圣经研究1——旧约的国度、圣约和正典 KOT

——第三课：上帝的圣约

目录

一、介绍

二、国度和圣约

考古发现

圣经见解

三、圣约的历史

普世性之约

亚当

挪亚

国度性之约

亚伯拉罕

摩西

大卫

新约

四、圣约的动态

普世性之约

亚当

挪亚

国度性之约

亚伯拉罕

摩西

大卫

新约

五、圣约的子民

人类的分类

圣约之内的人

包含在约内和排除在约外的人

动态的应用

排除在约外的非信徒

包括在约内的非信徒

包括在约内的信徒

六、总结

一﹑介绍

如果你是一个国王，一个专制君主，你将如何统治你的王国？你将如何处理你统治时期国家的发展和遇到的挫折？你将会如何对待国外的敌人和朋友？你又将如何处理国内的叛徒和忠心的臣仆？

当我们学习旧约时，这些都是很好的、我们可以自我发问的问题。毕竟，旧约所讲明的是神作为至圣的王，要建立并扩展他的王国，直到地极。他的国度历史久远，有前进，也有后退，在神的王国之外，有仇敌，也有朋友，在神的王国之内，有叛徒，也有忠心的臣仆。因此，神如何决定来统治他的王国或国度？神怎样治理国度内的生命？《圣经》的答案是：神透过圣约来治理他的国度。

本课是「国度、圣约和旧约正典」系列的第三课。这个旧约纵览中，我们将了解整本旧约讲的是有关神的国度、神透过圣约来治理这个国度、透过旧约或者旧约正典来向神的子民解释并应用圣约。

本课的题目为「神的圣约」，因为我们要探讨，在旧约历史中，神怎样透过建立一系列的盟约来治理他的国度，一旦我们掌握了这些圣约的轮廓，我们就会更清楚地看到神的约怎样引导旧约中神子民的人生，我们也会更清楚地明白这些圣约怎样引导我们现今的人生。

我们将从四个部分来探讨神的圣约：第一，我们要查考神的国度和神的圣约之间的基本关系；第二，我们要查考旧约中圣约的历史发展；第三，我们要探讨圣约中的人生动态；第四，我们要探讨圣约中的子民。首先，我们来谈神的国和他的圣约之间的关系。

二﹑国度和圣约

上一课，我们涉及到一个事实，就是整本旧约统一在神的国降临在地上如同在天上这个主题上。本课，我们将要了解，「圣约」的概念也很接近旧约信仰的中心。旧约中圣约的重要性从很多方面表现出来，比如，常常翻译成「盟约」（希伯来文בְּרִית / brit /）的词出现大约287次。书中关于神国的圣约一词的突出地位常常产生一个很重要的问题：那就是神的圣约怎样涉及到神的国度？这两个极其重要的《圣经》概念之间有什么样内在的联系？

为了回答这些问题，我们从两点来看：第一，我们将要介绍最近的一些考古发现，这些考古发现提供了理解《圣经》盟约基本特点的背景；第二，我们也要看一看，这些发现怎样帮助我们了解神的国和神的约之间内在的《圣经》联系。让我们先简单描述最近的一些和我们研究《圣经》圣约相关的考古发现。

考古发现

有关旧约其中一个很值得注意的事情就是，旧约不是一个神话故事，里面所记载的事件确确实实在天底下发生过的，而且就发生在古代中东地区。作为当代人研读旧约《圣经》最令人兴奋的情况之一，就是透过最近的一些考古发现，我们有幸比了解到更多有关《圣经》的古代世界。我们比过去的基督徒知道得更多。结果，我们发现有了这些背景知识，就增强了对旧约的理解。尤其是想要理解旧约中的圣约，这些背景就更显得更加重要。上个世纪里，发现了很多有关古代以色列周围国家的文化和文明，帮助我们更多的体察《圣经》圣约的突出特点。

许多古代文献帮助我们更彻底地了解圣约，但是，就我们现在学习的目的，其中一个最重要的发现，就是一组文献的出土，这些文献是宗主国和附庸（诸侯）国的条约。其实，不要让这些术语困扰你，「宗主国」一词和拉丁文的「凯撒（Caesar）」、俄文的「沙皇(Czar)」、德文的「皇帝(Kaiser)」都是同一个词根，简单的意思就是「皇帝」。当然，「附庸（诸侯）国（Vassal）」一词的意思是「臣仆、从仆」，或者在此处的意思是，「皇帝的臣仆」。一个宗主国和附庸（诸侯）国的条约是一个大国王（宗主国）和一个小国王或国家间所达成的国际协定。在这些条约内，小的国王和国家是大的国王的臣仆。

《圣经》中的古代世界是一个王国的世界，从很多方面，这个政治现实在古代近东地区占主导地位，以致影响人们生活中几乎每一件事情的思维方式。若是论及到王国的形成过程、维系方式、以及治理方法，情况就更加如此。古代世界，一些强大的国王，象埃及法老、赫人有势力的国君、以及亚述的帝王，往往会透过占领或吞并临近弱小的国家和城邦来扩张他们的王国，当然，并不是所有的国际关系都用一模一样的方式来处理，但是，大多数这样的关系都要透过我们现在所说的宗主附庸国的条约来形成和处理。宗主国和附庸国的条约对学习旧约很重要，重要的原因有很多，但是我们只特别涉及一个主要的思想：就是宗主国和附庸国的条约是国王设计来治理他们的各诸侯国的。

为了帮助领略一下这些君王治理的特色，我们先来描述一个典型的宗主国和附庸国间条约的内容。几乎毫无例外，这些古代条约的范本都遵循三个有轨可循的模式。第一，条约的开始就会强调国王向他的附庸国所显示出王的慈爱和善良。在条约起初的导言里，国王把自己看成是配受赞美的荣耀的君王。历史上有一段时期，导言后面还紧接着一个有关历史的序言，在序言里，国王会历数他为子民所作的许多历史功绩。

宗主国和附庸国的条约的第二个主要部分主要集中在要求附庸国的忠心上面，条约清楚地说明附庸国需要顺服的方面，详细列出规则条令，解释附庸国怎样按照期望要求生活在宗主王国里面。

宗主国和附庸国的条约的第三主要部分，强调附庸国忠心以及不忠心所导致的后果。条约应许忠心的仆人将来会得到祝福和报偿；同时，条约也威吓不忠心的仆人要从他们的国王受到种种的诅咒和惩罚。

当然，条约中还包括其他的部分，比如，为条约文件提供安全妥善的保存，祈求神做为见证人来看顾条约中的条文，以便条约得以执行而不被忘掉。然而，宗主附庸国之间关系的中心是用下列这种方式来表述的。强大的国王宣称他们对较小的附庸国及其国王负有仁义慈爱，因为这种仁爱，宗主国要求他们的附庸国要忠心，对于附庸国的忠心和不忠心，他们列出很多积极和消极的后果，正如我们将要看到的，宗主国和附庸国条约的这三个主要特点可以帮助我们更清楚明白旧约中圣约的性质，以及他们如何与神的国相关联。

有了宗主国和附庸国条约的概念，我们现在看看在我们探讨圣约和国度的关系时，它们能给我们提供什么样的见解。

《圣经》见解

首先从广义上讲，我们应该说约或者berit这个概念描述了很多种关系。它指出朋友之间、夫妻之间、政治领袖之间、部落之间以及国家之间的关系。在旧约中，这些关系统称为立约的关系，因为这种立约以相互的职责和期望把人们彼此正式束缚起来。但是这种关系繁杂不同，他们的盟约在很多方面也不一样。不仅如此，《圣经》有时把这些不同的盟约关系与神和他百姓之间的关系相比较。比如，我们与神的关系被描写成婚姻的关系、家庭结合的关系、以及朋友的关系。因此，从不同种类的盟约，我们可以对我们自己和神有很多的了解。

但是，本课我们涉及的不是这种广义范围内的类比，而是旧约中一个特别类型的盟约，就是神的圣约。这些圣约是神自己和他的百姓所立的约。旧约中，神总共立了6个主要的圣约，即神分别与亚当、挪亚、亚伯拉罕、摩西、大卫和基督所立的约。这一课，我们主要的兴趣在于理解这些圣约的特点以及他们怎样和神的国联系起来。

我们将在本课探讨这6个盟约，但是在此，我们以其中的一个，即与摩西所立的约为例，简要地来看看宗主国和附庸国的条约如何帮助我们理解旧约中圣约的特点。神与摩西所立的这个盟约尤其符合我们的目的，因为神在这个约里面比旧约中其他的约向我们彰显更多的内容。

当我们看神与摩西所立的约，非常明显，其结构和古代近东宗主国和附庸国条约的结构极为类似。摩西的约包含了宗主国和附庸国条约中相同的三个结构成分，这种相似性可以从根本上帮助我们理解神的圣约，也就是神作为大君王即以色列的大君王，来治理他国度的方式。

在此，看一段特别的经文，可能会帮助我们明白这种相似性。出埃及记第19章第4节－6，神透过摩西以这种方式和以色列立约：

这几节经文的场景是神和以色列立约时的情景，当时以色列在去应许之地的路途中，聚集在西奈山下。这些极其相近地反映了宗主国和附庸国条约的三个主要结构。

你可能回忆起宗主国和附庸国条约有三个主要部分：陈明国王的慈爱；要求附庸国效忠；以及忠心和不忠心所带来的后果。极为有趣的是，在出埃及记第19章第4节－6中介绍的摩西之约，也同样有这三个利害关系。

首先，神提醒以色列百姓，他曾恩慈地从把他们从埃及为奴之地带领出来，以此彰显他的慈爱。正如他在出埃及记19:4所说的，

和古代近东地区的国王一样，神提醒以色列百姓记着他曾经是他们的王，他曾经行了大事，把他们从埃及地拯救出来，而且，正是在神对他的百姓慈爱的境况下，神与他们立约。

第二，神要人们对他忠心。再看出埃及记第19章第5节：

和古代近东地区的宗主国一样，神要求他的人类臣仆忠心。虽然摩西之约是基于神的怜悯，而不是人的行为，但是神仍然要他的仆人们忠心，摩西的律法清楚地说明了表示他们忠心的多种方式，神期望人们遵守圣约的规定。

第三，摩西之约也设定了神的百姓忠心和不忠心的后果。出埃及记第19章第5节－6清楚地表示了这一部分。

和古代近东的国王一样，神很清楚地说明，如果百姓忠心，他们就会受到大大的祝福，这个祝福是极宝贵财产，就是祭司的国度。暗含的意思就是，如果他们不忠心他们不但没有这些很大的祝福，反而会受到咒诅。

因此，我们看到宗主国和附庸国条约的三个结构模式，也出现在神与摩西的立约中：就像宗主国宣称对他们的附庸国有慈爱那样，当神和以色列立约时，他首先建立对他们的慈爱；接下来提出神期望人类对他要忠心；然后，立约又具体提到如果人们对神忠心的话，会受到祝福，反之，将受到咒诅的后果。

摩西之约反映了宗主国和附庸国条约的这些组成部分，这个事实证明了当神和他的百姓立约时，从基本的标准上，神向以色列显示了他是他们的大君王，是他们的国王，而且，他要他的子民知道他们是他的臣仆。旧约中的圣约从根本上讲，是神安排的。神的国和圣约密不可分，因为圣约是神统管神国的方式。这些约是神国的行政治理，要带领神的国向最终扩展到地极的这一方向发展。

我们既然已经了解圣约的一个基本功用，就是治理或支配神国的人生，那么，现在我们要看看第二个主题：旧约《圣经》中圣约的历史发展。

三﹑圣约的历史

正如我们在前面的课程所看到的，旧约中，神国的历史是综合复杂的，神的国度在向其目标，即扩张到全地发展时，经历了很多不同的阶段或时代。在此，我们要看看在神国度的每一个阶段或时期，神设立不同的圣约，来着重处理国度中不同时期人们面临和遭遇到的特殊问题。我们可以有很多方式来处理旧约中圣约的发展历史，但是，我们将从三个主要的阶段来探讨这个历史问题。第一，普世性的约；第二，国家或民族性的约；第三，新约。

正如我们已经提到的，总共有6个主要的圣约涵盖整个旧约历史：即神分别与亚当、挪亚、亚伯拉罕、摩西、大卫、基督立约。配合前面课程中我们提到的神国度的历史阶段，我们要把这六个约分成三个组。我们要讲到在太古历史中，神与亚当、挪亚所立的普遍性的约；我们会讲到神拣选以色列国作为他的特殊子民时，与亚伯拉罕、摩西和大卫所立的国家性的约；我们也会讲到神国的新约阶段，神在基督里所立的新约。因此，当我们处理这些神的圣约时，我们会分别考查这三组圣约在旧约历史中的发展。让我们先来看看在太古历史中神所设立的普遍性的约。

普世性之约

我们说神与亚当和挪亚所立的约是「普遍」性的约，是因为这些约是神和所有人类之间的约。在太古历史时期，当设立这些约的时候，神还没有认定以色列作为他的特殊选民。与此相反，亚当和挪亚代表了各个族群和不同国家中的每一个人，必然的结果是，发生在他们身上的事情将会影响到他们之后所有的人类。

