Do you have a covenant relationship with God?
Last Sunday before church, I reached for my Bible and the little voice inside said to read Psalm 89, verse 3. I had no idea what this verse was, but over many years, I’ve often picked up the Bible and just listened for what verse to read. This verse reminded me about the covenant relationship we have with God.
Sometimes it’s a verse I’m familiar with. But sometimes, like last Sunday, I have no clue what the verse is going to tell me or how it will apply to my life or what’s going on in the world. But 99% of the time, it answers a specific need I have at the moment or it gives me an idea to think about that brings fresh inspiration.
That’s what happened Sunday. The Psalm is quoting what God had said to King David.
“I have made a covenant with my chosen one, I have sworn to David my servant, ‘I will establish your line forever and make your throne firm through all generations.’ ” Psalm 89:3, 4 NIV
The part that stood out to me was the line: “I have made a covenant with my chosen one.” Yes, this is referring to David. But I could see how the spirit of it applies to you and me as well.
God has chosen you and me, not for the same role or purpose as David’s, but chosen us all the same, for the part we can play in establishing, or rather participating in God’s kingdom here on earth.
A covenant relationship with God
Just because you’re not the king of Israel doesn’t mean God’s purpose for you and His covenant with you is any less important or valid.
The idea of God making a covenant, whether it’s with an individual, the nation of Israel, or the whole of mankind, is a continuing theme throughout the Bible. In fact, the word covenant is used over 340 times in the Bible.
And God’s covenant continues with us today.
So what does it even mean for God to make a covenant with someone? I mean, that sounds pretty cool doesn’t it, for God to make a covenant with you?
The Hebrew word for covenant means an alliance or pledge. It’s a compact or agreement between two or more parties for the benefit of everyone involved. It’s a promise for each party to keep their end of the bargain, whatever that might be.
But it’s more than just a legal contract. It goes deep into the hearts of those involved with the highest expectations of integrity and loyalty toward one another.
Noah’s covenant relationship with God
The first time the word covenant is used in the Bible is when God instructed Noah to build an ark. God says to Noah,
I will establish my covenant with you, and you will enter the ark—you and your sons and your wife and your sons’ wives with you. Genesis 6:18 NIV
God then goes into detail about what animals and food to bring into the ark. And Noah does all these things.
Noah and God have a covenant relationship. Noah does what God requests and God protects Noah and his family, along with all the animals.
So how does this apply to you and me? Has God ever asked you to do something? Even if it’s just a one-time task God is impelling you to do, it’s part of a bigger picture of your relationship with God, the covenant, or agreement of working together. And it can have far-reaching effects beyond the immediate situation itself.
If God asks you to do something that seems small in comparison to building an ark to house all those animals, that doesn’t mean it’s insignificant. It’s just different.
Maybe you’ve heard God’s voice wanting to enter into a covenant relationship with you where you pledge to do your part to achieve God’s higher purpose.
Without God’s direction, support, and specific instructions on how to build the ark, Noah could not have accomplished all he did. But because Noah did all God told him to, God protected him, his family, and all the animals.
Far-reaching effects of a covenant relationship
Noah could not have accomplished all he did by himself. If God had not guided and supported him, Noah would probably not have even survived.
Now, I realize many Bible scholars think the story of Noah did not happen literally the way it’s described in the Bible. As I like to say, I wasn’t there. I didn’t personally see what happened. But whether you take the story literally or metaphorically, the lesson is still the same.
And what was God’s covenant with Noah? There was more to it than just the safety of everyone on the ark. God tells Noah after the flood is over:
I establish my covenant with you: Never again will all life be destroyed by the waters of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth. Genesis 9:11 NIV
That’s a promise that affects all of us today. The covenant between God and Noah is still in place.
And the rainbow is to be a visible symbol or reminder of God’s promise.
It’s a promise God made not just to Noah, but with all of us and the whole earth as well.
When you enter into a covenant relationship or agreement with God, you can do so much more than you could by yourself without His help.
Now, this doesn’t mean you can bargain with God just to get what you want. That’s not the kind of agreement we’re talking about. It’s more about doing what God wants you to do and God blessing you as a result. And the beautiful thing is that the blessing goes on to bless many others in the process, not just those around you, but possibly for generations into the future.
Abraham’s covenant relationship with God
Unfortunately, mankind didn’t remain faithful to God after the flood and after many generations, God establishes another covenant through Abraham.
When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the LORD appeared to him and said, “I am God Almighty; walk before me faithfully and be blameless.
