Chapter 11 Struggling with the Old Covenants
I've shared a lot with you about the circumstances since the implementation of the New Covenant,
but let's step even further back in history for a bit.
Throughout the Old Testament, we see recurring examples of how the people of God struggled
to trust and obey Him.
Time and again, Israel tried to take matters into their own hands, often substituting their
own ideas for God's clear instructions.
These missteps reveal a deep-seated human tendency in us to approach God on our terms
rather than His, and they demonstrate the futility of religion when it replaces relationship.
Here are three key examples.
The Golden Calf, Exodus 32
The story of the Golden Calf is one of the most infamous examples of Israel's impatience
and failure to trust God.
After God delivered the Israelites from slavery in Egypt with miraculous signs and wonders,
including parting the Red Sea, the people stood at Mount Sinai where God gave Moses
the Ten Commandments.
This was a period of unparalleled closeness between God and His people.
He was revealing His covenant to them and providing the framework for their new identity
as a holy nation.
But when Moses went up the mountain to meet with God and didn't return for forty days,
the people grew impatient.
They began to doubt whether Moses would return at all and whether God was still with them.
Despite everything they had witnessed and all the Lord had done on their behalf—the
plagues in Egypt, the parting of the Red Sea, God's provision of manna and water in the
wilderness—their faith failed them, fear and insecurity crept in, and they decided
to take matters into their own hands.
Aaron, the brother of Moses, gave in to their demands to create gods to go before them that
they could see and perceive—something more to their understanding.
Aaron instructed them to collect their gold jewelry, which he melted down to create a
golden calf.
He even went so far as to proclaim,
These are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.
Exodus 32 verse 4.
This act of rebellion was a clear violation of the very first two commandments to have
no other gods before the Lord and to avoid making idols.
Why did Israel become impatient?
At its core, the problem was a lack of truth in God's timing and a desire to control their
situation.
They couldn't see what God was doing on the mountain, so they reverted to what felt familiar—an
idol, something tangible they could see and touch.
They replaced faith with religion, if you will, creating their own system of worship
to fill the void.
The lesson is a pertinent one.
When we grow impatient with God or try to force solutions in our own strength and understanding,
we risk turning to substitutes that can never satisfy or save us.
King Saul's Disobedience 1 Samuel chapter 15.
Saul's story is a tragic example of someone who was chosen by God but failed to keep himself
aligned with God's purpose.
Saul was Israel's first king, chosen not because of his merit but because of God's
grace and Israel's insistence on having a human king.
The people demanded a king to lead them like the other nations, despite God warning them
that this desire would lead to hardship.
1 Samuel 8 verses 19 and 20.
Nevertheless, God allowed it and chose Saul, a man from the tribe of Benjamin who stood
out for his impressive physical stature and humble beginnings.
Saul started as an ideal choice, beginning his governance over Israel with humility and
a desire to serve.
However, as his reign progressed, his pride, insecurities, fear of man, and lack of obedience
to God grew.
One of the clearest examples of this is in 1 Samuel 15, when God commanded Saul to completely
destroy the Amalekites, including all of their livestock, as an act of divine justice for
their long-standing wickedness.
But Saul disobeyed.
He spared King Agag and kept the best of the livestock, claiming that he intended to use
the animals for sacrifices to God.
When confronted by the prophet Samuel, Saul tried to justify his actions, saying,
The soldiers took the sheep and cattle from the plunder, the best of what was devoted
to God, in order to sacrifice them to the Lord your God at Gilgal.
1 Samuel 15 verse 21.
But Samuel's response exposed Saul's failure to understand what God truly desired.
Does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in obeying the Lord?
To obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed is better than the fat of rams.
Verse 22.
Saul's disobedience revealed a deeper issue.
He was more concerned with the
appearances and human approval than fully trusting and obeying God.
By sparing the livestock and the king of the Amalekites, Saul demonstrated that his concerns
were more important to him than what God had instructed.
This act of rebellion cost him his kingship, and the Spirit of the Lord, which had rested
on him, departed from his presence.
Saul's story serves as a cautionary tale of how even those chosen by God can lose their
way when they pursue their own agenda or prioritize their understanding over God's
instructions.
It also underscores the importance of obedience and trust in our relationship with God.
The Prophet's Warnings
Throughout Israel's history, God sent prophets to call His people back to Him when they strayed.
These prophets were His messengers, delivering words of correction, warning, and hope.
But all too often the people ignored their messages, choosing instead to follow their
own ways or cling to vain religious rituals devoid of relationship with God.
You can read Isaiah's rebuke of empty worship in Isaiah 1.11-17.
The prophet Isaiah confronted the people of Judah about their meaningless sacrifices and
hypocritical worship.
