Here in Hebrews 8, beginning
in verse 7, Paul writes, for if that first covenant had been
faultless, then should no place have been sought for the second.
Now that first covenant, the covenant of the law that was
given to Israel, and specifically what Paul has been talking about
here is the covenant of the Levitical priesthood we looked at last
week, which was a picture of the priesthood of Christ. Now
if that covenant had been perfect, then there wouldn't have been
any need for another covenant. If anyone could have been saved
under that old covenant, then there would have been any need
for God to send and give us another covenant. But that first covenant
was full of faults and weaknesses because it was just typical.
It just pictured what real salvation, real spiritual blessings are.
The people that that covenant was made with was the nation
Israel, that little nation of the Jews. Well, they were just
a picture of true Israel, spiritual Israel, God's people, his elect.
The blessings that were promised under that covenant were just
shadows of good things to come. They were earthly blessings that
pictured spiritual blessings, real eternal blessings. The sacrifices
that were offered and the blood that was shed under that covenant,
they were just types of the sacrifice of Christ and his blood, which
does put away the sin of his people. The mediators of that
covenant were priests, were men. They were just types of Christ,
the one mediator between God and men. And the works done under
that law, the works that that law required, were pictures of
Christ's perfect obedience. Everything about that first covenant
was just pictures and types and shadows. Now, there's nothing
wrong with that covenant, nothing wrong at all with the law that
God gave. It's perfect and holy. But it was weak through the flesh,
through our sinful flesh. It was given to sons of Adam
who were born without any ability to keep it. They were born without
any love for it. And that covenant was administered
by sinful men, so it could never forgive sins. But the new covenant,
the covenant of grace, does forgive sins. It actually forgives sins.
It doesn't do it in picture. It does it in reality. And because
of man's sin, that first covenant was full of darkness and fear
and dread. The mystery that surrounded the
high priest going into the Holy of Holies on the Day of Atonement.
Everything was dark and smoky and mysterious. And it always
produced death because of sin, because of man's inability to
keep it. But the second covenant, the covenant of grace, is full
of light. The light that's found in the
Lord Jesus Christ is full of life in Christ. And the covenant
of grace was not plan B. Just because it was the second
revealed to men does not mean it was plan B. It's the eternal
covenant. Look in verse 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. God found fault both with the
people that were under the covenant and the covenant. That covenant
had weaknesses. It was full of weaknesses. It
could not produce life because of sinful man. The people were
sinful and they could not continue in God's ways. They couldn't
continue in it and they wouldn't continue in it because they're
sinful. So God made a new covenant. But now this new covenant is
not called new because it's newly created or newly devised. Like
I said, it's not plan B. It's not a second plan. It's
not a backup plan. It's the everlasting covenant.
It was made with Christ and in Christ before the foundation
of the world. Look over in Hebrews chapter 13, just a few pages. In verse 20. Now, the God of peace that brought
again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd of
the sheep through the blood of the everlasting covenant. See,
this is the new covenant, the covenant of grace, the everlasting
covenant. That's the covenant he's talking
about. And it's called new for several reasons, because it's
newly revealed in human history. It's the eternal covenant, but
it's newly revealed in human history. But you know, really,
even in human history, the covenant of grace was preached to men
first. Long before the law was ever
given to Moses, God preached the covenant of grace to Adam.
He promised the woman seed. That's the covenant of grace.
To come and crush the serpent's head. was a preacher of righteousness. Long before the law was ever
given, Abraham, before the law was ever given, Christ said,
saw my day and was glad. He saw that, not in the law,
but in the covenant of grace. And that covenant of grace is
called new, the same way the song that's sung by the redeemed
in heaven is called new. Now those words are eternal.
You know the words now. But there we'll sing them anew,
won't we? In new bodies, in a new place, in new heavens, in new
earth. The words to that song, singing glory to our Redeemer,
are always new. But now the covenant of the law,
it grew old. It got outdated and old. But
the covenant of grace is always new. His mercies are new every
day. It'll never grow. will never
grow old or get outdated. It'll just never happen. The
covenant of grace is called new because it gives a new heart
to spiritual Israel. It gives a new nature in the
new birth. It gives a believer a new spirit,
a new attitude, and new motives. Our Lord says, Behold, I make
all things new. And then new covenant, the covenant
of grace. Now verse 9, our Lord says, This
covenant is 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." Now you
know the story of Israel. They're in bondage down in Egypt.
