel, whereunto I am appointed a preacher and
apostle and teacher of the Gentiles. For the which cause I also suffer
these things. He's in jail in Rome about to
have his head severed from his body. I suffer these things. Nevertheless, I am not ashamed,
for I know whom I have believed. He doesn't know what. He knows
whom. If you know whom, the whom you
know will determine the what that you know. You get the whom
right and all the other issues disappear and are delightfully
absorbed in him. You meet him, you don't have
any doubt whatsoever that he's absolutely sovereign. If you
meet Him, you don't have any problem whatsoever with election.
If you meet Him, you have no doubt whatsoever about predestination. If you meet Him, you'll find
grace delightful. If you meet Him, you'll find
His tender mercy remarkable. You'll find in Him everything
that you need. I know whom I have believed,
I am persuaded that He is able. He's performing, as Zechariah
said, isn't he? He's performing the mercy. He
is able to keep that which I have committed unto him. What have you committed unto
him? God's children have committed
the entire destiny of their eternal souls, and all of the things
that go between now and that meeting with God, they committed
into his hands. That's what faith is, isn't it?
Faith is relying on him. God's people had all their eggs
in one basket. and none anywhere else. They
have no righteousnesses that they can ever brag about or boast
about. They horrify when other people
bring them to them. Paul committed everything to
him. I know whom I have believed." This everlasting covenant, it's
called an everlasting covenant It's sure, unchangeable, it's
unblemishable for want of a better word. It can't be misapplied. It's the covenant that you rest
your heads on, on your pillow. It's the pillow you rest your
heads on in your dying day. If you're a child of God, you
will look to this covenant. for all of your peace now. And
if you're a child of God, you'll be looking to that covenant for
all your peace on that day." That's how David died. I'll just
read these words out of 2 Samuel 23 verse 5. We quote them often. They ought to be written down. on the tablets of our hearts.
He says, although my house be not so with God, he may well
be talking about his nation Israel, which was nothing but a mess.
He may be talking about his own household, in which there were
probably almost no believers whatsoever. His son raped his daughter. Another son murdered that son. Another son, Absalom, stood opposed
to him and took the hearts of the children of Israel and died
in his rebellion against David. David looked round his house
and he says, my house is not so with God. But, yet, He hath
made with me." You see, David didn't make a covenant with God.
He has made with me, with all of God's children, with all of
that house of the servant David, with all of them, God has made
this eternal covenant. He has made with me an everlasting
covenant. And we think everlasting means
it starts from here and goes on forever. Everlasting means
that it goes each way, and we have no idea how big it is. But
it goes a long, long, long way back. He's made with me an everlasting
covenant, ordered in all things and sure. Sure. Sure. Ordered in all things,
every little tiny thing to bring a child of God into the arms
of the Lord Jesus Christ in this world and to keep him there forever
is ordered and sure in all things. For this, says David on his dying
bed, for this is all my salvation. See, David's salvation wasn't
in anything that he did. All of his salvation was in this
eternal covenant. It's all my salvation and it's
all my desire. It's all he wanted. It's all
he wanted. Although he make it not to grow,
this eternal covenant doesn't need to grow. It's perfect. It's all my salvation and all
my desire. It's called a holy covenant.
It's a holy covenant because the Lord Jesus Christ is the
covenant. And he's the holy one of God.
That was the holy thing that Mary had birthed in her. But also, it's a promised agreement
between a holy father, a holy son, and a holy spirit. And it
reflects the character of a holy God. It is the way in which God
manifests his glory and his character in this world. And when Isaiah
met the Lord Jesus Christ in the temple, in Isaiah chapter
6, what happened? What did he see? The train of
his robe filled that temple. The train of his robe, all of
those that are in him and with him and joined, it filled that
temple. You couldn't see the candlestick, because he is the
candlestick. You couldn't see the showbread,
he's the showbread. It filled the temple. Isaiah,
Isaiah cried out, didn't he? Woe is me. Woe is me. He'd been pronouncing woes for
five chapters. He meets the Lord Jesus Christ
in the temple and he says, woe is me. And what do those angels
cry out? The angels are crying, holy,
holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. And the whole earth is full of
his glory. Even the doorposts of the temple had the decency
to move at the voice of the Lord Jesus Christ. And he declares
what he is to me in the face of holiness, I'm a man of unclean
lips. I'm a man, I'm a priest, he was a priest. He says I'm
a man of unclean lips, and I live amongst a people of unclean lips.