这些普遍性的圣约，满足了太古时期神国度治理和运作的需要。正是在这个时期，神建立了他国度的最基本性的次序和安排，来支配和管理着神与整个人类至始至终的关系。

我们将按照时间顺序来考查这些普世性的约，从亚当之约开始，再转到挪亚之约，让我们先看看神与亚当立的约。

亚当

我们都知道，亚当是 上帝创造的第一个人，因此，当我们说亚当之约时，我们指的是能想到的人类最早的历史阶段。一点也不奇怪，我们发现《圣经》关于亚当之约的教导，集中在人类生活的几个最基本的方面。

亚当之约出现在创世记前三章神创造世界的记载之中。其实，我们应该稍微提一下，一些基督徒并不同意神和亚当有正式立约，这些信徒中大部分人的观点基于这样一个事实，即「约」这个词在创世记的前三章并没有出现，有一些人还争论说在这几章中没有发现圣约的基本轮廓。然而，有三点证据强有力地显示了神的的确确与人类的代表亚当有立约的关系。首先，象我们在本课的后面要看到的，圣约的基本成分都确实出现在创世记的1－3章。神的慈爱，人类忠心的要求以及忠心和不忠心带来的后果都出现在这些章节里面。

神与亚当立约的第二个证据是在何西阿书第6章第7节，经文这样说，

这段经文把以色列的罪和亚当在伊甸园所犯的罪相比较，提到他们两者都违背了神的盟约，以色列背约正如亚当在伊甸园里背约一样。

神与亚当立约的第三个证据出现在创世记第6章第18节，这节经文是《圣经》中第一次正式使用「约」这个词，创世记第6章第18节中， 上帝对挪亚这样说，

这节经文很重要，因为翻译成「我要立」这个词语不是一般意义上的含义「开始或重新设立一个约」，而是「重申、确认」一个已经存在的约。挪亚之约的出现是确认前面已经存在的盟约，即神与亚当所立之约。

无论我们称神对亚当的安排是不是一个「盟约」，很显然，神和亚当建立了一个严肃的关系，而亚当代表了整个人类。这个与亚当的安排或盟约的焦点是建立了神与人类关系最基本的形态。由于这个原因，我们可以称之为根基之约。这个盟约中，神为人类生活在这个世界上设立了基本的生存模式。亚当和夏娃被指定作为神尊贵祭司的形象，要把神的国扩展到地极。但是他们被引诱，他们失败了。他们遭受了他们悖逆的痛苦，但是神却仍旧给他们希望。简而言之，亚当之约设置了长久以来人类和神之间关系的范畴，设立了我们在他国度中的使命基础。

挪亚

第二个普遍性的约，就是神与挪亚立的约，这个约有很多东西可讲，但是我们只是简单介绍一些《圣经》中突出记载的中心议题。挪亚之约也是建立在神国度的太古阶段，涉及到一些全人类都要面临的最根本问题。

神与挪亚的约记载在创世记的两章经文里面，即创世记6章和9章。神在创世记第6章第18节这样说，

正如我们已经提到的，挪亚之约不是一个自成一体、全新的约，它实际上是一个确认的约，也就是说，是对神与亚当之约或安排的进一步完善。

与挪亚立约强调的重点是什么？这个问题的答案是在洪水之后，神在实质上确立了这个约。创世记第9章第9节－11，这样记载这个盟约：

就如我们这里看到的，神与挪亚所立的约，以某种重要的方式，影响了从那个时候起一切的活物。

挪亚之约的设立确定了创造次序的稳定性，由于这个原因，此约可称为稳定之约。你可以记起，在前面的课程，我们了解到当挪亚和他的家离开方舟时，神知道人类严重的罪的倾向性，而且表明了实现其国度目的的长期计划。创世记第8章第21节－22说，

为了保证这个计划，神与挪亚立约，应许自然要保持稳定，以便人类能够在堕落的世界中繁衍下去。这个普世性的约，和与亚当所立的约一样，建立了人类生存的基本结构，适应于任何地方、任何时候和任何民族。

我们既然已经了解到，神怎样透过与亚当和挪亚立约，建立其国度的基本次序，保障其国度的目的，我们就把注意力转到以色列开始进入神国度中心的历史时期。

国家性之约

当神的国从太古时代进入到神特别注重以色列的时期，神设立三个民族或国家性的盟约。我们称这些盟约为「国家性的约」，是因为它们主要涉及的是作为神特别的选民以色列人。我们将以时代顺序来看看这些国家性的约，从亚伯拉罕开始，接着到摩西，最后是大卫。

亚伯拉罕

因为第一个国家性的约是与亚伯拉罕所立的，所以亚伯拉罕就被称为全以色列之父，创世记第15章和17章清楚地提到了亚伯拉罕之约。第一次提到神与亚伯拉罕立约出现在创世记第15章第18节，

这里所说的「立约」，字面意思就是「签约」，是表示开始一个盟约关系的正常方式。接着，几年之后，神详细阐明了他与这位族长的盟约，在创世记第17章第1节－2，这样说，

这段经文，神「确认」或者「建造」以前他在15章与亚伯拉罕所立的约。这个词和创世记第6章第18节所用的词是一样的，当时，神向挪亚确认他先前与亚当所立的约。

与亚伯拉罕所立的约很重要，因为它将以色列民族跟地上很多别的民族分别出来，成为神特别的器皿，要把神在天上的国带到整个地上。这个过程的第一步就是为这个民族设立一个异象，神应许亚伯拉罕有众多的后裔，以及可以建立国家的土地，以此来建立神的国。因着这个原因，亚伯拉罕之约可以称之为应许之约。就像创世记第15章第18节记载的，

而且创世记第17章第2节也说，

这些圣约的应许，为以色列人作为神国中子民的全部盼望，设立了一个永远的异象。

摩西

以色列人迁到埃及，遭受奴役之苦后，神带领他们进入到国家之约的第二阶段，就是与摩西所立之约。与摩西所立之约和亚伯拉罕之约紧密相连，从许多方面，它增进了亚伯拉罕之约，摩西没有把他自己看成是前所未有的，相反，摩西常常提到亚伯拉罕之约是他在国度中所有工作的基础。在出埃及记第32章第13节中，摩西代表民族这样恳求神：

与摩西的国家之约不是一个取代了亚伯拉罕之约的全新之约，相反，它是建立在神与亚伯拉罕所立之约的基础之上，与之融洽一致，相得益彰。

我们晓得神透过摩西与以色列人所立的圣约，主要记载在出埃及记的19－24章，当神在西奈山下聚集以色列12个支派，使他们形成一个国家，一个政治上一体的子民，虽然在摩西之前，神的百姓也有规章制度，但是，和任何一个新兴的国家一样，那个时候，以色列所需要的东西，其中一个主要的就是一套律法系统，一套规章制度来治理国家的生活，因此，神赐给以色列人十条戒命和约书来指导整个国家，由于这个原因，和摩西所立之约可以称之为律法之约。

实际上，摩西之约十分强调律法，以致当以色列民同意参与这个圣约时，他们的承诺是以对神律法承诺的形式出现。出埃及记第19章第7节－8这样说，

因此，我们看到神与以色列人的第二个盟约是与摩西所立的盟约，这个盟约是一个强调神律法的盟约。

大卫

现在我应该转到大卫王时期的以色列之约，这个时期以色列已经成为一个完全成熟的王国。大卫之约也是一个国家性的约，因此它和前面的摩西之约息息相关。所罗门在历代志下第6章第16节说得很清楚，神对大卫的应许依赖于对摩西律法的信实，经文这样说，

大卫之约建立在以前神与以色列人所立之约的基础之上。

虽然我们无法确切知道具体的什么时间神与大卫立了此约，但是诗篇89篇这段经文清楚地说明了大卫之约的内容。诗篇第89章第3节－4这样讲述神对大卫的应许，

这段经文指出大卫之约主要集中在以色列的王权上，更精确地说，这个约应许大卫他的后裔要永远坐在以色列的王位上。当大卫成为神百姓的君王之后，他通过把以色列变为一个王朝来祝福他的国家，也就是说，他带领他们进入国度发展的更高一层。为保障国家将来的祝福，神应许稳固的永久王位继承方式，即设立一个王朝。所以，我们可以把大卫的约称之为以色列的王权之约。

新约

既然我们对普遍性的约和国家性的约有了一定的基本理解，现在让我们看一看贯穿神国度最后一个阶段的盟约：即新约。除了我们已经看到的5个圣约之外，旧约的先知提到在神国度的最后阶段，将会有一个新约，他们宣称这个新约比以前任何一个盟约都伟大。

《圣经》中很多地方都提到了这个新约，但是耶利米书31章和以西结书37章是两处很重要的经文。耶利米书第31章第31节中这样提到「新约」：

先知以西结在几个场合下都提到这一相同盟约是永久的平安之约，以西结书第37章第26节这样说，

所有的基督徒都知道，当保罗提醒哥林多人耶稣在最后的晚餐时所说话，他很清楚地表明这个永远的、平安的新约在基督里面实现了，保罗在哥林多前书第11章第25节这样记载耶稣的话：

神透过在基督里的新约来治理神国的最后阶段，我们称之为新约时代。这个新约的设立是为了在这个阶段治理神的百姓，而这个时期是神要完成在太古时期所建立的，又透过以色列国而增进的国度目标。由于这个原因，最好把它看作成全之约。

这个成全之约是为了治理那些结束被掳，将神的国扩展到地极的神的百姓而设立的。新约是神的承诺，他要将他的子民变为被饶恕和被救赎的族类，能够全力服事神，而永不失败。耶利米在耶利米书第31章第31节－34 这样描述这种变化：

就如前面课程我们看到的一样，神国度最后阶段的来临分三个时期。它的开始时期是透过基督在地上的事工以及使徒的工作；它的发展时期就是我们现在的时间；它的完成时期只有在基督再来，成就一切事情之时。

牢记新约国度中的这个三个时期，对于理解神如何建立新约非常重要。从很多方面，新约的结果也来自三个阶段。新约的转换从基督的第一次来开始生效，新约的发展则是要跨越整个基督教会的历史。然而，只有当基督再来时，新约最终的实现才会发生。当那一天来临时，新约将是神整个所有圣约历史的完全实现。从而神在亚当之约、挪亚之约、亚伯拉罕之约、摩西之约、和大卫之约治理中的终极目的就在新约里完全的达成。

既然已经明白了圣约是神在历史中，治理其国度的手段和方式，我们就转到第三个主题：圣约的动态。每一个约是怎样协调支配神与人之间的互动？

四﹑圣约的动态

在回答这些问题之前，我们需要指出重要的一点，就是有一些经文是直接地涉及到神正式进入与人类立约或者确认盟约关系的那个时刻，因而这些经文对每一个盟约分别强调其不同的重点。但是在这些不同重点的背后，我们需要更多地了解有关圣约人生的动态。

亚当之约强调在世界开始之初需要建立一个特定的基本模式；挪亚之约强调自然的稳定性；亚伯拉罕之约着重神的应许；摩西之约强调神的律法；大卫之约突显了大卫王朝是神特别拣选的王室；而新约则是强调圆满实现。但是，这些着重点不是对圣约人生的综合描述，而只是提到了这些圣约特定的突出部分。为了看到圣约里，一个更全面的、动态的人生画面，我们必需认识到圣约中的人生，包含了远比这些着重点更多的要素。

亚当和神立约的关系，不能简单地说它仅仅涉及了一些基础；挪亚时期，人类和神之间的互动不仅仅只包含了自然的稳定；亚伯拉罕时期，与神的关系也超越了应许之外的很多事情；神在摩西时代的治理也不仅仅局限在神律法的范畴；大卫时期，神和他百姓之间的关系，也不是仅仅参照大卫的王朝；新约中，与神有约的人生远比约的成就这个重点要更为复杂。

在我们探讨圣约的人生时，我们会了解到，所有的圣约都遵循相同的基本安排，就是我们已经看到的古代近东宗主国和附庸国条的三个模式的结构。神圣约中的人生动态常常包含了神的慈爱，对人类忠心的要求，以及人忠心和不忠心所带来的后果。

为了解明旧约中圣约的动态，我们要看看这三个因素在旧约的每一个圣约怎样出现。首先，我们要看一下起初普遍性的盟约；第二，我们要看看神与以色列所立的国家性之约的动态；第三，我们要看看这些动态在基督的新约里面如何呈现。让我们先看看最初普遍性的盟约。

普世性之约

太古历史时期，神与亚当建立了基础之约，与挪亚建立了自然稳定之约，但是这些圣约之下的人生则包含了更大范围之内的东西，可以归纳在神的慈爱，人类的忠心，和人类忠心及不忠心所产生后果这三个条款之下。我们简单看一下，在初始时期的每一个约里都是这样：首先是与亚当的约，接着是与挪亚的约。

亚当

第一点，即使在人类第一个男人和女人犯罪之前，神已向他们施行了很多慈爱。他为人类预备了这个世界，使之从混沌状态变为次序井然。神为亚当和夏娃创造了一个壮丽辉煌的伊甸园，让他们居住，赐给他们各种各样的特权，这些慈爱的举动为神与人类第一个立约的方式做了铺垫。

第二点，亚当之约也要求人类忠诚守信，除了要求亚当和夏娃以神的形象来服事之外，神用分别善恶树来试验他们的忠心。神在创世记第2章第16节－17吩咐说，

亚当时期，在圣约下的人生，神要求人类要忠心是无可否认的。

第三点，亚当和夏娃的忠心和不忠心都会产生一定的后果。神非常清楚地告诉亚当和夏娃，如果他们不忠心而吃了禁果，他们的后果就是要遭到咒诅。就像神在创世记第2章第17节告诉他们的：