They're completely helpless and hopeless. They were slaves under
the heel of Pharaoh. They were held captive, and there
wasn't a thing they could do about it. There wasn't a thing
they could do to set themselves free. But God moved in power. And he came and took them by
the hand. Just like we take the hand of a little child going
up and down the stairs. You don't let your toddlers go up and down
the stairs by themselves. You take them by the hand. And
the Lord came to Egypt and took them by the hand. And he led
Israel out. Led them out into the wilderness
to bring them to the promised land. And he made a covenant
with that nation Israel. And they are so happy to be set
free from Israel, they said we'll always keep this covenant. Oh,
we're so happy. We're so thankful. We'll always
keep this covenant. Well, they promised to keep it,
but they couldn't do it. They couldn't do it, and they
wouldn't do it. Because their heart was hard. Their heart was
evil. And all Israel had was that law
written on tables of stone. God wrote it with His finger
in stone. And it couldn't even be entrusted to men. They had
to put it in the ark. But they had it on stone. But
they didn't understand it. They didn't have a heart that
loved it, and they wouldn't keep it. So the Lord said He regarded
them not. And that actually means He abhorred
them because they didn't regard His covenant. But that will never
happen under the covenant of grace. That's an old covenant.
But look at verse 10 at the covenant of grace. 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
minds. and write them in their hearts, and I'll be to them a
God, and they shall be to me a people." Now this is promised
back in Jeremiah chapter 31, verse 31. You can read that this
afternoon if you want, but it's a direct quote from here. It
was promised in Jeremiah, and it's fulfilled in Christ. When
Christ came, every bit of this is fulfilled in Him. This is
the covenant that God made with spiritual Israel, and it's a
covenant of grace. God moves in grace and He gives
spiritual life to His people through the new birth. And we're
born again, we're given a new heart and a new mind. We're given
a heart that loves God. We're given a heart that desires
to keep His law. We're given a new mind that remembers
God, remembers His law. And we're given a mind that understands
that Christ kept the law for me as my representative, as my
substance. And believers don't have to read
the law carved in stone. You don't have to have the law,
the Ten Commandments written on a piece of paper hanging up
on the wall somewhere to remember it. Why not? It's written in
your heart. God gave you a mind and He wrote
it. And you'll remember it and you'll love it if you're a believer.
If you're one of God's children, you'll remember it and love it
because He makes it so. Now sometimes when we read in
Scripture the word law, It means all the commandments of God.
It means the ten commandments, all the Levitical law that's
given in the Old Testament. Our Lord said that that whole
law, He was asked, what's the greatest commandment? He said,
well, the whole law is summed up in two commandments. The first,
love the Lord thy God with all thy heart. The second is like
unto it, love thy neighbor as thyself. The whole law hangs
on those two commandments. Well, that law, that desire is
written in your heart if you're one of God's children. Of course
God's children love Him. Of course they do. Sometimes
the law means all the commandments of God and the gospel concerning
repentance towards God and faith towards Christ. The great commandment
of the gospel is that we repent and believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ. Well, a believer does that every day. Of course you
repent of who and what you are and turn to the Lord Jesus Christ.
If you've seen Him, of course you do. Sometimes the law means
the whole Word of God, all the Scriptures, all the teachings
of Christ that are contained in God's Word. Well, you love
hearing God's Word taught. I mean, you love it. Week after
week after week, you love it. Why? God's given you a heart
that loves His Word His commandments aren't grievous to His people.