While they were meticulously following the sacrificial system, their hearts were far
from God.
The Lord declared, Stop bringing meaningless offerings.
Your incense is detestable to Me.
Learn to do right.
Seek justice.
Defend the oppressed.
Take up the cause of the fatherless.
Plead the case of the widow.
Isaiah 1.13-17.
These texts reveal God's heart.
He is not impressed by outward displays of religion or superficial obedience to the law.
What God desires is a transformed heart that reflects His character through acts of justice,
mercy, and compassion.
The prophet Micah echoed a similar sentiment when he asked, With what shall I come before
the Lord and bow down before the exalted God?
Shall I come before Him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old?
Micah 6.6.
The answer comes in verse 8.
He has shown you, O mortal, what is good.
And what does the Lord require of you?
To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.
This powerful statement encapsulates the difference between adhering to religion and engaging
in a relationship with God.
The Lord isn't looking for ritualistic offerings.
He seeks a people who reflect who He is because they've come to know Him.
When you truly begin to know who God is, His personal presence in your life begins
a process of inevitable change and spiritual growth within you.
As such, you cannot help but begin to reflect Him, walking with Him in increasing love,
mercy, and humility that flows from Him through you.
That is something that too many believers have never realized.
Under the old covenants, the people of Israel relied on priests and kings to mediate their
relationship with God and take responsibility for the nation's spiritual direction.
The law and sacrifices were but external mechanisms designed to maintain a connection to Him,
albeit superficially, until Christ would come and breach the chasm that sin had created
between God and man.
Still, Israel frequently fell back into patterns of idolatry and religious formalism.
They repeatedly failed to live up to their part of the covenant's demands.
Again, why?
The people's relationship with God was not personal.
Then, unlike now, the Holy Spirit did not dwell within individuals.
Rather, the Spirit would temporarily rest upon and empower certain leaders or prophets
for specific tasks.
The people did not have the personal, internal guidance of the Spirit of God in the way that
we as believers can now experience under the new covenant.
And without the permanent indwelling of the Holy Spirit to transform their hearts and
minds, the people of Israel lacked the internal transformation needed to sustain their beliefs
and trust in the Lord.
As a result, they fell into cycles of rebellion, repentance, and revile again.
This reality led to times of significant spiritual decline when the nation drifted away from
the commandments and fell into idolatry.
Other prophets, like Elijah, Hezekiah, and Josiah, led movements to bring people back
into the worship of Yahweh, but these revivals generally failed to last beyond a generation
when, almost habitually, the people fell back into cycles of disobedience and idolatry,
and the nation, once again, had to be called back to repentance.
part a result of the limitations of the old covenant, and in no small part, the very nature
of sinful man and our inherent inability to uphold the covenants, despite their promise
and even their best intentions to do so.
Israel as a nation, and of their own accord, had repeatedly taken an oath to God that they
would do all that the Lord told them to do.
See Exodus 19.8.24.3-7, Deuteronomy 5.27, and Jeremiah 42.6-20 for a few examples.
Israel's spiritual revivals were based on external conformity rather than lasting internal
transformation.
And so, while a generation may have returned to God under the influence of a godly leader,
the revival usually faded when that leader was gone, unable to be sustained by the population
themselves.
This is why the writer of the New Testament book of Hebrews explains in chapter 8 verse
6, But in fact, the ministry Jesus has received is as superior to theirs as the covenant of
which he is mediator is superior to the old one, since the new covenant is established
on better promises.
The better promises are the guarantees of a new, intimate, and transformative relationship
with God through Jesus Christ.
They assure us of complete forgiveness of sins, unconditional grace, internal transformation
by the Holy Spirit, direct access to God, and an eternal inheritance.
The old covenant highlighted humanity's need for God as well as our inability to meet His
standards through works.
It was focused on external laws written on tablets of stone.
It required strict adherence to the law, but it couldn't change the heart.
Blessings were contingent upon obedience to the law, see Deuteronomy chapter 28, and failure
to comply brought curses.
But that was the old.
The relationship you can have with God now is starkly different.
The new covenant reveals the heart of God and His desire to meet us where we are, transform
us from within, and restore the relationship He always intended for us.
Under the new covenant, God's laws are written on your heart and mind, and the Holy Spirit
transforms you from the core, leading to genuine change, not mere outward appearance.
The fulfillment and upholding of the covenant is based on His grace, not your effort.
Your salvation and right standing with God come through your faith in Jesus, not through
your works.
See Ephesians 2, verses 8 and 9.
What you do and how you act will change, not because you're simply trying to be and do
better, but because you are being positively influenced and affected through the ever-increasing
intimacy you cultivate with God that is made possible through His Spirit abiding within
you, as we'll examine further in the next chapter.