“As for me, this is my covenant with you: You will be the father of many nations.
“I will make you very fruitful; I will make nations of you, and kings will come from you. I will establish my covenant as an everlasting covenant between me and you and your descendants after you for the generations to come, to be your God and the God of your descendants after you.
“This is my covenant with you and your descendants after you, the covenant you are to keep: Every male among you shall be circumcised. You are to undergo circumcision, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and you.” Genesis 17:1, 4, 6, 7, 10, 11 NIV
Circumcision was an outward symbol that came to represent the Children of Israel’s obedience to God in every facet of their lives, and the love and protection God would give them.
This is what God says about His part of the covenant. He told Abraham,
in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed. Genesis 12: 3 NKJV
Do you see how God’s covenants go beyond a specific time period and apply to all mankind? You and I are still being blessed by Abraham’s faithfulness to God.
When you obey God and keep His covenant, this will bring blessings to those who are not even born yet.
Not everyone maintained a covenant relationship with God
But everyone who lived after Abraham did not keep God’s covenant. Many generations later, God established another covenant through Moses. God gave him the Ten Commandments, along with many other laws for living and co-existing with others. But the Children of Israel did not keep God’s covenant consistently.
Several hundred years later God makes His covenant with David, which I mentioned in that verse from Psalm 89, that David’s descendants would govern God’s people. But once again, the people, including David’s heirs to the throne, were not always faithful and did not uphold their covenant relationship with God.
They willfully and flagrantly disobeyed God and adopted ideas and practices which were the absolute antithesis of obedience to God.
Jeremiah’s vision for a new covenant relationship
But even though the Children of Israel repeatedly broke their covenant with God, God never gave up on them.In fact, God reveals through the prophet Jeremiah what His plans are for the Children of Israel.
“The days are coming,” declares the LORD, “when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and with the people of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them,” declares the LORD. “This is the covenant I will make with the people of Israel after that time,” declares the LORD. “I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. No longer will they teach their neighbor, or say to one another, ‘Know the LORD,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest,” declares the LORD. “For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.” Jeremiah 31:31-34 NIV
That’s pretty amazing isn’t it. Imagine if you had heard Jeremiah proclaim these words when it seemed like your world was coming to an end, the government was corrupt, and everything you held dear was falling apart or taken from you.
God will make a new covenant. But this time it will be different. God will write His laws, the governing power of His love for His children, in their minds and their hearts. God will have a direct covenant relationship with each individual.
Jesus brings the new covenant
The beautiful thing is, Jeremiah’s prophecy has been fulfilled, and continues to be fulfilled, through Jesus Christ. And it’s the same thing with the covenant God made with David, because Jesus is the fulfillment of God’s promise that David’s descendants would be on the throne. Jesus fulfills that role as well.
All the previous covenants God made with the Children of Israel culminated in what Jesus brings to the table with the promise of salvation, wholeness, freedom from sickness, sin, and ultimately death.
And Jesus symbolizes this covenant on the night before his crucifixion. At the Passover meal with his disciples, he offers bread to them as a symbol of his body, his substance, the truth he taught them. Then he offers a cup of wine for them to share and says,
For this is My blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins. Matthew 26:28 NKJV
Jesus is referring to the new covenant prophesied in Jeremiah that God would write in our minds and on our hearts. In effect, Jesus is asking us to participate in this covenant by sharing a taste of the struggles he endured.
A covenant relationship with God means standing with Christ
Are you willing to take a stand for the truth Jesus taught and lived, even if you face opposition because of it? That is the cross. That is the blood of Jesus we all end up taking at least a sip of: to stand strong against the world’s antagonism toward the truth and love of Christ.
Paul talks about this very thing in his letter to the Romans. He’s explaining that we are all children of God and what that involves as we partake of and participate in the new covenant of Christ.
Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory. Romans 8:17 NIV
I’ve always found this very encouraging. When we experience even a taste of the sacrifice and sufferings Jesus experienced, it turns us to God, just as Jesus’s suffering on the cross impelled him to turn to God for deliverance.
And then we taste his victory over sin and death and thereby participate in and partake of this new covenant God has established to deliver us from all sin and restore us to wholeness. And this fulfills the prophecy in Jeremiah, to have God’s law of love written in our hearts and minds.
God wants a covenant relationship with you
This is the two-way covenant relationship God wants with you. He gives you all His love, all His truth, His holy nature, and writes it on your heart and mind, inscribes it on your affections and the way you think. He protects and guards and guides and heals you in the process.