其暗含的意思就是，如果亚当和夏娃通过了这个试验，他们就会得到大大的祝福，就是他们可以服事神，扩展神的国度。

因此，神与亚当之约的关系也包含了因忠心和不忠心而带来的后果。所有适合于亚当和夏娃的情形，同样适合于他们的后裔，和神一起的人生继续包含了神的慈爱、人类的忠心以及其带来的后果。

挪亚

除了和亚当的盟约之外，在这三个圣约动态上，神也涉及到挪亚及其后裔。

首先，神的慈爱预备了挪亚之约的方式。当神按照其公义的审判，决定要毁灭人类的时候，他也定意要救挪亚及其全家。创世记第6章第8节这样说，

神向挪亚和他的全家施行了极大的慈爱。

第二，神要求挪亚对神忠心。神吩咐挪亚建造方舟，聚集动物。听听创世记第6章第18节－19，与挪亚立约和挪亚的责任的关联是何等的接近，这段经文这样说，

挪亚有责任和他的家人一起进入方舟，把动物也带进方舟，保全他们的性命。甚至在洪水之后，神重申挪亚的责任，就是要作为神的形象来完成人类的使命。还有其他的事情，神在创世记第9章第7节说，

挪亚之约的重点在神对自然稳定的应许上，这并没有排除挪亚以及其所代表的人类对神的忠心。

第三，挪亚时代，也存在人类忠心和不忠心所带来的后果。挪亚自己对神很忠心，因此，神喜悦他在洪水之后给神的献祭，祝福他，给他一个稳定的世界。就像创世记第8章第20节－21所说的，

但是神也清楚地表明，如果违背神就会遭受咒诅的严厉后果。比如，在创世记第9章第6节，神说，杀人的人将要受到咒诅，

圣约中人生的三个动态也继续适用于挪亚整个的后裔。

国家性之约

所有在太古时期的普遍性之约中显示的真理，也同样适用在神与以色列所立的国家性之约中。亚伯拉罕之约的重点在应许上，摩西之约则强调律法，大卫之约的重点是大卫家永远的王位，这三个约都遵循宗主国和附庸国条约的模式。 上帝的慈爱，人类的忠心以及人忠心与否导致的后果，这些动态要素都出现在这三个约圣约的不同阶段中。再一次，我们要按他们出现的次序逐个看一看这些圣约：首先是亚伯拉罕；接着是摩西；最后是大卫。

亚伯拉罕

亚伯拉罕之约强调对以色列的后裔和土地的应许，但是这个时期，约的三个动态都依然运作。第一，神向亚伯拉罕彰显极大的慈爱，比如，在最初呼召亚伯拉罕的时候，也就是在与神立约的很多年前，神就向神亚伯拉罕显明极大的慈爱，神在创世记第12章第2节这样说，

亚伯拉罕整个的人生中，神向以色列的这位族长大施怜悯，赦免其罪，称他为义，在患难中保护他。

第二，神也要求这位族长忠心，比如，即使在神最初呼召的时候，也要求亚伯拉罕遵守。创世记第12章第1节我们看到神这样吩咐他：

神要求亚伯拉罕离开他的本地和父家，到一个他从来没有见过的地方。请听创世记第17章第1节－2，在神与亚伯拉罕确认他的约时，怎样提醒亚伯拉罕要忠心：

尽管很多基督徒看不到这一点，但是，亚伯拉罕与神的立约关系不全部都是应许；和旧约中其他全部的圣约一样，神要求亚伯拉罕忠心顺服。

第三，亚伯拉罕的忠心或者不忠心会有不同的结果，这一点，神说的非常清楚。我们再听听创世记第17章第1节－2，神要求亚伯拉罕要忠心，尤其注意第二节祝福的结果，

接着第二节

神明确地说亚伯拉罕后裔的繁盛是忠心的结果。相应地，神也说，不忠心将带来严重的咒诅，创世记17:10-14，神这样告诉亚伯拉罕说，

神要求割礼作为承诺对盟约忠心的记号，以致以色列男人当中任何人不受割礼，就要遭受从神的民中被剪除的咒诅，被排除在圣约人生的祝福之外。这三个盟约动态密切相连地出现于亚伯拉罕的约中，而且从亚伯拉罕到下一个摩西之约之间，继续掌控、治理着神子民的人生。

摩西

神与以色列民族设立的第二个盟约是与摩西所立之约。我们已经知道，这个盟约的重点是神的律法，因为设立这个约的时候，正是神要将以色列从部落民族变为一个统一的国家。但是，如果认为在摩西之约下的人生没有其他的圣约所包含的动态，那就大错特错了。为了证明所有约的动态都出现在摩西之约里面，让我们简单看一下这个约的核心，就是十条戒命。

十条戒命中，在引入神的律法之前的序言里面，神的慈爱就清晰可见。你可能记起来，在出埃及记第20章第2节，十条戒命的开始是这样的，

神与摩西的约不是行为之约，而是怜悯和恩典之约。虽然如此，十条戒命说得很清楚，神要求他的子民要忠心，就象出埃及记第20章第3节，第一条戒命所说的，

神的恩典和人的忠心并不冲突；相反，它支持而且导致忠心的要求。除此之外，在出埃及记第20章第4节－6，十戒提到忠心或不忠心而产生的后果，

出现在十戒中约的动态从摩西时代一直延展到大卫之约时的所有人生。

大卫

神与以色列民族所立的最后一个盟约，就是大卫之约，强调了神要建立大卫的后裔成为治理以色列的永久王朝。然而，当我们从大的画面来看时，很显然，以色列王权的恩赐也来自神的慈爱、人类的忠心及其后果这样的环境中。诗篇第89章第3节－4这样论及神与大卫的约：

这些经文反映了神向大卫所显示的慈爱。他拣选大卫，建立大卫及其子孙成为治理以色列的永久王朝。但是神要求他们忠心，而且警告由于不忠心所产生的严重后果，诗篇第89章第30节－32这样说，

如果大卫的子孙离弃了神的律法，他们会受到严厉惩罚，另外一方面，如果大卫的子孙忠心于神，他们就会受到大大的祝福。我们读以色列的历史，从大卫时代直到旧约结束时期，显而易见，这些约的动态依然是盟约人生中的特点。因此，三个约的动态都出现在旧约时期以色列的每一个圣约里面。

把普遍性之约和国家性之约里面的人生动态存在心里，我们已经准备好转到新约，就是成全之约。

新约

透过旧约的诸约来治理运作而逐步发展的神的国度，因着耶稣基督亲自设立新约的事工而到达它的高潮。虽然如此，就像在其他圣约里面那样，基本《圣经》盟约的动态在基督的新约里面也是显而易见的。首先，新约中包含神的慈爱。当神设立新约时，神应许向被掳的子民大施恩慈。象耶利米书第31章第34节说的，

新约以这种以及其他很多方式清楚地显示神的仁慈。

同时，人类的忠心也是新约的一个因素。神没有答应除去他的律法，也没有要求人们不去遵守。相反，他要求人们的忠心。但是神也在耶利米书第31章第33节应许说，

这节经文教导我们神会给他的子民一颗喜爱律法的心，这样，人们可以从心底里顺服他。

最后，忠心的结果也是显然的，象耶利米书第31章第33节说的，

这个结构提供了一种确据，神要带给他的子民极大的祝福，因为他们要遵守盟约的职责。

我们必需时常记住，遵循神的国在基督里末后世代的模式，新约是通过三个阶段来产生其果效的。新约的奠基阶段是在耶稣的第一次降临和使徒们的事工中；新约的延续贯穿在整个教会历史中，透过基督在教会里掌权，以多种方式开花结果；最后，新约的成全是在神国度的成就阶段，当耶稣基督在荣耀中二次降临时，到达其完全的地步。

首先，新约的奠基是因为基督完成了他在地上的事工。基督忠心于所有盟约的要求，从他出生起，他从来没有违背过他的天父，不仅如此，因为基督替人的罪死在十字架上，做了赎罪祭，他的义就算在所有在基督里有得救信心的人身上。基督一次性的献祭是如此的完全，不需要重复。希伯来书的作者在希伯来书第10章第12节－14如此说，

因为这个赎罪祭，新约就已拉开的序幕。就象希伯来书作者在希伯来书第9章第12节－15所讲的，

神介入历史，通过差遣他的儿子遵守神律法的每一部分，并以自己献上当作完全无瑕的赎罪祭，来设立新约。基督的赎罪祭为那些在基督里有得救信心的人，带来永久的赦免。

尽管基督第一次降临的救赎工作非常重要，但是新约的伟大救恩也依赖于基督在新约中，持续作中保的工作。日复一日，基督在天上父神的宝座前替他的百姓代求。再一次，希伯来书的作者指出这个事实，希伯来书第7章第24节－25这样说，

因为基督作王且替我们代求，我们可以确信基督将带领所有在他里面有信心的人，度过我们现在面临的试探和困难。

最后，因为耶稣已经替我们付了罪债，而且继续替我们代求，我们可以确信将来有一天耶稣会第二次降临，完成新约里面所有的应许。象希伯来书的作者在希伯来书第9章第28节解释的，

当那一天到来时，每一个相信基督的人将在神永远的新天新地的国度里面，得到完全的圣洁和永远的生命。因此，当我们读到关于《圣经》里的盟约时，记着每个圣约阶段都有其与众不同的重点，这是非常明智的。但是我们也同时必需牢记，与神有约的人生包含比这些重点更多的要素。神圣约里人生的每个阶段都包含了全范围的约的动态。

我们已经明白圣约里的人生如何伴随三个约的动态：神向人施的慈爱，人要忠心的要求，及其忠心或不忠心所产生的结果。现在，我们转到我们最后的主题：圣约中的子民。

五﹑圣约中的子民

谁是神约中的子民？哪些人包含在神的约中，哪些人不包含在里面？这些不同的人怎样涉及到神圣约的动态？为了回答这些问题，我们需要涉及两个方面：第一，我们将探讨人类不同的分类；第二，我们将要看一看约的动态对这些不同人群的应用。让我们首先来看看人类根据与神圣约的关系应有的分类方式。

人类的分类

很遗憾，我们生活在一个对圣约的子民非常模糊不清的时代。极大程度上，福音派基督徒认为在世界上有两种人：信徒和非信徒，得救的和没有得救的。其实，这种基本分类一点没有错，《圣经》也很多次这样说。但是这样会产生问题，因为很多福音派把信徒和在神的圣约里面有份的人划等号，而把非信徒和在神的圣约之外的人等同起来。按照这种想法，只有两种人，任何得救的人都是在神的圣约里面的人，任何没有得救的人就是在圣约之外的人。

但是，当我们仔细察看圣约中的子民时，很快就明显地发现这种简单的二分法，没有办法充分地描述人类状态。为了找到一个比较适当的方式来考虑人的分类，我们着眼于两个问题：第一，圣约之内人的分类；第二，那些包含在圣约之内的人和那些排除在圣约之外的人之间的分类。

圣约之内的人

第一点，我们应注意到，《圣经》中每一个圣约都出现重要的人的分类。旧约中每一个盟约中都同时包含了信徒和非信徒。在亚当之约和挪亚之约中，这点不难发现。他们严格地被称为普遍性的约，是因为所有的人，不管信徒或者非信徒，都因这些圣约而与神有关联。亚当之约中设立的基本原则，同时适用于那些有得救信心的人和那些没有得救信心的人。挪亚之约中神对自然稳定的应许，同时适用于信徒和非信徒。因此，在太古历史时期，在世界上有两种人：在神的约中的真信徒和同样也在神的约中的非信徒。

亚伯拉罕、摩西、大卫的国家之约也具有类似情况，每个盟约同时都包含了信徒和非信徒。旧约里面很清楚，经过这么多世纪，证明大多数的以色列人不是信徒，尽管他们也在神的约里面。整个国家作为圣约中的百姓，只有一些是真信徒，从他们的罪中永远得救。因此，以色列的国家之约包含了信徒和非信徒。这样看来，神与以色列所立的国家之约中的百姓，和神与亚当、挪亚所立的普遍性之约中的百姓非常相似。

现在，当我们考虑到关于新约的约中之民时，会出现另外一个复杂因素。新约中的应许，从某种意义上来说，约中的每一个人都是真信徒。听一听耶利米在耶利米书第31章第34节这样强调这个事实：

新约的盼望在于神的百姓要完全地从罪中得救赎。每个人都要认识耶和华，毫无例外。

但是，这是新约的最终目的，同时，我们还必需再次记得，新约时期，神国的完成需要三个阶段：在耶稣基督的第一次降临时奠基；在现今的教会中延续；在基督第二次荣耀降临时圆满完成。换句话说，新约的盼望不是在耶稣基督第一次降临时，就突然完全彻底地完成。

其结果是，在基督再次降临，带来完全的救恩之前，新约中同时存在信徒和非信徒。一方面，新约中的人包含了经历基督里得救信心的男女，不论犹太人还是外帮人，他们是基督的宝血买赎回来的真信徒，而且永永远远的因信称义。另外一方面，新约中的人也包含了犹太人和外帮人中的假信徒，虽然他们没有得救的信心，但是他们却经历了一定的新约祝福。

