The Truth about Covenant
“In those days, your population
will greatly increase in the land.
‘At that time’, says the Lord,
‘people will no longer talk about having the ark
that contains the LORD’s agreement with us.
They will not call it to min,
or remember it, or miss it.
No, that will not be done any more!”
Jeremiah 3:16
Here we find God speaking through the Prophet Jeremiah. Addressing the condition of his people. Not just their physical condition, but the spiritual condition of their hearts. They were in exile, because they, like Adam, had chosen to live outside of the will and instruction of the Lord.
Jeremiah spoke God’s Word, which parallels our here and now. The Lord says, in the midst of their pain and suffering, that He would return to them, despite their hardened hearts and disobedient nature. Here the people are not thinking of the Lord about the Lord, but He was thinking about them.
Who is God, that He honors His covenant?
God’s people had walked away from Him, and even while in “timeout”, they remained unrepentant. They stayed in their sin, and God, who initiated a covenant with their forefather, chose to honor the covenant with his seed.
God is truly committed!
He is committed beyond what we can understand, comprehend and rationalize. It would seem that past breaking the covenant, God, like man, would cease to honor the agreement that He made with man. With any agreement, it must be honored by both parties, and this commitment to the covenant serves to govern the on going commitment to the agreement formed. This both solidifies and build trust in the agreement established. And despite the breaking of covenant, God honors the agreement!
I am covenant breaker!
I thought to myself, not about the condition of the world, but about my own state. Truly I am a covenant breaker. I have not honored the covenant that God established with me, and yet, He is still mindful of me, listens to me, and even blesses me along the way. Even when I walked far away, God continued to reach out, speaking, and sending word to me that He desired to spend time with me.
God continues to send a search party!
Has God sent word to you? Of course, this is a rhetorical question! You too, like me, and like the children of Israel have been both an enemy of the cross, and or AWOL! Maybe you you deserve to be dishonorably discharged! Despite our behavior, God sends prophets and angels, discharged with instructions and directions, to real us back into relationship with Him. He sends flowers and blessings, and allows us to experience life without Him, and still reaches out to us. He watches us walk hand in hand with sin, bathing in iniquity, and soaking in indiscretions, and drafts beautiful love discourses to express His unfailing love for us. Who does this but God?
Life with you is better than life without you!
I wish our actions were reflective of the above statement! Often times, they say the opposite. Sadly enough, when I wrote this, I was thinking of God. His actions from the start have declared, life with you is better than life without you. Though he has it all, he chose to share, deciding not to exist in a vacuum, called into existence a paradise, and placed into it a people. Shared His love, as well as His wisdom and provision, and despite His giving of all He possessed, man still wanted more and sought to obtain outside of Him, risking the covenant relationship with God for someone newly introduced and that had nothing to offer.
He is still consistent and we are still inconsistent!
Maybe you have been saved now so long, that the portion of your life in Christ is now more than your life without Him. In this, it could be possible that some of us have experienced more forgiveness, mercy and grace than you did before you met Him. Imagine that! God has forgiven and looked beyond our past, but loves us in the present, and is committed so that He will love us in the future. All while knowing what lay ahead! Its amazing that He would hold our hand and allow us to bare and
speak His name in the midst of our sin and struggle. Why the aisle doesn’t open up to swallow us, one can not justify, but God justifies us! Through our covenant agreement, we are heirs to a Kingdom via a promise that is undeserved.
We deserve to be disowned. We deserved to be abandoned. We deserve to be cast aside. But His mercy are new every morning! His grace covers our stumbles. And His blood covers our unrighteousness.
Why? It makes no sense. We do not deserve to be restored, but God restores and renovates, even upgrades us to new levels as we walk with Him. Praise God! He is truly better to us than we are to ourselves. He loves us despite our inconsistencies, and loves us until we are made consistent through His love for us!
#PastorJDO3