We love His Word. We love hearing of Him. And you
have a mind that thinks on these things and a heart that loves
them. Because that's the mind and the heart that God gives
His people. And He says in this covenant, I will be their God. Now we could spend the rest of
the time that we have this morning on this statement, I will be
their God. That is an amazing astounding
statement of grace. I will be their God. To think
now that the holy God of heaven and earth, the one who we've
sinned against and rebelled against, would promise to be our God. We're so undeserving, yet He
promises to be our God. It's like He's saying, yes, you've
sinned and rebelled against Me. You're at war with Me, but I'll
make peace between you. and I'll be your God." Now God,
He's the God of everyone. He's the God of everyone and
everything because He's the God of creation. It all belongs to
Him. And He rules over His creation. It all belongs to Him. But the
Lord here is talking about a special relationship. And I will illustrate
it this way. You know, all of our children,
our little ones here, we call them our children. I do. I say
these are our children. All of our children, they're cute, they're
beautiful, they're smart, they're wonderful. They're our children,
aren't they? We love them. We watch out for them. We're
interested in them. When you ladies are in the nursery,
you take care of them. You're not going to have them
hurt on your watch. You're going to make sure they
feel loved and protected. They're safe. They're our children. But Brent, there's two of them.
Oh, they're your children. You love them. You love them
in a special way. You love them with all your heart.
You provide everything you can for them. You give your life
for them. You teach them. You find your joy in them. There's
nothing you wouldn't do for those two babies. Nothing you wouldn't
do for them if you thought was best for them. You'd give them
everything you can. If it came to it, you'd die for them, wouldn't
you? Without thinking. I mean, without a moment. There's
Savannah. Without a moment's thought, I'd die for her. I wouldn't
even give it a moment's thought. I'd die so she could live. I
love her. She's my child. Every parent here knows just
what I'm talking about. That's what the Lord's saying about
His children. I'll be their God. It's a special relationship. their God. I'll be everything
that God is to them. I'll provide everything for them.
I'll be the God of all grace, the God of all mercy, the God
of all love. I'll be to them Jehovah Shammah,
the Lord their righteousness. I'll be to them Jehovah Shammah,
the Lord's presence. My children will never be alone.
Jehovah Shammah, the Lord's presence. I'll be to them Jehovah Shalom,
The Lord our peace. I'll give Him peace. I'll be
to them Jehovah-Nissi. Over them I'll spread my banner,
the banner of love. I'll be to them Jehovah-Rev,
the Lord that healeth. I'll be the great physician like
Dan prayed, come and heal all their wounds, bruises and putrefying
sores. I'll be to them Jehovah-Jireh,
the Lord will provide. He'll provide everything that
we need. Every good and right thing He'll
take care of His people. He'll provide for us. He'll teach
us. He'll feed us. He closes us both materially
and physically. He teaches us. He feeds us. He
closes us. He feeds us with His Word and
the green pastures of His Word. He closes us in the righteousness
of His Son. He finds His joy in His people. And we say, I would die for my
children. I would. I've never been called
on to do it, but I would. God did. died for His people. He died so we could live. He took our filth, our iniquity,
and our sins, and He died so that we could live. I'll be their
God. Oh, I'll never get off of that
statement all week. I will be their God. We have
so much to be thankful for. The tender care and provision
that God has for His people. I will be their God. And they
shall be my people." Now, we're not being God's people like all
men who live on the face of this earth are subject to God's authority
because He's the God of creation. He made us. He sustains us. He
feeds us. There's a whole lot deeper than
that. We'll be His children. The children of His household. Peter said, Beloved, now are
we the sons of God. Aren't you thankful to be God's
people? That's a miracle of God's grace.
He'd make us His children. We're a people to love Him, to
honor Him, to obey Him, to depend on Him, and to worship Him. We're His people. Oh, that's
grace. That's the covenant of grace
given to a people who are undeserving. That's good news. Look at verse
11. He goes on. And they shall not
teach every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying,
Know the Lord. For they shall all know Me, from the least to
the greatest." Look back in Hebrews chapter 1, verse 1. God who at sundry times and in
diverse, different manners spake in times past unto the fathers
by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by His
Son. Now those sundry times and different
manners to the fathers back in the Old Testament, If someone
wanted to hear from the Lord, they had to go to the priest,
because the Lord spoke to the people through the priest, through
the prophet. Some religions today still want
to put that restriction on people. If you want to hear from God,
you've got to go to the priest. It's still dark and mysterious. But you know that's not scriptural.