在约翰一书第2章第19节，使徒约翰提到教会中不信的人时这样说，

使徒在这里写到有关离开基督信仰的人，他说，从一种意义上讲，他们是「属于我们的」，也就是说，他们是基督教会的一部分。但是，他又说，因为离开信仰，他们很明显是「不属于我们的」。也就是说，他们不是真信徒。那么，约翰怎么知道这个呢？象他说的，如果他们真的属于我们，他们应该与我们同在。也就是说，他们应该持守信仰到底。

我们都知道，教会的花名册中包含了从罪中得救的人和没有得救的人。没有人宣称在新约中的每个人都是真正得救的人。即使我们不能常常分辨他们，但是新约明确地教导我们，在基督第二次降临之前，教会，也就是新约的团体，同时包含了真信徒和假信徒。

包含在约内和排除在约外的人

第二点，我们也必需认识到，在特定圣约之内的人和在特定圣约之外的人之间具有的重要分别。我们知道，每个人都包含在与亚当和挪亚立的普遍性的约里面。没有人排除在这些约所建立的根基原则和自然稳定之外。但是神一旦拣选以色列人作为他特殊的子民，人类的情形也就发生了变化。

随着以色列民被拣选作为神的圣约之民，就增加了复杂性。我们已经知道，亚伯拉罕、摩西、和大卫之约中同时包含了信徒和非信徒，但是这些盟约是与一群人所立的，这群人包括以色列人和少数归入以色列的外帮人，这意味着，在极大程度上，外帮民族被排除在这些约之外。准确地讲，所有的人，包括外帮人都是普遍性之约中的人，但是外帮人却不包括在以色列的国家之约以内。在以弗所书第2章第12节，保罗这样描述以弗所的没有信主之前的外帮人，

在以色列国家性约外面的人，没有神，也没有盼望。因此，到国家性之约的时候，实际上，世界上有三种人：那些在以色列圣约之内的真信徒；那些在以色列圣约之内的假信徒；那些在以色列圣约之外的人。

新约中也具有相同的三种情况。我们已经看到的，耶稣基督在荣耀里第二次降临之前，新约中同时包含信徒和非信徒。但是，除了新约中这两种人之外，我们也必需加上第三类，拒绝福音的男男女女，就是那些宣称他们不是基督徒的人，那些不属于教会的人。他们被排除在信仰之约以外。而在旧约国家性之约期间，那些在圣约之外的人基本上是外帮人，现在，耶稣基督已经来了，那些在新约之外的人既有犹太人，也有外帮人，他们都不属于基督，或者他的教会。

因此，我们了解，根据和圣约的关系，《圣经》以多种方式把人分类。普遍性的约包含了所有的人，信徒和非信徒；国家性的约把大部分的外帮人排除在外，但是，也包含了以色列中信徒和非信徒；直到耶稣基督再来洁净他的教会之前，新约把没有基督信仰的犹太人和外帮人排除在外，但是同时也包含了犹太人和外帮人中的信徒和非信徒。

我们既然已经明白了，人类根据与圣约的关系分成不同的类别，我们就转到另外一个问题：这些约的动态神的慈爱，人类的忠心，人类忠心和不忠心而导致的后果是如何应用到这些不同类别的人上？

动态的应用

当我们读旧约，试图理解经文的原意，而且怎样应用到我们今天的人生，重要的是，我们要记得，旧约时代最初读旧约的以色列人和我们今天读旧约的基督徒，都面临一个相似的三种类别的人：圣约外面的人，圣约里面的非信徒，圣约里面的真信徒。

这意味着，如果我们希望明白约的动态如何应用到生活在旧约时代的人们，然后把原意的不同层面和我们今天联系起来，我们就必需经常联想到这三种人。让我们首先看看约的动态怎样应用到那些不包括在以色列国家之约和新约之内的非信徒。

排除在约外的非信徒

虽然这些非信徒实际上失落的人，他们的确与亚当和挪亚之约有份，因而他们的人生也受到所有这些圣约动态的影响。第一点，所有的非信徒都经历了神向所有人施的恩慈。正如耶稣在马太福音第5章第44节－48所说的，

我们经常称这些祝福为「普遍恩典」，因为这些不是拯救的怜悯，而是向所有人施发的恩典。

第二点，即使在国家之约和新约外面的非信徒也有义务向他们的造物主忠心，很多在圣约之外的非信徒至少对神启示给以色列和教会的特殊启示有一定的了解，这些了解要求他们有责任忠心。但是，除此之外，即使那些对旧约和新约教导没有任何知识的人，也应透过普通启示或自然启示，基本了解他们有责任服事 上帝。正象保罗在罗马书第1章第20节说的，

因此，即使在以色列之约和新约之外的非信徒，也有一个最基本的责任敬拜服事他们的造物主。

第三点，在国家之约和新约外面的非信徒也经历他们行为所带来的后果，有些时候，当非信徒按真理行事为人时，神会给予他们暂时的祝福。即使这些非信徒活在智慧中的话，也有益处。另外一些时候，对于他们的恶行，神给予暂时的惩罚。尽管盟约之外的人有这些混合的经历，当基督再来时，这些不信的人得不到从神来永远的祝福，他们要接受神永远的审判。无论是处在当初以色列国家之约以外的非信徒，还是现在新约以外的非信徒，都以这些方式经历着普遍性盟约的动态。

包含在约内的非信徒

我们所涉及的第二类人是那些处在以色列国家之约和新约之内的非信徒。圣约的动态怎样应用到他们身上呢？第一点，神已经向这些人比那些在圣约之外的人显示更多的慈爱和怜悯。不错，他们没有得到得救的恩典，因为他们不是真正的信徒。然而，在旧约时，与以色列有份会有极大的优势，就象在新约中，如果与教会有份会有极大的优势一样。当使徒保罗描述不信的以色列人的好处时，谈到这种参与神特殊盟约的优势，罗马书第9章第4节这样说，

神对在以色列国家之约和新约中的非信徒比在这些圣约之外的非信徒彰显更大的怜悯。

旧约中，不信的犹太人从埃及被救出来，他们在西奈山接受神的律法，他们占领应许之地，他们在大卫及其子孙的统治下受到祝福。同样，新约教会的非信徒受真信徒的牧养照顾，他们在讲道中听到神的话，他们分享圣灵的工作。以此或其他方式，在特殊圣约团体中的非信徒得到极大的从 上帝而来的恩慈。

第二点，这些在以色列国家之约和新约中的非信徒，因为在约中而受到这些益处，相应地，他们也要求更高的忠心。他们对神的旨意的知识比在圣约之外的非信徒了解得更多，所以，他们也被要求更多的顺服和服事，正如耶稣在路加福音第12章第48节讲的，

那些听到神话语真理的人，那些知道神道路的人，有责任对神更加忠心。

第三点，在国家性之约和新约中的非信徒，也经历他们忠心和不忠心所带来的后果。一方面，他们在今生会受到强化的祝福或者惩罚，也就是，受到很多不同类型的短暂祝福或咒诅。但是，另外一方面，当基督再来时，在神的圣约里面的非信徒只有一个结果：就是永久的咒诅，永久的审判。因为他们不相信神在基督里面的应许，他们仍然失落在罪中，落入永久的惩罚。

希伯来书的作者如此警告新约里对非信徒的永久性审判，他在希伯来书第10章第28节－29这样说，

注意，这些人是被「约的血」「成圣」的，这并不意味着他们是得救的。他们只是被分别为圣，他们只是在神的约里面而已。当这些人违背神时，他们常常不同程度的这样做，只有一个结果，就是神永远的审判，这个审判是为神的仇敌所预备的。这个审判是更加严厉的，因为他们得到的恩慈也是巨大的。

因此我们看到，神的慈爱、人的忠心、及其后果，这些约的动态对于在国家性之约和新约之内的非信徒而言会更为强化。但是，最终的结果，如果这些非信徒不悔改，没有得救的信心，他们就会遭受神永远的审判。

包含在约内的信徒

我们读旧约而且使之应用到今天所必需涉及的第三类人，是圣约中真正的信徒。这些人是神奇妙的特殊子民，在基督里注定有不可夺去的永生。在他们身上，有神完全测不透的慈爱，包括罪得赦免，与神永远的同在，正如保罗在罗马书第8章第1节－2说的，

同时，当我们在神的律法里面不被定罪时，我们也被要求忠心顺服神，感谢神在基督里为我们所成就的事情。这就是为什么罗马书第8章第7节，保罗继续拿信徒和非信徒相比较，他说，

相对应，爱神的就顺服他的律法，因此，罗马书第8章第12节－13，保罗加上这些话，

换句话说，信徒有责任和非信徒生活得不一样，也就是说，他们有责任顺服神的律法，这样做不是为了挣得救恩，而是为了尊崇神。

象旧约中的以色列人，基督徒必需遵守《圣经》的原则规定，来检验证明他们的信心，旧约中真正的信徒被要求遵守摩西的律法，以此试验他们的信心，就如摩西在申命记第8章第2节告诉百姓的，

新约中的基督徒也要求同样的试验，保罗在哥林多后书第13章第5节告诉哥林多人，

基督是完全顺服的 神的儿子，他的义归于我们，使我们确信有永远的救恩。然而，在我们平常的生活中，我们要证明神已经给我们的救恩，保罗在腓立比书第2章第12节鼓励腓立比人说，

第三点，旧约和新约中真的信徒要体验他们忠心或不忠心而带来的后果。一方面，真信徒会经历神暂时的祝福和惩罚，最小程度上，我们被赋予圣灵的祝福，除此，神常常甚至给他的子民肉身上的祝福，但是，反过来也是一样，希伯来书的作者解释神透过管教来训练他的真子民，希伯来书第12章第6节写道，

因为主所爱的，他必管教，又鞭打凡所收纳的儿子。（希伯来书第12章第6节）

此时此刻，尽管这些现今的人生有这些混合经历，但是最终，圣约中的非信徒和圣约中真正的信徒将有很大的不同，那些有得救信心的人只有，也只能有一个结果。当基督在荣耀中再次降临时，只有真信徒将经历神永久的祝福，就像我们在启示录第21章第7节读到的，

当我们继续学习这个旧约系列时，我们有必要常常记得这三种人类的分类，以及盟约的动态如何应用到他们身上。当我们记得在国家性之约和新约之外的非信徒、在国家性之约和新约之内的非信徒，和这些约之内的真实信徒之间的差别，我们就能装备好理解旧约对最初的读者以色列的应用，我们也更能装备好了解怎样应用到我们今天。

旧约的每一段经文都在警告、鼓励最初的读者去思想他们与圣约关系的状况，我们今天也必须这样作。旧约随处都呼召那些在以色列之约外面的非信徒，要他们自己归向神，进入神的圣约里面，否则就要受到神永远的审判。今天，旧约也同样呼召那些在新约之外的人。最初，旧约呼召那些在以色列国家之约里面不信的人，现在也同样呼召那些在新约之内不信的人，凭信心接受神在基督里面的救恩应许，否则就要面临永远严厉的审判，因为他们违背了与神的盟约关系。旧约曾经呼召旧约时代的以色列中真正的信徒，现在也呼召在新约里面真正的信徒，要他们记得神向他们所施的怜悯，要他们忠心活在神面前来证明他们的信心，并要他们不断盼望在神的国度完成时，新天新地中永远的生命。

当我们记得如何将圣约的动态应用到这些不同种类的人群时，我们就能明白应该怎样把旧约应用到我们的人生和我们周围其他人的人生里。我们今天读旧约时，我们要询问每一段经文如何呼吁圣约之外的非信徒，进入神的新约里面。我们也要询问每一段经文如何呼求新约之内不信的人，使他们朝着在基督里有得救信心的方向迈进。我们也要寻求每一段经文，如何呼召新约里面真正的信徒要继续不断地增强他们的信心，在基督的新约里忠心感恩地生活。

六﹑总结

本课，我们介绍了有关圣约的《圣经》教导。我们已经了解到，神透过盟约的安排来治理他的国度；我们已经看到，旧约中的每一个圣约分别强调了神的国，在不同历史时期所要求的特殊事情；我们已经探讨了与神在圣约关系里的动态，并明白这些约的动态如何应用到过去和现在的不同人群的人生中。

当我们继续学习这个旧约纵览的课程时，我们将要时不时地回到圣约的这个主题上。圣约构成了旧约中的以色列信仰人生的结构和动态，同样，他们也构成了我们今天人生信仰的结构和动态。

Kingdom, Covenants, and Canon of the Old Testament: Divine Covenants

INTRODUCTION

If you were a king, an absolute monarch, how would you rule your kingdom? How would you manage the growth and the setbacks of your reign? How would you handle enemies and friends outside of your empire and how would you deal with traitors and faithful servants within your kingdom?

These are good questions to ask ourselves as we study the Old Testament. After all, the Old Testament presents God as the divine king who is building and expanding his kingdom to the ends of the earth. His kingdom has a long history of advances and setbacks. There have been both enemies and friends outside of God's kingdom, and there have been traitors and faithful servants within his kingdom. So, how did God decide to rule over his kingdom? How does he regulate life within his kingdom? The Bible's answer is this — God administered his kingdom through covenants.