I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips, for mine eyes
have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. Then flew one of the
seraphims unto me, having a live cold in his hand, which he had
taken with tongs from off the altar. And he laid it on my mouth
and said, Lo, this has touched thy lips, that which was unclean,
when it meets with this holy God, and your iniquity is taken
away, and your sin is purged." It's a holy covenant because
it reflects the character of a holy God. And what it does,
remarkably, isn't it, is that this holy covenant makes the
objects, His people, Israel, holy in His sight. Turn in your
passage there to Luke 1.75, verse 75. It says, this is the covenant,
the oath that was sworn to David, that he would grant to us being
delivered out of the hands of our enemies, we might serve him
without fear in holiness and righteousness before him. It makes people holy. It declares
people to be holy. It declares Isaiahs to be holy. It declares everyone in that
covenant to be holy. Holy in what they do. Anyone
here think they've ever done a holy thing? Have you ever done
one thing? Can you think of one thing you've
ever done which you could bring to God? and find Him to reward
you and to accept it. But look what it says, look what
it says, look what God says to us. You're going to serve Him
without fear in holiness and righteousness before Him all
the days of our life. We serve in Him. He is our holiness. He is our righteousness. And He is that right now, brothers
and sisters in Christ. You'll never be more holy in
heaven than you are now if you're a believer in the Lord Jesus
Christ. You're not going to grow in holiness. Holiness is an absolute. It's the work of the Lord Jesus
Christ. It's a great description of what He's doing, what wonders
He does to His people in this world. We do quote this verse
in Colossians 1.22. He's taken away all your sins,
hasn't he? And he's in the body of his flesh
through death, and his job in this covenant is to present you
holy and unblameable and unapprovable in his sight." Do you think that
just happens at the end? So people think, don't they,
in works religion, people think that they grow more and more
righteous and more and more holy and then they become like a piece
of ripe fruit to be plucked from the tree. Let me tell you right
now, brothers and sisters, there's absolutely no gospel in that
whatsoever. The gospel begins with the declaration
that your sins are completely taken away. That's what repentance
is. It's repentance toward God regarding
how He takes sins away. The sins are taken away in the
Lord Jesus Christ. We've read it there in Zechariah's
prophecy. He's redeemed His people. He's
saved His people. He's delivered His people. Verse
77, He's remitted their sins. It means they're gone, they're
blotted out, they don't exist. That's what it is to be justified
before a holy God, is to be declared by God to have never sinned. Never sinned. Lord Jesus Christ
took those sins and He took them away. It's one of the great truths
of religion, isn't it? All of the righteous people before
God never see anything righteous in anything they've ever done.
And all of the unrighteous, all of those who will be unrighteous
in that day when they meet God, think that they have some righteousness
of their own. God says it's filthy rags. Chuck them away. I love what
Spurgeon said, he said, I really feel like what we need to do
is to take all of our very best works and all of our sins and
put them all in the one basket because they're all effectively
the same and throw them away and simply trust what the Lord
Jesus Christ has done. It's a holy covenant. It speaks
of a holy agreement between holy members of the Trinity. It speaks
of the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ and His holiness. And
it magnifies every character of God, doesn't it? See, one
of the problems of all false religion is that it takes away
from the glory of our God and He's diminished. He's robbed
of His sovereignty. He's robbed of His justice. He's
robbed of His glory. This holy covenant magnifies
His holiness. His justice is holy justice. His righteousness is holy righteousness. Which is why the psalmist said,
I'll speak of your righteousness and yours only. I don't have
any of my own. There's none. No creature righteousness. So that's what God said to Abraham. It's really simple, isn't it?
He says, you walk before me and be holy. Be perfect, is what
he said. Walk before me and be perfect.
Did Abraham walk before God in perfection? In his flesh he never
did. In the Lord Jesus Christ he never
did anything but perfection. That's why when Peter says, be
holy for I am holy, He wasn't saying that you live
holiness in your lives. God's people despise the sin
that clings to them, and they turn from it in every possible
way, and they grieve over it, and they plead with the Lord
to to take it away from them. They plead with the Lord not
to let them be a public embarrassment to him and the gospel they proclaim.