God speaks to his people today through the word. You don't need
a priest. You'll need somebody to go and
interpret for you and tell you what God says. Every believer
is a priest. God speaks to his people. Look
over in Revelation 1. He speaks to them all, from the
least to the greatest. In Revelation 1, verse 5, all
believers are made priests and are God. And from Jesus Christ,
who is the faithful witness and the first begotten of the dead,
and the prince of the kings of the earth. unto Him that loved
us and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and hath made
us kings and priests unto God and His Father." Peter called
believers a royal priesthood, kings and priests. And that applies
from the least to the greatest. Every believer has God's Spirit
dwelling in us, communing with us, living in us. Now, that certainly,
you know, doesn't mean we don't need pastors and teachers. The
Lord gives us a pastor. to feed us in the Word, teach
us for our maturity and growth. And that doesn't mean we don't
need private conversations with each other. We get together over
dinner. We talk about things of the Lord.
If we need those things, it's good for us. What Paul is saying
here is every child of God, they will hear God's voice in the
Word. He will speak to them. They will
hear the Gospel. They will know the Lord. Every child of God will, though
knowing And this is not book knowledge now. We read things
in books. I read things about history and
things. I know about those things from
a book. I never experienced them. You don't know God's grace in
a book knowledge, in an academic way, because you heard some professor
lecture on it. You know it by experience. You've
experienced God's grace. He shed His love abroad in your
heart. You know it by experience. It's
a close, intimate relationship. He's our God and we're His people. He's in us and we're in Him.
Just wrapped together in one. And every child of God is not
going to be a theologian. Good that we don't be a theologian. I don't want to be a theologian.
But here's what every believer is going to know. I know whom
I have believed. I know Him. I love Him. I'm taken
up with Him. We know the Lord Jesus Christ
is everything to me. Everyone from the least to the
greatest knows Him. Now verse 12, For I will be merciful
to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities
will I remember no more. Now at the very heart of this
new covenant, you find mercy. Every blessing, every promise
that comes from this new covenant springs from God's mercy, from
the mercy that He delights in. I delight to show mercy to sinners,
He says. Everything that God gives His
people is because of mercy. And God forgives sins freely,
absolutely freely, not because of merit. You're not putting
this new covenant because of merit, because we deserve it,
because we earned it. He says it's because of mercy. Pure, unadulterated mercy. Mercy for the miserable. And
this word mercy here means propitious. The covering, the sin covering,
like the mercy seat covered the broken law and the ark. God's
merciful to those people whose sins are covered in the blood
of Christ. So, God's forgiveness is an act
of justice. Think of that. God's mercy is
an act of justice as well as an act of mercy. If Christ, God's
own Son, was punished for your sins, then God in justice must
be merciful to you. That's an act of justice. He
can't punish sin twice. Once in Christ and once in me.
No, if He punished my sins in Christ, it's an act of justice
that He be merciful to me. Because my sins have been propitiated,
covered in the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. God will never
forsake His justice or His mercy. That old law, that old covenant
just had justice in it, didn't it? It didn't provide for mercy
ever. If you broke the law, there was
death. But in the new covenant, the second covenant, the covenant
of grace, we find mercy and truth meeting together, kissing each
other in the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. It's a far better
covenant. And God says their sins and iniquities
Well, I remember no more. All sin is forgiven. All of our
sin. Our original sin in Adam. Sins
we've committed either before the Lord saved us or after. Either
one. All of them. Sins of the future. Sins of the
past. Sins of thought, word and deed. Forgiven. Completely forgiven. God forgives every act of sin.
And He cleanses us from the filth of our sin. From all of our iniquity
and unrighteousness. Now, the Lord says He will forget
the sin of His people. Now, you know God doesn't forget
anything. Scripture uses terms we're familiar with. I'm familiar
with forgetting. Good grief. I mean, I'm 42 years
old. I mean, if I forget anymore,
it's hard to tell what the future holds. I'm familiar with forgetting
things. I mean, if I don't write it down,
it's gone. And half the time we write it
down it is, too. We're familiar with that term, but God doesn't
forget anything now. Other places in Scripture talks
about our sin being cast behind God's back, or cast in the depths
of the sea. Well, God's everywhere, even
in the depths of the sea. But we're familiar with losing
things, aren't we? We're familiar with having things
in places that we can't find them, or having things in places
that we can't go. But God's everywhere. There's nowhere God can't go.