This is the third lesson in our series, Kingdom, Covenants and Canon of the Old Testament. In this survey of the Old Testament we will see that the Old Testament is a book about the kingdom of God, a kingdom that God administered through covenants, which in turn were explained and applied to God's people in the books or "canon" of the Old Testament.

We have entitled this lesson "Divine Covenants" because we will be exploring how God governed his kingdom through a series of covenants that he established in Old Testament history. As we grasp the contours of these covenants, we will see more clearly how divine covenants guided the life of God's people in the Old Testament, and we will also see more clearly how they guide our lives even today.

Our exploration of divine covenants will divide into four parts. First, we will investigate the fundamental relationship between God's kingdom and his covenants. Second, we will look into the historical developments of covenants in the Old Testament. Third, we will examine the dynamics of life in covenant with God. And fourth, we will explore the people of the divine covenants. Let's turn first to the connection between God's kingdom and his covenants.

KINGDOM AND COVENANTS

In our last lesson we touched on the fact that the entire Old Testament is unified by the theme of God's kingdom coming to earth as it is in heaven. In this lesson we will see that the concept of "covenant" is very close to the heart of Old Testament faith as well. The importance of covenants in the Old Testament is evident in many ways, including the fact that the term usually translated "covenant," berit in Hebrew, appears some 287 times. The prominence of the term "covenant" in this book about God's kingdom raises an important question: How did divine covenants relate to the kingdom of God? What is the association between these two very central biblical concepts?

To answer these questions we will look at two issues. First, we will introduce some recent archaeological discoveries that provide a background for understanding the fundamental nature of biblical covenants. And second, we will see how these discoveries give us insights into the biblical connection between God's kingdom and his covenants. Let's begin simply by describing some recent archaeological discoveries that are relevant for our study of biblical covenants.

Archaeological Discoveries

One of the most remarkable things about the Old Testament is that it is not a fairy tale. The events we find described there actually took place in space and time, in the ancient world of the Middle East. One of the most exciting things about studying the Old Testament in our day is the fact that we have the privilege of knowing much more about that ancient world of the Bible through recent archaeology. We know much more than Christians have known in the past, and as a result, we often find that our understanding of the Old Testament is enhanced by this background knowledge. This is certainly true when it comes to understanding covenants in the Old Testament. In the last century, many discoveries were made about the cultures surrounding ancient Israel that have given us many insights into the character of biblical covenants.

Many different ancient writings help us understand covenants more thoroughly, but for our purposes, one of the most important discoveries is a group of writings known as suzerain-vassal treaties. Now, don't let this terminology throw you. The term "suzerain" comes from the same root as the Latin word Caesar, Czar in Russian, or Kaiser in German. It simply means "emperor." And of course, the term "vassal" means "servant," or in this case "servant of the emperor." A suzerain-vassal treaty was an international agreement made between a great emperor (or suzerain) on the one hand, and a lesser king and nation, on the other hand. Within these treaties, the lesser king and nation served as the vassals of the great emperor.

The ancient world of the Bible was a world of empires, and in many ways, this political reality so dominated the landscape of the Ancient Near East that it shaped the ways people thought about nearly everything in life. This was certainly true with respect to the ways empires were established, maintained, and administered. In the ancient world, great kings such as the Pharaohs of Egypt, the powerful kings of the Hittites, or the Assyrian Emperors would extend their kingdoms by conquering or annexing weaker nations and city-states. Of course, not every international relationship was handled in exactly the same way, but many of them were formalized and managed through what we now call suzerain-vassal treaties. Suzerain-vassal treaties are important to Old Testament studies for many reasons, but we are particularly concerned with one main idea: suzerain-vassal treaties were designed by kings for the administration of their kingdoms.

Now to get a flavor of what these imperial arrangements were like, it will help to describe the contents of typical suzerain-vassal treaties. With rare exceptions, the formal features of these ancient treaties followed a predictable threefold pattern. First, the treaties were introduced by a focus on royal benevolence, the kindnesses the emperor had shown to his vassals. They began with a preamble in which the king identified himself as a glorious king, worthy of praise. And at certain stages in history, the preamble was followed by a historical prologue in which the king described many good things that he had done for the people.

The second major portion of suzerain-vassal treaties focused on the requirement of vassal loyalty. They spelled out the kinds of obedience required of the emperor's vassals. Lists of rules and regulations were given to explain how vassals were expected to live in the suzerain's kingdom.

The third major portion of suzerain-vassal treaties drew attention to the consequences of loyalty and disloyalty from the vassals. Faithful servants were promised further blessings or rewards, but unfaithful servants were threatened with curses or punishments of various sorts from their emperors.

Now, other elements also appear in these treaties. For instance, provision was made for the safekeeping of treaty documents, and divine witnesses were called to watch over the parties of the treaties so that the terms of these treaties would not be forgotten. But the heart of the suzerain-vassal relationship may be put in this way. Great kings declared their benevolence toward lesser vassal kings and nations. The suzerains required loyal service from their vassals because they had shown kindness. And they set forth many positive and negative consequences for the loyalty and disloyalty of their vassals. As we will see, these three central features of suzerain-vassal treaties will help us understand more clearly the nature of Old Testament covenants and how they relate to the kingdom of God.

With the basic concept of suzerain-vassal treaties in mind, we are in a position to see what insights they offer us as we explore the connections between covenants and kingdom.

Biblical Insights

Now we should say from the outset that in a broad sense the term covenant (or berit) describes many different kinds of relationships. It points to relationships between friends, spouses, political leaders, tribes and nations. All of these relationships were called covenants in the Old Testament because they formally bound people to each other with mutual obligations and expectations. But these relationships were so diverse that their covenants differed in many ways. And more than this, the Scriptures sometimes compare these diverse covenant relationships to God's relationship with his people. For instance, our relation with God is described as marriage, as a family bond, and as friendship. So, we can learn much about ourselves and God from these different types of covenants.

But our concern in this lesson is not with this broad range of analogies, but with one specific type of covenant in the Old Testament, namely divine covenants. These are the covenants that God himself made with people. God made six such major corporate covenants in the Old Testament. He entered into covenants with Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David and Christ. In this lesson we are primarily interested in understanding the character of these covenants and how they relate to the kingdom of God.

Now, we will explore all six divine covenants in this lesson. But at this point, we will look briefly at one of these covenants, the covenant with Moses, to illustrate how suzerain-vassal treaties have helped us understand the character of Old Testament covenants. The covenant with Moses is particularly well suited for our purposes because God revealed so much more about this covenant than he did about any others in the Old Testament.

When we look at the covenant God made with Moses, it quickly becomes apparent that it was structured in ways that resemble Ancient Near Eastern suzerain-vassal treaties. Moses' covenant consisted of the same three main elements that we have seen in these treaties. And this resemblance will help us understand that in a fundamental sense, God's covenants were the way he, as the great king of Israel, chose to administer his kingdom.

It will be helpful for us to look at one passage in particular at this point that reveals this resemblance. In Exodus 19:4-6 God initiated his covenant through Moses with Israel in this way:

You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagles' wings and brought you to myself. Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole earth is mine, you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation (Exodus 19:4-6).

These verses open the scene where God entered into covenant with Israel when the nation gathered at the foot of Mount Sinai on their way to the Promised Land, and they closely reflect the three central elements of a suzerain-vassal treaty.

You'll recall that suzerain-vassal treaties had three main concerns: the presentation of royal benevolence, the requirement of vassal loyalty, and the consequences of loyalty and disloyalty. And interestingly enough, these same three concerns appear in Moses' covenant as it was introduced in Exodus 19:4-6.

First, God reminded Israel of his divine benevolence demonstrated in the way God had graciously delivered them from slavery in Egypt. As he said in Exodus 19:4:

You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagles' wings and brought you to myself (Exodus 19:4).

Like Ancient Near Eastern emperors, God reminded the Israelites that he had been

their kind king; he had done great things in delivering Israel from Egypt, and it was in the context of his benevolence toward his people that he offered to enter into covenant with them.

Second, God called for human loyalty. Listen again to Exodus 19:5:

Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession (Exodus 19:5).

Like Ancient Near Eastern suzerains, God required loyalty from his human vassals. Although Moses' covenant was based on God's mercy and not human good works, God still required his servants to be loyal, and Moses' law spelled out many of the ways they were to show their loyalty. The people were expected to obey the regulations of the covenant.

Third, Moses' covenant also entailed consequences for loyalty and disloyalty from God's people. This element becomes clear in Exodus 19:5-6:

Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole earth is mine, you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation (Exodus 19:5-6).

Like Ancient Near Eastern emperors, God made it clear that if the people were faithful, they would receive great blessings — they would be a treasured possession, a kingdom of priests. And by implication, if they were unfaithful, they would not receive these great blessings but would be cursed instead.

So, we see that the threefold pattern of suzerain-vassal treaties appears in God's covenant with Moses. As suzerains claimed to be kind to their vassals, when God entered into covenant with Israel, he first established his divine benevolence toward them. The covenant went on to set forth the expectations of human loyalty to God, and the covenant specified the consequences of blessings and curses that the people could expect as they were loyal or disloyal to God.

The fact that the Mosaic covenant reflected these elements of suzerain-vassal treaties demonstrates that at a very basic level, when God made covenant with his people, he revealed himself to Israel as their great king, their emperor, and that he wanted his people to think of themselves as his vassals. Old Testament divine covenants were essentially royal arrangements. Kingdom and covenants go hand in hand because covenants were the means by which God ruled over his kingdom. They were God's kingdom administrations leading the kingdom of God toward its destiny of expanding to the ends of the earth.

Now that we have seen that divine covenants had the fundamental function of regulating or administrating life in God's kingdom, we are in a position to look into our second topic: the historical developments of covenants in the Old Testament.

HISTORY OF THE COVENANTS

As we have seen in a prior lesson, the history of the kingdom of God in the Old Testament was very complex. God's kingdom went through many different periods, or epochs, as it developed toward the goal of reaching the entire earth. At this point, we will see that during each period or stage in the kingdom, God introduced covenants that addressed the particular issues that people were facing at each stage of the kingdom. There are many ways we could handle the history of divine covenants in the Old Testament. But we will explore this history in three main stages: first, the universal covenants; second, the national covenants; and third, the New Covenant.

As we have already mentioned, there are six major divine covenants that span the entire history of the Old Testament: God's covenants with Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David and Christ. We will divide these six covenants into three groups aligned with the ways we described the historical stages of God's kingdom in the preceding lesson. We will speak of the universal covenants with Adam and Noah during the primeval history. We will speak of the national covenants with Abraham, Moses and David during the time when God drew close to the nation of Old Testament Israel as his special people. And we will speak of the new covenant in Christ during the New Testament phase of the kingdom. So, as we deal with the divine covenants, we will look into each of these three groups of covenants as they developed in the history of the Old Testament. Let's look first at the universal covenants that God established during the primeval history.

Universal Covenants

We speak of the covenants with Adam and Noah as "universal" because they were made between God and all of humanity. During the primeval period, when these covenants were made, God had not yet identified Israel as his special people. Instead, Adam and Noah represented every person from every tribe and nation. And as a result, what happened to them impacted the lives of every human being to come after them.

These universal covenants met the need for an administration of the kingdom during the primeval period. This was the time when God established the most basic arrangements that governed his relationship with the entire human race for all time.

We'll investigate these universal covenants in chronological order, beginning with the covenant with Adam and then moving to Noah. Let's consider first God's covenant with Adam.

Adam

As we all know, Adam was the first human being that God created, so when we speak of the covenant with Adam, we are referring to the earliest period of human history imaginable. And not surprisingly, we find the Bible's teaching about Adam's covenant focuses on some of the most basic or foundational dimensions of human life.

The covenant with Adam appears in the creation narratives found in the first three chapters of Genesis. Now, we should mention that some Christians do not agree that God made a formal covenant with Adam. Most of these believers base their views on the fact that the term "covenant" does not appear in the first three chapters of Genesis, and some also argue that the basic contours of divine covenants cannot be found in these chapters. Nevertheless, three pieces of evidence strongly suggest that God did in fact establish a covenant with Adam as the representative of humanity. First, as we will see later in this lesson, the basic elements of divine covenants are indeed present in Genesis 1–3. Divine benevolence, human loyalty, and consequences for loyalty and disloyalty do appear in these chapters.

A second evidence that God did enter into covenant with Adam is found in Hosea 6:7. There we read these words:

Like Adam [or "humanity," as it may be translated], they have broken the covenant — they were unfaithful to me there (Hosea 6:7).

This passage compares the sinfulness of Israel with Adam's sin in the Garden of Eden, and speaks of both as breaking covenant. Israel had broken covenant just like Adam had in the Garden of Eden.

A third evidence that God entered into a covenant with Adam appears in Genesis 6:18. In Genesis 6:18, which is the first passage in the Bible where the term "covenant" actually occurs, God spoke to Noah in this way:

I will establish my covenant with you (Genesis 6:18).

This passage is significant because the term translated "I will establish" does not normally mean "to start" or "to initiate" a covenant but "to confirm" a covenant that already exists. Noah's covenant was presented as a confirmation of a previously existing covenant, namely the covenant God made with Adam.