In return you’re faithful to how God wants you to live your life. And you’re able to love yourself and others with His love. See yourself and others with His mercy. And hold fast to His truth in everything you say and do.
Your relationship with God is not static. It’s an active and participatory relationship.
So what does it really mean to be in a covenant relationship with God? Well, it starts with the idea of oneness or unity with God, to be in obedience, in tune with, in sync with God. It means having a deep desire and making an earnest effort to obey God, to follow Christ in your daily life, to imbibe the spirit of Christ’s love in everything you think and do, because Jesus gave us the clearest picture of who God is.
That’s what The Bible Speaks to You Podcast is really all about, to help you think, pray, and love like Jesus. Paul says,
…we have the mind of Christ. 1 Corinthians 2:16 NIV
Because this is true, we can follow and obey Christ in everything we do. Of course, that doesn’t mean we always do. We may often fall short of living, thinking, and loving the way Jesus did. But we do have the ability and can always strive to get better at it.
Following Christ
This effort to follow Christ, to embrace the teachings of Jesus in every detail of our lives and the willingness to face the world’s opposition to his way of thinking and living, to me, are the essence of the new covenant God revealed in Jesus. It’s often symbolized by eating the bread and drinking from the cup of Jesus. But at the heart of it all, it’s participating in his purpose, sharing in his struggles, all while imbibing the spirit of his love.
This is the heart and soul of entering into a covenant relationship with God.
Jesus has actually prayed for you to experience this relationship with God on the deepest and highest level, just as he experienced it.
My prayer is not for them alone [his disciples]. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one—I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. John 17:20-23 NIV
Take a moment to ponder, embrace, and participate in this complete oneness, this complete unity, with God and Christ.
Now you may be thinking: Hey James, I’m just not worthy to be in this kind of covenant relationship with God. I’ve made too many mistakes and there so many unresolved issues in my life, how on earth can God want to have this kind of relationship with me?
Your covenant relationship with God is established in heaven
Well that’s actually the point. It’s not based on what’s you’ve done or not done on Earth. It’s based on what’s true about you in the kingdom of heaven, which Jesus says is here and now, not just way off in the future.
God sees you through the lens of His absolute love. What He sees is wonderful to His eyes. He sees you as He originally created you in His image and likeness. That’s what he loves about you. That’s who He wants to be in a covenant relationship with.
In fact, in heaven, this covenant relationship, this unity with God, is already established and can never be broken. The more you bear witness to your oneness and unity with God in the kingdom of heaven, the more you’ll experience it here on earth.
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James Early, the Jesus Mindset Coach, is a Bible teacher, speaker, and church mentor. He conducts Bible workshops online and in person. His focus is on getting back to the original Christianity of Jesus by learning to think, pray, and love like Jesus. Contact him here.
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Bible References
Psalm 89:3, 4 NIV
3 “I have made a covenant with my chosen one, I have sworn to David my servant,
4 ‘I will establish your line forever and make your throne firm through all generations.’ ”
Genesis 6:18 NIV
18 I will establish my covenant with you, and you will enter the ark—you and your sons and your wife and your sons’ wives with you.
Genesis 9:11 NIV
11 I establish my covenant with you: Never again will all life be destroyed by the waters of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth.
Genesis 17:1, 4, 6, 7, 10, 11 NIV
1 When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the LORD appeared to him and said, “I am God Almighty; walk before me faithfully and be blameless.
4 “As for me, this is my covenant with you: You will be the father of many nations.
6 I will make you very fruitful; I will make nations of you, and kings will come from you.
7 I will establish my covenant as an everlasting covenant between me and you and your descendants after you for the generations to come, to be your God and the God of your descendants after you.
10 This is my covenant with you and your descendants after you, the covenant you are to keep: Every male among you shall be circumcised.
11 You are to undergo circumcision, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and you.
Genesis 12: 3 NKJV
3 in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.
Jeremiah 31:31-34 NIV
31 “The days are coming,” declares the LORD, “when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and with the people of Judah.
32 It will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them,” declares the LORD.
33 “This is the covenant I will make with the people of Israel after that time,” declares the LORD. “I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.
34 No longer will they teach their neighbor, or say to one another, ‘Know the LORD,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest,” declares the LORD. “For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.”
Matthew 26:28 NKJV
28 For this is My blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins.
Romans 8:17 NIV
17 Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.
1 Corinthians 2:16 NIV
16 …we have the mind of Christ.
John 17:20-23 NIV
20 My prayer is not for them alone [his disciples]. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message,
21 that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.
22 I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one—
23 I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity.