He's already there. He just is. And God's holy. Now, He cannot forget sin because
He's holy. He can't overlook sin because
He's holy. And Scripture tells us He won't
do it. Look over in Numbers chapter 14. In Numbers 14, verse 18, the Lord is longsuffering and
of great mercy, forgiving iniquity and transgression, and by no
means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon
the children under the third and the fourth generation. Now,
we know God's longsuffering. He's a great mercy, but it sounds
like to me he's not going to forget sin. Even to the third
and fourth generation down the road, he'll visit the iniquity
of the Father. He doesn't forget sin, does he?
Well, how can both be true? How can God be holy, of great
mercy, never forget sin, and yet forgive our sin and forget
it? Well, you know the answer as well as I do. It's through
the Lord Jesus Christ, the sinner's substitute. God doesn't remember
the sin of His elect because, listen to me, they don't exist. That's why He doesn't remember
them. They do not exist. Our sins have been put away under
the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. And my friends, there's nothing
to remember. They're gone. It's not like my
sins are paid for. It's not like my sins have been
put under the blood. They are gone. They have been
paid for. There's no in-between. It's not
like... It is. They have been paid for under
the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, God doesn't overlook sin.
He can't turn a blind eye to it. He can't pretend that it's
not there. We do that, don't we? That's
what we're familiar with. You know, as a parent, you really
try your best. Not to overlook the things your
children do wrong. You try to teach them. You correct
them. You punish them when you have to. But there are times,
either through our own weakness, we see them do something wrong,
or we just kind of turn a blind eye to it. Or they're so cute. I mean, they're just so cute.
Sometimes you turn a blind eye to them. You have mercy on them
because they're cute. Not because their sin's been paid for. Because
they're cute. God doesn't have a blind eye. And sin is never
cute to God. Because He's a whole. God deals
with things as they are. Brother Henry used to say, play
like. God didn't play like our sins paid for in Christ. He didn't
play like he killed his son for my sin. He did. It's not play
like. God deals with things as they
are. And the sin, every sin, transgression
and iniquity that was laid on the Lord Jesus Christ is G-O-N-E,
gone. put away under his blood, and
it's easy to forget something that never existed. It's gone. Justified. We've used this term,
I've heard this, just that high. Just as if I'd never sinned. And that's a good way to remember
what that word means. But it's not just as if I'd never
sinned. It's not just as if my sin's
been put away in Christ. The way God sees it, I've never
sinned. That sin does not exist. That's a new covenant. That old
covenant, there was a remembrance made of sin again every year,
wasn't there? Not this covenant. Gone. That's the blood of the
Lord Jesus Christ. That's the blood that seals this
covenant. That's good news. I told Jan,
I said, I'm looking forward to this lesson. She said, why? I
said, I've got good news. This is good news. I've loved
studying this all week long. Well, verse 13 will end. And
that he sayeth a new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now
that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away.
Now the covenant of works under the law, you can't even compare
that to the covenant of grace in Christ. Christ has no comparison. Now that old covenant did serve
a purpose. It served its purpose and its
time as a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ. It did do that.
But now the crisis comes. There's no use for that covenant
anymore. The covenant of the law has no
use for anybody or anything anymore. It's worn out. It's old. It's
out of style. Just like our clothes. You know,
clothes, over the course of time, they become tattered through
use. They start to wear out. They get outdated, out of style.
That's not the style anymore. And men, Well, hang on to clothes
like that. I mean, I've had t-shirts. I
mean, they've got holes and they're tattered. I love them. They're
comfortable. They fit me good. I love them.
I've got clothes that, you know, are out of style. I don't know
it. I don't know those things. My Lord gives us a wife. She
throws away those old clothes. And she keeps us in clothes that
are in style. Well, believers, don't hang on
to this old covenant. You are not interested in this
old covenant. Any more and you're interested
in wearing a leisure suit this morning. It's out of style. It's
old and tattered and worn out. Here's what a, in closing, here's
what a writer, I read this this week, said about that old covenant
of the law. He said this is antiquated as
a candle after the sun rises. Oh, there's a fire on it, isn't
there? But it's nothing compared to the sun. It's as antiquated
as a candle when the sun comes out. Well, I hope I have blessed
you.