Whether or not we call the divine arrangement with Adam a "covenant," it is clear that God entered a solemn relationship with Adam, and Adam represented the entire human race. The focus of this arrangement, or covenant with Adam, was to establish the most fundamental features of God's relationship with humanity, and for this reason, we may call it a covenant of foundations. In this covenant, God set the fundamental patterns of life for all human beings living in his world. Adam and Eve were ordained to serve as God's royal and priestly images, spreading his kingdom to the ends of the earth. They were tested and they failed. They suffered for their rebellion but were given hope. In short, the covenant with Adam laid out the parameters of humanity's relationship with God for all time. It established the foundations of our role in his kingdom.

Noah

The second universal covenant is God's covenant with Noah. There is much that could be said about this covenant, but we will simply introduce some of the more central issues that come to the foreground in the biblical account. The covenant with Noah was also established in the primeval period of God's kingdom and concerned some of the most basic issues that face all of humanity.

God's covenant with Noah is mentioned in two chapters of Genesis, Genesis 6 and 9. Listen to what God said in Genesis 6:18:

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 6:18).

As we have already mentioned, Noah's covenant was not a brand new covenant, standing on its own. It was actually the establishment — that is, the furthering — of the covenant or arrangement God had made with Adam.

What was the emphasis of this covenant with Noah? We find the answer to this question after the flood when God actually made the covenant. In Genesis 9:9-11 we read this account of that covenant:

I now establish my covenant with you and with your descendants after you and with … every living creature on earth… Never again will all life be cut off by the waters of a flood (Genesis 9:9-11).

As we see here, God's covenant with Noah affected every living creature from that time on in some very important ways.

The Noahic covenant was introduced to assure stability in the created order, and for this reason it is rightly called a covenant of stability. As you will recall, in a prior lesson we saw that when Noah and his family left the ark, God acknowledged humanity's severe propensity toward sin and revealed a long-term strategy for fulfilling his kingdom purposes. As we read in Genesis 8:21-22:

Never again will I curse the ground because of man, even though every inclination of his heart is evil from childhood. And never again will I destroy all living creatures, as I have done. As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease (Genesis 8:21-22).

In order to secure this strategy, God established his covenant with Noah, promising that nature would remain stable so that the human race could reach its destiny in this fallen world. This universal covenant, like the covenant with Adam, established basic structures for human existence that apply to all peoples in all places and at all times.

Now that we have seen how God established the basic order of his kingdom and secured his kingdom purposes through the covenants with Adam and Noah, we should turn our attention to the period of the kingdom where Old Testament Israel moved to center stage.

National Covenants

As the kingdom of God moved from the primeval history to the period in which God focused especially on the nation of Israel, God established three national covenants. We may rightly call these "national covenants" because they were especially concerned with Israel as the special chosen people of God. We will look at the national covenants in chronological order, beginning with the covenant with Abraham, then moving to Moses and finally David.

Abraham

Because the first national covenant was made with Abraham, Abraham is recognized as the father of all Israel. We find explicit references to Abraham's covenant in Genesis 15 and 17. The first mention of God's covenant with Abraham appears in Genesis 15:18:

On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram (Genesis 15:18).

Here the expression "made a covenant," or literally "cut a covenant," is the normal way of indicating the beginning of a covenant relationship. Then, a number of years later, God clarified his covenant with the patriarch. In Genesis 17:1-2 we read these words:

I am God Almighty; walk before me and be blameless. I will confirm my covenant between me and you (Genesis 17:1-2).

In this passage, God "confirmed" or "established" the covenant he had initiated with Abraham in Genesis 15. This is the same terminology that we saw in Genesis 6:18 when God confirmed with Noah the covenant that had been previously made with Adam.

The covenant with Abraham was important because it set the people of Israel apart from among the many nations on earth to be God's special instruments in bringing his heavenly kingdom to the whole earth. The first step in this process was to create a vision for the nation by promising Abraham a large multitude of descendants as well as a homeland in which to build the kingdom. And for this reason Abraham's covenant may be characterized as a covenant of promise. As we read in Genesis 15:18:

On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram and said, "To your descendants I give this land" (Genesis 15:18).

And in Genesis 17:2:

I will confirm my covenant between me and you and will greatly increase your numbers (Genesis 17:2).

These covenant promises created a permanent vision for all of Israel's hopes as the people of God's kingdom.

Moses

After the tribes of Israel had migrated to Egypt and suffered slavery there, God brought them to a second stage of national covenant, the covenant with Moses. The covenant with Moses was closely tied to the covenant with Abraham, and in many respects, it furthered the Abrahamic covenant. Moses did not see himself as beginning something brand new. On the contrary, Moses frequently appealed to the covenant with Abraham as the basis of his own kingdom work. Listen to the way Moses pleaded with God on behalf of the nation in Exodus 32:13:

Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac and Israel, to whom you swore by your own self: "I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and I will give your descendants all this land I promised them, and it will be their inheritance forever" (Exodus 32:13).

The national covenant with Moses was not a brand new covenant that replaced the covenant with Abraham. Rather, it was built on and in harmony with the national covenant that God had previously made with Israel under Abraham.

We find the primary record of God entering covenant with Israel through Moses in Exodus 19–24. As God gathered the twelve tribes at the foot of Mount Sinai, he was shaping them into a nation, a politically unified people. Although there had been rules and regulations for God's people before the time of Moses, like every new nation, one of the chief things Israel needed at this time was a system of law, a body of regulations to govern life in the nation. So God gave Israel the Ten Commandments and the Book of the Covenant to guide the nation. For this reason, the covenant with Moses may be called a covenant of law.

In fact, Moses' covenant stressed the law so much that when the people of Israel agreed to enter this covenant, their commitment came in the form of a commitment to God's law. In Exodus 19:7-8 we are told these words:

So Moses … set before them all the words the Lord had commanded him to speak. The people all responded together, "We will do everything the Lord has said" (Exodus 19:7-8).

So we see that the second covenant with the nation of Israel was the covenant with Moses, a covenant that stressed the law of God.

David

Now we should turn to the covenant that came to Israel during the days of King David, when Israel had become a full-fledged empire.

Now, David's covenant was also a national covenant and was therefore closely associated with the previous covenant with Moses. As Solomon made it clear in 2 Chronicles 6:16, God's promises to David were dependent on faithfulness to Moses' law. As we read there:

Now Lord, God of Israel, keep for your servant David my father the promises you made to him when you said, "You shall never fail to have a man to sit before me on the throne of Israel, if only your sons are careful in all they do to walk before me according to my law" (2 Chronicles 6:16).

David's covenant was built on the previous covenants with the nation of Israel.

We do not know precisely when in David's life God formally established this covenant, but one passage that explicitly states the content of David's covenant is Psalm 89. In Psalm 89:3-4 God's promise to David is presented with these words:

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).

This passage indicates that the David's covenant focused on kingship in Israel. Or to be more specific, it promised David that his line would always be Israel's ruling dynasty. When David became king over God's people, he blessed the nation by turning Israel into an empire; that is, he took them to a higher level of kingdom development. And to secure the future of this national blessing, God promised the stability of a permanent succession of kings, a dynasty. So we may call David's covenant Israel's covenant of kingship.

New Covenant

Now that we have a basic understanding of the universal and national covenants, we should look at the covenant that governs the final stage of God's kingdom: the new covenant.

In addition to the five covenants we have already seen, the prophets of the Old Testament spoke of a new covenant that would come during the final stage of God's kingdom. They announced that it would be greater than any covenant that had come before it.

The new covenant is mentioned many places in the Bible, but Jeremiah 31 and Ezekiel 37 are two very important passages. Jeremiah 31:31 speaks of this "new covenant" in this way:

"The time is coming," declares the Lord, "when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah" (Jeremiah 31:31).

And on several occasions, the prophet Ezekiel spoke of this same covenant as an everlasting covenant of peace. As we read in Ezekiel 37:26:

I will make a covenant of peace with them; it will be an everlasting covenant. I will establish them and increase their numbers, and I will put my sanctuary among them forever (Ezekiel 37:26).

And as all Christians know, when Paul reminded the Corinthians of Jesus' words at the Lord's Supper, he made it clear that this everlasting new covenant of peace came to fulfillment in Christ. Paul recorded the Lord's words in 1 Corinthians 11:25:

This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me (1 Corinthians 11:25).

Through this new covenant in Christ, God administers his kingdom in its final stage, which we call the New Testament age. The new covenant was designed to govern God's people during the time when God would complete the kingdom goals that he had established during the primeval period and furthered through the nation of Israel. And for this reason, it is best thought of as a covenant of fulfillment.

This covenant of fulfillment was to govern God's people when he ended their exile and spread his kingdom to the ends of the earth. The new covenant is God's commitment to transform his people into a forgiven and redeemed race that is fully empowered to serve him without fail. Listen to the way Jeremiah described this transformation in Jeremiah 31:31-34:

"The time is coming," declares the Lord, "when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah… 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 a man teach his neighbor, or a man his brother, saying, '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).

As we saw in the preceding lesson, the arrival of this final stage of the kingdom of God comes in three phases. It was inaugurated through the earthly ministry of Christ and the work of his apostles. It continues in our time, and it will reach it fullness only when Christ returns at the consummation of all things. Remembering these three phases of the kingdom in the New Testament is essential to understanding how God established the new covenant.

In a variety of ways, the effects of the new covenant also come in three phases. The transformations of the new covenant began to take effect at Christ's first coming. They continue throughout the entire history of the Christian church. But the ultimate reality of the new covenant will take place only when Christ returns. When that day comes, the new covenant will be the complete fulfillment of the entire history of God's covenants. It will bring to fruition God's purposes behind the covenant administrations in Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, and David.

Having seen that covenants are the means by which God administers his kingdom throughout history, we should turn to our third topic: the dynamics of the covenants. How did each covenant govern the interactions between God and his people?

DYNAMICS OF THE COVENANTS

Now before we can answer these questions, we need to make an important point. Some passages deal more directly with the moments when God formally entered into covenants or confirmed them, and these passages draw attention to the particular emphases of each covenant. But much more can be learned about the dynamics of covenant life that go far beyond these emphases.

Adam's covenant stressed certain foundational patterns established at the commencement of the world. Noah's covenant emphasized the stability of nature. Abraham's covenant accentuated God's promise. Moses' covenant emphasized God's law. David's covenant highlighted the Davidic dynasty as God's specially chosen royal family. And the new covenant stressed fulfillment. But these emphases are not comprehensive descriptions of covenant life; they merely touch on certain highlights. To see a fuller picture of the dynamics of living in covenant we must recognize that life in covenant with God involved much more than these emphases.

Adam's covenant relationship with God did not simply concern foundational matters. During the period of Noah, interaction between humanity and God involved much more than the stability of nature. Relationship with God during the period of Abraham entailed much more than promise. God administered the epoch of Moses with more in view than his law. God related to his people during the epoch of David in the light of more than David's dynasty. And life with God in the new covenant is more complex than its emphasis on fulfillment indicates.

As we explore covenant life, we will see that all divine covenants follow the same basic arrangement: the threefold structure we have already seen in Ancient Near Eastern suzerain-vassal treaties. The dynamics of living in covenant with God always involved the benevolence of God, the requirement of human loyalty, and consequences for human loyalty and disloyalty.

To unpack the dynamics of Old Testament covenants, we will see how these three elements appear in each Old Testament covenant. First, we will look at the universal primeval covenants. Second, we will see these dynamics in the national covenants God made with Old Testament Israel. And third, we will see how these dynamics are present in the new covenant in Christ. Let's look first at the primeval universal covenants.

Universal Covenants

During the primeval history God established a covenant of foundations with Adam and a covenant of natural stability with Noah. But life under these covenants also involved a broad range of issues that may be summarized under the rubrics of divine benevolence, human loyalty, and consequences for human loyalty and disloyalty. We will look briefly at how this is true for each of the primeval covenants — first, the covenant with Adam and then the covenant with Noah.

Adam

In the first place, God showed much benevolence toward the first man and woman, even before they sinned. He prepared the world for humanity, taking it from chaos to a beautiful order. And he formed a splendid paradise and placed Adam and Eve within it, giving them all kinds of privileges. These acts of kindness prepared the way for God's first covenant arrangement with the human race.

In the second place, the covenant with Adam also required human loyalty. In addition to requiring Adam and Eve to serve as his images, God tested their loyalty with the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. As he commanded in Genesis 2:16-17:

You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Genesis 2:16-17).

Human loyalty was undeniably required in covenant life during the period of Adam's covenant.

And in the third place, there were consequences for Adam and Eve's loyalty and disloyalty. Quite explicitly, God told Adam and Eve that they would suffer the consequences of curse if they were disloyal and ate the forbidden fruit. As God told them in Genesis 2:17:

When you eat of it you will surely die (Genesis 2:17).

And by implication, if Adam and Eve had passed the test, they would have been greatly blessed as they served God and spread his kingdom.

So, Adam's covenant relationship with God involved consequences for loyalty and disloyalty as well. Now what was true for Adam and Eve was true for their descendants as well. Life with God continued to involve divine benevolence, human loyalty, and consequences.

Noah

In addition to the covenant with Adam, God also related to Noah and his descendants in term of all three covenant dynamics. First, God's benevolence prepared the way for Noah's covenant. When God determined to destroy the human race in his righteous judgment, he also determined to save Noah and his family. As we read in Genesis 6:8:

But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord (Genesis 6:8).

God showed much kindness to Noah and his family.