But the holiness that Peter's talking about is not Peter's
activities. The holiness is the Lord Jesus
Christ. He's made of God unto us wisdom and righteousness and
sanctification. That word sanctification means
holiness. This notion that there is progressive
sanctification and you get more and more holy and righteous as
you grow older is a load of rubbish. And no one in the scriptures
ever declared that they were like that. And no honest person
in this world ever would say that. He is our sanctification. He
is our holiness. His law is holy. It reflects
His holy law. He will magnify that law and
make it honourable. He made it honourable in His
obedience to it and He made it honourable in His suffering under
the justice of it when all of the sins of God's people were
laid on Him and the righteous law of God slew the Son of His
love and shed His precious blood. It's holy, Covenant, because
it has a holy love. It reflects a holy love for His
own, a love that is pure, a love that is powerful. It reflects
the holy word of promise. All of the children of Abraham
are the faith children of God. The Lord Jesus Christ shed his
blood and he says, this is my blood of the new covenant. This is my blood of the eternal
covenant, is what he's saying, because the new covenant is much,
much older than the Mosaic covenant. The new covenant is new because
it's new every morning. and it provides a new way. It
reflects a holy, holy work of the Lord Jesus Christ. He says
in Hebrews 13 verse 20, he says, Now the God of peace that brought
again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of
the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant,
make you perfect in every good work to do his will. working
in you. I love that. He works in us.
Which is well pleasing in his sight through Jesus Christ to
whom be glory forever. It's a holy covenant that's promised. It's a holy covenant that's performed. To perform the mercy promised. the first time that word covenant
is used in the scriptures, and we'll close with this picture. But Noah, Noah was amongst that
race of evil people that the Lord poured out his wrath upon. And he poured out his wrath upon
Noah, poured out his wrath upon Noah and all of his family. And Noah, Noah found grace in
the eyes of the Lord and that wrath that fell on Noah fell
on the ark. All of that wrath of God fell
on all of them. And Noah, Noah was preserved
and protected from all of the wrath of God and from all that
fell upon those people because he was in the ark, he was in
the Lord Jesus Christ. I love what the covenant says.
It says in verse 18 of Genesis 6, he says, but with thee will
I establish my covenant. And what does the covenant mean
for Noah? Thou shalt come into the ark. There's no question
whatsoever that Noah was going to be put in the ark. And Noah
and the salvation of he and his family is a picture of the salvation
of all of God's people. They'll all be put in the ark.
Thou shalt come unto the ark. In the eternal covenant, the
covenant of grace, God makes promises and God fulfills them.
He says, I will and they shall. Every single last one of them
shall because God wills it. You'll come into the ark and
he's going to put a bow in the cloud. If you remember the story
later on in Genesis chapter 8, he puts a bow, a rainbow in the
cloud. That rainbow in the cloud is
the rainbow of that covenant. which surrounds the throne of
God right now in heaven. That's what John saw. He saw
a rainbow around the throne, and a rainbow about the throne
of God. Everything that comes from God's
throne into this world, into the lives of his people, comes
through that rainbow. that Eternal Covenant and everything
that comes back to God comes through that Eternal Covenant. He makes His people servants. He makes His people worshippers. He makes His people holy. He
makes His people righteous. and this eternal covenant gives
knowledge and it gives light and it guides our feet into the
way of peace. God's children hear the promises
of God and like Mary and like David they say to God do as you promised. Let's pray. Heavenly Father we pray that
you would grant us the simplicity of trusting in your son and your
son alone. We praise you, Heavenly Father,
for the covenant that you made in eternity, in which all of
your elect people, all of your chosen people, all of the faith
children of Abraham, are there as one with your dear and precious
son when the promises are made. We praise you, Heavenly Father,
that your operations in this world draw your people to the
foot of the cross, draw your people into the arms of the Lord
Jesus Christ. We thank you, our Father, that
he has tender mercies toward us. We thank you, our Father,
for the promises that you have made. And we pray, Heavenly Father,
that we, like Abraham, would simply believe what you have
said that it might be counted unto us for righteousness. Our
Father we pray that as we go through our time in this world
you would cause us to live in such a way that the glory of
the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ would be exhibited in
the things that we say and the way we live. And may you use
us, Heavenly Father, to proclaim His name to each other as we
meet, and to others in this lost and broken world. We thank you,
Heavenly Father, that your people are saved eternally. We thank
you that your people are in the hands of the Lord Jesus Christ
and no one will ever pluck them out of his hands. And we pray,
Heavenly Father, that he would receive great glory for the way
that he performs the mercy to us and remembers his holy covenant. We pray that you bless us, Heavenly
Father, with knowledge and sight and wonder and praise for the
Lord God of Israel. We pray in his name. Amen.