Second, God required loyalty from Noah. He commanded him to build the ark and to gather animals. Listen to how closely the making of covenant with Noah is associated with Noah's responsibility in Genesis 6:18-19. There we read:

I will establish my covenant with you, and you will enter the ark… You are to bring into the ark two of all living creatures, male and female, to keep them alive with you (Genesis 6:18-19).

Noah was responsible to enter the ark with his family and to bring animals with him to keep them alive. Even after the flood, God reiterated Noah's responsibility to fulfill the role of humanity as God's image. Among other things, in Genesis 9:7 he said:

As for you, be fruitful and increase in number; multiply on the earth and increase upon it (Genesis 9:7).

The emphasis of Noah's covenant on the promise of stability in nature did not eliminate the need for Noah and those whom he represented to be loyal to God.

Third, there were consequences for human acts of loyalty and disloyalty during the period of Noah. Noah himself was faithful to God. So, God was pleased with his sacrifice after the flood and blessed him with a stable world. As we read in Genesis 8:20-21:

Noah built an altar to the Lord and, taking some of all the clean animals and clean birds, he sacrificed burnt offerings on it. The Lord smelled the pleasing aroma and said in his heart: "Never again will I curse the ground because of man, even though every inclination of his heart is evil from childhood. And never again will I destroy all living creatures, as I have done" (Genesis 8:20-21).

But God also made it clear that rebellion against him would have severe consequences of curse. For instance, in Genesis 9:6 God addressed the curse that would come upon murderers:

Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed (Genesis 9:6).

The three dynamics of covenant life also continued through to Noah's descendants.

National Covenants

Now, what was true for the primeval universal covenants was also true for the national covenants God made with Israel. The Abrahamic covenant emphasizing promise, the Mosaic covenant highlighting law, and the Davidic covenant accentuating the permanent dynasty of David's house, all followed the pattern of suzerain-vassal treaties. The dynamics of divine benevolence, human loyalty and consequences were present in each of these stages of divine covenants. Once again, we will look at each of these covenants in the order in which they appear: first Abraham; second, Moses; and third David.

Abraham

Abraham's covenant emphasized the promises of progeny and land for the people of Israel, but all three covenant dynamics were operative at this time. First, God showed much benevolence to Abraham. For example, in his initial call to Abraham, which preceded the covenant by many years, God demonstrated great kindness to Abraham. Consider Genesis 12:2 where God said:

I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing (Genesis 12:2).

Throughout Abraham's life God showed mercy to the patriarch, forgiving him of sin, counting him as righteous, protecting him from troubles.

Second, God also required loyalty from the patriarch. For instance, even in God's initial call, Abraham was required to obey. As we read in Genesis 12:1 God commanded him:

Leave your country, your people and your father's household and go to the land I will show you (Genesis 12:1).

God required Abraham to leave his homeland and family to go to a land he had never seen. And listen to how God reminded Abraham of the requirement of loyalty when he confirmed his covenant in Genesis 17:1-2:

I am God Almighty; walk before me and be blameless. I will confirm my covenant between me and you and will greatly increase your numbers (Genesis 17:1-2).

Although many Christians fail to see it, Abraham's covenant relationship with God was not entirely promissory. As with all covenants in the Old Testament, God required loyal obedience from Abraham.

Third, God also made it clear that there were consequences for Abraham's loyalty and disloyalty. Listen once again to God's demand that Abraham be faithful in Genesis 17:1-2, paying special attention to the consequences of blessing in verse 2:

I am God Almighty; walk before me and be blameless (Genesis 17:1).

And then in verse 2:

I will confirm my covenant between me and you and will greatly increase your numbers (Genesis 17:2).

God explicitly stated that the increase of Abraham's descendants would be a consequence of loyalty. And correspondingly, God also said that disloyalty would result in severe curses. Listen to what he told Abraham in Genesis 17:10-14:

This is my covenant with you and your descendants after you, the covenant you are to keep: Every male among you shall be circumcised… Any uncircumcised male, who has not been circumcised in the flesh, will be cut off from his people; he has broken my covenant (Genesis 17:10-14).

God required circumcision as a sign of commitment to covenant loyalty, so that anyone who was not circumcised among the men of Israel would suffer the curse of being cut off from his people, excluded from the blessings of covenant life. These three covenant dynamics that appear in close association with Abraham continued to regulate the life of God's people from Abraham to the next covenant in Moses.

Moses

Now the second covenant with the nation of Israel was the covenant with Moses. As we have seen, this covenant stressed God's law because it was established when God was forming the tribes of Israel into a unified nation. But it would be a terrible mistake to think that other covenant dynamics were absent from life under Moses' covenant. To illustrate the presence of all covenant dynamics in Moses' covenant, let's look briefly at the centerpiece of his covenant, the Ten Commandments.

Divine benevolence is evident in the Ten Commandments in the prologue that precedes God's laws. You will recall that the Ten Commandments begin in this way in Exodus 20:2:

I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery (Exodus 20:2).

The covenant of Moses was not a covenant of works; it was a covenant of mercy and grace. Even so, the Ten Commandments make it very clear that God required loyalty from his people. As the first commandment puts it in Exodus 20:3:

You shall have no other gods before me (Exodus 20:3).

Divine grace was not contrary to human loyalty; rather, it supported and led to the requirement of faithfulness. Beyond this, the Ten Commandments speak of the consequences of loyalty and disloyalty in Exodus 20:4-6:

You shall not make for yourself an idol… You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sins of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing love to a thousand [generations] of those who love me and keep my commandments (Exodus 20:4-6).

The covenant dynamics that appear in the Ten Commandments extend to all of life from the days of Moses to the next covenant with David.

David

The last covenant with Old Testament Israel, the covenant with David, stressed that God was establishing David's line as the permanent dynasty to rule over Israel. Yet, when we look at the larger picture, it also becomes apparent that the gift of kingship to Israel came in the context of divine benevolence, human loyalty, and consequences.

Listen to the way Psalm 89:3-4 comments on God's covenant with David:

You said, "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).

These verses reflect on the benevolence God showed to David. He chose David and established him and his descendants as the permanent dynasty over Israel. But God also required loyalty, and threatened consequences for disloyalty. Listen to Psalm 89:30-32:

If his sons forsake my law and do not follow my statutes … I will punish their sin with the rod, their iniquity with flogging (Psalm 89:30-32).

If David's sons forsook God's laws, they would be punished severely. On the other hand, great blessings would come to the sons of David who were faithful to God. When we read the history of Israel from David's day until the end of the Old Testament, it is evident that these covenant dynamics continued to characterize covenant life. So it is that all three covenant dynamics appear in each covenant period of Old Testament Israel.

With the dynamics of life in the universal and national covenants in mind, we are ready to turn to the new covenant, the covenant of fulfillment.

New Covenant

The destiny of the kingdom of God administered through Old Testament covenants reached its climax through the work of Christ in establishing the new covenant. Even so, as in all other divine covenants, the basic dynamics of biblical covenants are evident in the new covenant in Christ. In the first place, the new covenant involves divine benevolence. God promised to show great kindness to his exiled people as he established the new covenant. As Jeremiah 31:34 reads:

For I will forgive their wickedness and remember their sins no more (Jeremiah 31:34).

In this and many more ways, the new covenant clearly displays God's tender mercy.

At the same time, human loyalty is also a factor in the new covenant. God does not promise to do away with his laws, and he does not exempt anyone from obeying them. On the contrary, he requires loyalty. But God also promises in Jeremiah 31:33:

I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts (Jeremiah 31:33).

This verse teaches that God will give his people a love for his law so that they earnestly obey him.

And finally, the consequences of loyalty are also evident. As Jeremiah 31:33 continues:

I will be their God, and they will be my people (Jeremiah 31:33).

This formula offered assurance that God would bring great blessings to his people because they would keep the obligations of this covenant.

Now, we must always remember that the new covenant comes into effect in three stages, following the pattern of the final phase of God's kingdom in Christ. The new covenant was inaugurated in the first coming of Christ and in the work of his apostles. Throughout church history the new covenant continues to come to fruition in a variety of ways through the power of Christ working in the church. And the new covenant will reach its completion when Christ returns in glory at the consummation of the age.

First, the new covenant is inaugurated because Christ finished his earthly ministry. Christ was faithful to all covenant requirements. From his birth, he never disobeyed his heavenly father. And more than this, because Christ died on the cross as a sacrifice for the sins of his people, his righteousness is credited to all who have saving faith in him. Christ's one sacrifice was so perfect that it never needs to be repeated. As the writer of Hebrews put it in Hebrews 10:12-14:

But when [Christ] had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God… because by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy (Hebrews 10:12-14).

And because of this sacrifice, the new covenant has been inaugurated. As the author of Hebrews wrote in Hebrews 9:12-15:

[Christ] entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, having obtained eternal redemption… For this reason Christ is the mediator of a new covenant (Hebrews 9:12-15).

God intervened in history to establish the new covenant by sending his son to keep every detail of God's law and to offer himself as a perfect and complete sacrifice for sin. His sacrifice brings eternal forgiveness to all who have saving faith in him.

Now despite the importance of Christ's saving work in his first coming, the great salvation of the new covenant also depends on Christ's continuing work as the mediator of the new covenant. Day by day Christ intercedes on behalf of his people before the throne of his father in heaven. Again the writer of Hebrews pointed to this reality. In Hebrews 7:24-25 he wrote these words:

Because Jesus lives forever, he has a permanent priesthood. Therefore he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them (Hebrews 7:24-25).

Because he reigns and intercedes on our behalf, we can be confident that Christ will bring all who have saving faith in him through the trials and troubles that we now face.

And finally, because Christ has paid for our sins and continues to intercede on our behalf, we can be confident that one day he will return and bring to completion the promises of the new covenant. As the writer of Hebrews explained in Hebrews 9:28:

Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many people; and he will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him (Hebrews 9:28).

When that day comes, every person who has trusted Christ will receive complete holiness and the gift of eternal life in God's eternal kingdom of the new heavens and new earth. So, we see that as we read about covenants in the Bible, we are wise to remember the distinctive emphases of each covenant period. But we must also keep in mind that there was much more to life with God than these distinctive emphases. Each stage of life in covenant with God involved the full range of covenant dynamics.

Now that we have seen how life in covenant with God always entails the threefold dynamics of divine benevolence, human loyalty, and consequences, we should turn to our final topic: the people of the covenants.

PEOPLE OF THE COVENANTS

Who were the people of God's covenants? Who was included in and excluded from divine covenants? How did these various people relate to the dynamics of God's covenants? To answer these questions we will touch on two matters; first, we will explore the divisions of humanity; and second, we will see the application of covenant dynamics to these various divisions of humanity. Let's look first at the ways the human race is divided in relation to God's covenants.

Divisions of Humanity

Unfortunately, we live in a day when there is much confusion about the people of the covenants. For the most part, evangelical Christians think that there are two kinds of people in the world: believers and unbelievers; saved and unsaved. Now there is nothing wrong with these categories; the Bible speaks this way many times. But problems arise because many evangelicals equate believers with those who are in covenant with God, and unbelievers with those who are outside God's covenant. In this way of thinking, there are only two kinds of people — everyone who is saved is in covenant with God, and everyone who is not saved is outside of the covenant.

But when we look more carefully at the people of the divine covenants, it soon becomes apparent that this twofold division does not adequately describe the human race. To unpack a more adequate way of thinking about the divisions of humanity, we will look at two issues: first, the division of people within divine covenants; and second, the division between those who are included and those who are excluded from divine covenants.

Within Covenants

In the first place, it is important to see that an important division of people appears within every covenant in the Bible. Every covenant of the Old Testament included both believers and unbelievers. This is not difficult to see with the covenants with Adam and Noah. They are called universal covenants precisely because all people, whether believers or unbelievers, are bound to God by these covenants. The foundational principles established in Adam's covenant apply to those who have saving faith and those who do not. The promise of stability in nature in the covenant with Noah applies both to believers and unbelievers. So during the primeval history, there were two kinds of people in the world: true believers who were in covenant with God and unbelievers who were also in covenant with God.

Now, a similar situation held for the national covenants with Abraham, Moses and David. Each of these covenants also included both believers and unbelievers. As the Old Testament makes clear, throughout the centuries, the majority of Israelites proved to be unbelievers, even though they were in covenant with God. Within the entire nation as God's covenant people, only some truly believed and were eternally saved from their sins. So, the covenants of national Israel included both believers and unbelievers. In this way, the people of the national covenants with Israel looked very much like the people of the universal covenants with Adam and Noah.

Now when we consider the people of the covenant with respect to the new covenant, another complication arises. The promise of the new covenant was that at some point, everyone within it would be true believers. Listen to the way Jeremiah stressed this fact in Jeremiah 31:34:

"No longer will a man teach his neighbor, or a man his brother, saying, '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 remember their sins no more" (Jeremiah 31:34).

The hope of the new covenant was that the people of God would be fully redeemed from sin, each one knowing the Lord without exception.

But while this is the destiny of the new covenant, we must remember once again that the kingdom of God in the new covenant is fulfilled in three phases. It was inaugurated in Christ's first coming, it continues today in the church, and it will reach its consummation when Christ returns in glory. In other words, the hopes of the new covenant did not come about suddenly or completely when Christ first came to earth.

As a result, until Christ returns to bring full salvation, there are both believers and unbelievers in the new covenant. On the one hand, the people of the new covenant include men and women who have exercised saving faith in Christ. Whether Jews of Gentiles, they are true believers purchased by Christ's blood and eternally justified by faith. On the other hand, people of the new covenant also include Jews and Gentiles who are not true believers but who have experienced a measure of the blessings of the new covenant, even though they have no saving faith.

Listen to the way the apostle John spoke of unbelievers in the church in 1 John 2:19:

They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us. For if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us; but their going showed that none of them belonged to us (1 John 2:19).

Here the apostle wrote about people who leave the Christian faith. He said in one sense they were "of us"; that is, they were part of the Christian church. But he says also that by leaving the faith, they made it clear that they did "not really belong to us"; that is, they were not true believers. And how did he know this? As he said, if they had really been of us, they would have remained with us. That is, they would have remained faithful to the end.

We all know that the rosters of churches include people who are saved from their sins and people who are not. No one claims that everyone counted among the people of the new covenant is truly saved. Even though we cannot always distinguish between them, the New Testament clearly teaches that until Christ returns, the church, the new covenant community, consists of both true believers and unbelievers.

Included and Excluded

In the second place, we must also recognize an important division among human beings between those who are included and those who are excluded from certain covenants. Now we understand that every person is included in the universal covenants with Adam and Noah; no one is excluded from the foundations and natural stability established in these covenants. But the situation for humanity changed once God chose Israel as his special people.

With the selection of the nation of Israel as the covenant people of God, a complication arose. Now, we have already seen that the covenants with Abraham, Moses and David included both believers and unbelievers. But these covenants were made with a select group of people, the Israelites, and with a few Gentiles who were adopted into Israel. This meant that, for the most part, Gentile nations were excluded from these covenants. To be sure, all people, including Gentiles, are people of the universal covenants, but the Gentiles were not people of the special national covenants made with Israel. Listen to the way Paul described the Gentiles in Ephesus before they became believers. In Ephesians 2:12 he wrote:

At that time you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world (Ephesians 2:12).

People outside the national covenants with Israel were without God and without hope. So, by the time we come to the national covenants, there are actually three kinds of people in the world: those who were in Israel's covenants with God as true believers; those who were in Israel's covenants with God as unbelievers; and those who were outside Israel's covenant.

The same threefold situation holds for the new covenant as well. As we have also seen, until Christ returns in glory, the new covenant has both believers and unbelievers within it. But in addition to these two kinds of people in the new covenant, we must add a third category: men and women who reject the gospel; those who do not claim to be Christian; those who are not part of the church. They are excluded from the new covenant. While during the Old Testament period of national Israel those outside of covenant were primarily Gentiles, now that Christ has come, those outside of the new covenant include both Jews and Gentiles who have no part in Christ or his church.

So we see that the Scriptures divide the human race in various ways in relation to divine covenants. The universal covenants include all people, both believers and unbelievers. The national covenants excluded the vast majority of Gentiles, but also included both believers and unbelievers within Israel. And until Christ returns in glory and purifies his church, the new covenant excludes Jews and Gentiles who have no part in the Christian faith, but also includes both Jews and Gentiles who are believers and unbelievers.

Now that we have seen how humanity is divided into various groups as they relate to God's covenants, we are ready to turn to another issue: How are the dynamics of covenants — divine benevolence, human loyalty, and consequences of loyalty and disloyalty — applied to these various groups?

Application of Dynamics

As we read the Old Testament seeking to understand its original meaning and how to apply it to our day, it is important to remember that both Old Testament Israelites who first read the Old Testament and we Christians who read it now face a similar threefold division of the human race: those outside covenant; unbelievers in covenant; and believers in covenant.

This means that if we hope to understand how the dynamics of covenant applied to people living in the days of the Old Testament and then relate those dimensions of original meaning to our own day, we must always think in terms of these three kinds of people. First, we must consider unbelievers excluded from the national covenants with Israel and unbelievers excluded from the new covenant. Second, we must consider unbelievers who are included in the national covenants with Israel and unbelievers who are included in the new covenant. And third, we must consider true believers included in the national covenants with Israel and true believers within the new covenant.

Let's look first at how covenant dynamics apply to unbelievers who were excluded from the covenants with Israel and the new covenant.

Unbelievers Excluded

Although these unbelievers actually live as lost people, they participate in the universal covenants with Adam and Noah; their lives are touched by all three dynamics of the covenants. In the first place, all unbelievers experience God's kindness through the mercy he shows to all people. As Jesus put it in Matthew 5:45:

Your Father in heaven… causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous (Matthew 5:45).

We often call these blessings "common grace" because they are not saving mercies, but grace shown to all human beings.

In the second place, even unbelievers outside the national covenants and the new covenant are obligated to be loyal to their creator. Many unbelievers outside the exclusive covenants have at least some knowledge of the special revelation given to Israel and to the church, and this knowledge obligates them to be loyal. But beyond this, even those who have no specific knowledge of any Old Testament or New Testament faith have a basic understanding of their obligations to serve God that comes through general or natural revelation. As Paul put it in Romans 1:20:

Since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities — his eternal power and divine nature — have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse (Romans 1:20).

So, even unbelievers outside the covenants with Israel and the new covenant have a basic obligation to worship and serve their creator.

In the third place, unbelievers outside the national covenants and the new covenant experience consequences for their actions. At times, God grants temporary blessings to unbelievers when they live according to the truth. Even among such unbelievers, wise living has benefits. And at other times God responds to their flagrant rebellion with temporary curses. Despite these mixed experiences for those outside of covenant, when Christ returns, these unbelievers will have no blessings from God. They will only suffer his eternal judgment. In these ways, unbelievers outside of Israel's national covenants and unbelievers excluded from the new covenant today experience the dynamics of the universal covenants.

Unbelievers Included

Now, the second category of humanity that concerns us is unbelievers who are in the covenants with the nation of Israel and in the new covenant. How do the dynamics of divine covenants apply to them? In the first place, God has shown much more kindness and mercy to these people than to those who remain outside of these covenants. True, they are not shown saving grace because they are not true believers. Yet, in the Old Testament there were still great advantages to being part of Israel, just as there are now great advantages to being part of the New Testament church. The apostle Paul reflected on the advantages of participating in God's special covenants when he described the benefit that came even to unbelieving Israelites. In Romans 9:4 he wrote:

Theirs is the adoption as sons; theirs the divine glory, the covenants, the receiving of the law, the temple worship and the promises (Romans 9:4).

God shows greater mercy to unbelievers who are in the covenants with Israel and in the new covenant that he does to unbelievers outside of these covenants.

In the Old Testament, unbelieving Jews were delivered from Egypt. They received God's gracious law at Sinai. They conquered the Land of Promise. They were blessed by the reigns of David and his sons. In the same way, unbelievers in the New Testament church are ministered to by true believers; they hear the preaching of the word; they share in the work of the Spirit. In these and other ways, unbelievers in the special covenant community have been shown great kindness from God.

In the second place, along with receiving these benefits from being in covenant, unbelievers in the national covenants and in the new covenant have heightened requirements of loyalty. They have received greater knowledge of God's will than other unbelievers who are excluded from these covenants; therefore they are required to render even more obedience and service. As Jesus put it in Luke 12:48:

From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded (Luke 12:48).

Those who hear the truth of God's Word, those who know his ways, are held responsible to be loyal to him.

In the third place, unbelievers in the national covenants and in the new covenant also experience consequences for their loyalty and disloyalty. On the one hand, they experience heightened blessings and cursings in this life, many different kinds of temporary blessings and curses. But on the other hand, when Christ returns, unbelievers in covenant with God have just one expectation: eternal curse, eternal judgment. Because they have not trusted in the promises of God in Christ, they remain lost in sin and destined to eternal punishment.

The writer of Hebrews warned against the heightened judgment coming against unbelievers in the new covenant. In Hebrews 10:28-29 he wrote these words:

Anyone who rejected the law of Moses died without mercy … How much more severely do you think a man deserves to be punished who has trampled the Son of God under foot, who has treated as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that sanctified him, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace? (Hebrews 10:28-29).

Notice here that these people are "sanctified" by "the blood of the covenant." This does not mean that they were saved, but only that they were set apart to God, that they were in covenant with him. And when these people rebel against God, as they always do to some degree or another, there is only one expectation, namely, the eternal judgment of God, the judgment he has reserved for his enemies. And this judgment is all the more severe because the mercy shown to them was so great.

So, we see that for unbelievers in the national covenants and the new covenant, the dynamics of divine benevolence, human loyalty and consequences are heightened. But in the final analysis, if they do not repent and exercise saving faith, these unbelievers will still suffer eternal judgment from God.

Believers Included

The third category of human beings that must be of concern to us as we read the Old Testament and apply it today is true believers in covenant. These people are the wondrously special people of God destined irrevocably to eternal life in Christ. The divine benevolence shown to true believers is absolutely immeasurable, including forgiveness of sins and eternal fellowship with God. As Paul wrote in Romans 8:1-2:

Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death (Romans 8:1-2).

At the same time, while we are free from the condemnation of God's law, we have also been called to loyal obedience out of gratitude for what God has done for us in Christ. This is why in Romans 8:7 Paul went on to contrast believers with unbelievers, saying these words:

The sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God's law (Romans 8:7).

By contrast, the mind that loves God submits to his law. So, in Romans 8:12-13 Paul added,

Therefore, brothers, we have an obligation… [to] put to death the misdeeds of the body (Romans 8:12-13).

In other words, believers have an obligation to live differently from unbelievers; that is, they have an obligation to submit to God's law, not to earn salvation, but to honor God.

Like Old Testament Israelites, Christians must follow Scripture's rules and regulations to test and prove their faith. True believers in the Old Testament were called to obey the law of Moses as a test of their faith. As Moses told the people in Deuteronomy 8:2:

Remember how the Lord your God led you all the way in the desert these forty years, to humble you and to test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands (Deuteronomy 8:2).

Christians in the New Testament are called to the same kind of testing. As Paul told the Corinthians in 2 Corinthians 13:5:

Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves. Do you not realize that Christ Jesus is in you — unless, of course, you fail the test? (2 Corinthians 13:5).

Christ was the perfectly obedient Son of God, and his righteousness is credited to us so that our eternal salvation is secure. But as we live our daily lives, we are to prove the salvation that God has granted to us. As Paul encouraged the Philippians in 2:12:

Work out your salvation with fear and trembling (Philippians 2:12).

In the third place, true believers in the Old Testament and New Testament experience the consequences of their loyalty and disloyalty. On the one hand, true believers experience both temporary blessings and curses from God. At a minimum, we are granted the blessings of God's Spirit, and beyond this, God often grants even physical blessings to his people. But the opposite is true as well. The writer of Hebrews explained that God trains his true children through discipline. In Hebrews 12:6 he wrote:

The Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son (Hebrews 12:6).

Despite these mixed experiences here and now in this life, in the end there is a grand difference between unbelievers in covenant and true believers in covenant. There is but one final outcome for those who have saving faith. When Christ returns in glory, true believers will only experience the eternal blessings of God. As we read in Revelation 21:7:

He who overcomes will inherit all this, and I will be his God and he will be my son (Revelation 21:7).

As we continue to study the Old Testament in this series, it is essential that we always remember these three divisions of humanity and how covenant dynamics apply to them. When we remember the distinctions between unbelievers outside of the national covenants and the new covenant, unbelievers within these covenants, and true believers within these covenants, we will be equipped to understand what implications the Old Testament had for the ancient Israelites who first read it, and we will be better equipped to see how it applies to us today.

Every passage in the Old Testament warned and encouraged its original readers to consider their status in relation to God's covenants, and we must do the same today. At every point, the Old Testament called unbelievers outside of Israel's covenants to submit themselves to God and to enter into his covenants or suffer God's eternal judgment. The Old Testament calls on those outside the new covenant to do the same today. The Old Testament first called unbelievers in Israel's national covenants, and now calls unbelievers in the new covenant to exercise saving faith in the promises of God in Christ or face severe eternal judgment for violating their covenant relationship with God. And the Old Testament once called true believers in Old Testament Israel, and now calls true believers in the new covenant to remember the mercy God has shown them, to demonstrate their faith by living faithfully before God, and to continue to hope in eternal life in the new heavens and new earth that God will bring at the consummation of his kingdom.

When we remember how covenant dynamics apply to every kind of person living today, we can see how we should apply the Old Testament to our own lives and to the lives of others around us. As we read the Old Testament today, we are to ask how each passage calls for unbelievers outside of the covenant to enter into the new covenant, and we are to ask how each passage calls for unbelievers in the new covenant to move forward toward saving faith in Christ, and we are ask how each passage calls true believers in the new covenant to ever increasing faith and grateful faithfulness to the new covenant in Christ.

CONCLUSION

In this lesson we have introduced the biblical teaching of divine covenants. We have seen that God administrates his kingdom through covenant arrangements. We have seen how each covenant in the Old Testament stressed particular things that the kingdom required at different stages of its history. We have explored the basic dynamics of a covenant relationship with God, and we have seen how these dynamics apply to different kinds of people living in the past and today.

As we move forward in this survey of the Old Testament, we will return to the theme of divine covenants time and again. Covenants formed the structures of the life of faith for Israel in the Old Testament, and they also form the structures of the life of faith even today.