Marks of the Covenant

Introduction

Let me begin by asking you a few questions. In whom do you trust? Who do you trust to keep their promises? Politicians? Your friends? If I said here’s £5, whoever comes to ask me for it at the end of this service can have it, what would you do? Would you believe me? Would you trust my promise? One London newspaper once said that they would give £5 to any reader who took the free offer slip from inside the newspaper to one of their street sellers. Thousands of people buy this paper on the streets but only eleven claimed their free £5 note. Many did not believe the paper’s promise.

Have you received God’s free gift of eternal life through faith in Jesus Christ? He keeps his promise. John’s Gospel says ‘to all who received Jesus, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.’ (John 1:12) Perhaps some of you here tonight have done so this past week during the special events at Newcastle University. And in response to his grace are we now walking with God living to please him as it states in v1 of Genesis 17? Are we willing to deny ourselves and take up our cross and follow Jesus? Jesus said, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.” (Luke 9:23) And if you have put your faith in Jesus Christ do you believe God in your daily life? Do you believe his promises? ‘If you belong to Christ’, as Paul puts it in Galatians 3:29, do you know that ‘you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise’? Do you believe that the God of the New Covenant is unconditionally committed to you? Because it’s true. God’s Word is true. Are you walking by faith? Do you trust that God is in control and that nothing is too hard for him? Do we believe the JPC verse for the year from Hebrews 13? ‘Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.’ So we say with confidence, ‘The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid. What can man do to me?’

Sometimes we struggle to trust God and we can have doubts. We can wonder why God doesn’t appear to answer a particular prayer. Well Abraham, one of the great heroes of faith, also struggled at times as we see in Genesis 12-17. Twenty four years earlier in Genesis 12 the Lord God had called Abram to go to the land of Canaan. In this fallen world God had been looking for someone whom he could trust and who would trust him. He found Abram, and approached him in sheer undreamed of grace and Abram responded. He promised Abram that he would make him into a great nation, he would bless him, make his name great and that Abram would be a blessing. God promised that he would bless those who bless Abram and curse those who curse him and that all peoples on earth would be blessed through him. Abram trusted God and promptly obeyed and went. He was seventy five years old and his wife Sarai just ten years younger. When he arrived there the Lord appeared to him and said:

“To your offspring I will give this land.”

A number of years later in Genesis 15 Abram and Sarai were still childless. Abram began to believe that the Lord was not going to give them a son and that a servant in his household would be his heir. But God assured him:

“This man will not be your heir, but a son coming from your own body will be your heir. He took him outside and said, ‘Look up at the heavens and count the stars – if indeed you can count them…So shall your offspring be.’Abram believed the Lord, and he credited to him as righteousness. The Lord also said to him, ‘I am the Lord, who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land to take possession of it…On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram and said, ‘To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates…” (Genesis 15:4f)

But at the age of 85 and 75 respectively, Abram and Sarai still had no child, ten years after the promise. So Sarai took things into her own hands in Genesis 16 and gave Abram Hagar, hoping that her maidservant could be a sort of surrogate mother. But from this sin a horrible mess ensued and Ishmael was born. Thirteen years later when Abram was 99 years old we come to Genesis 17 and there is still only Ishmael. Abram is no doubt wondering if God’s promise will come true. His faith is trembling. Later in v17 he laughs in temporary disbelief that he will be a father at the age of 100 and Sarai a mother at 90 to son who would be called Isaac – a name which means 'he laughs’!. Abraham is no doubt miserable at the start of chapter 17. He has sinned. But then who walks in? God! Look at v1:‘the Lord appeared to Abram and said:

1. “I am God Almighty” (which is my first heading)

God wants to confirm his covenant (or binding agreement) with Abram and, in v2, says that he will greatly increase Abram’s numbers. But this conversation begins a little differently in v1. God speaks to Abram, but for the first time introduces Himself as God Almighty (which in Hebrew is El-Shaddai). Why does God do that? God wants Abram to know, beyond all doubt, that He is the Almighty God who is all sufficient and all-powerful, and that nothing – absolutely nothing – is too hard for him. Twenty times in this chapter God says either “I will” do something or indicates some very specific event or change that is about to happen. God is on the move! He is faithful and will keep his promises. He is Almighty and totally trustworthy.

Is that something you need assurance of today? The Bible says that if we have trusted Christ then we have been saved or rescued from hell, we are being saved and we will be saved. Jesus is coming again. We will be in heaven with him forever if we belong to him. If we confess our sins God is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:9) He is Almighty God who does answer our prayers even if it’s not always in the way we expect or in our timescale. My grandmother prayed for me for 15 years before I trusted in Jesus Christ as Saviour and Lord. Here God strengthens Abram’s faith with this reminder that he is God Almighty. We see the evidence of this in Romans 4:18-21. Paul writes:

“Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said to him, "So shall your offspring be." Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead – since he was about a hundred years old – and that Sarah's womb was also dead. Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised.”

Note that after twenty-four years, Abram and Sarai are still waiting – and will still wait a while longer – for Isaac to be born. Perhaps you’ve been praying for God to act in a particular situation for a long time. Just because God has not yet answered your prayers doesn’t mean He can’t or He won’t. The essence of faith is that we “are sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see” (Hebrews 11:1) … and sometimes God works on our faith. At this service of Holy Communion we remember that God gave himself for us, in the person of Jesus Christ. As we look at the cross, we are reminded of God’s great love for us. How he died for us. His death on the cross being the fundamental event by which the new covenant was established. And how he rose from the grave for us. If El-Shaddai, God Almighty, can do that he can do anything!

One Christian writer, Oswald Chambers, once said:

“Beware of worshipping Jesus as the Son of God, and professing your faith in Him as the Saviour of the world, while you blaspheme Him by the complete evidence in your daily life that He is powerless to do anything in and through you.”

We must also beware in our prayers of limiting God, not only by unbelief, but also by fancying that we know what he can do. How does Paul pray in Ephesians 3?

“Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.”

So firstly God says ‘I am God Almighty.’ He is in control of the nations and their territory and he is able to give to Abram and Sarai a son in their old age. Secondly he says:

2. WALK BEFORE ME AND BE BLAMELESS

God required those who were in covenant with him to live in such a way as to please him. They were to walk in his presence with nothing to hide from him and be wholly dedicated to God’s cause.

We are too in response to his grace. When we repent and believe in Jesus we don’t just say sorry, we say we want to go God’s way rather than our own way. And we are to live lives that are pleasing to God (1 Thessalonians 4). If we love someone we want to please them. May be some of you were doing that yesterday on Valentines Day! If we love Jesus then we will want to please him. Our faith should be accompanied by the ‘obedience that comes from faith’ as Paul puts it in Romans 1:5. It is a mark of genuine repentance and faith. Jesus said in John 14: “If you love me you will obey my commands.” In our Gospel reading from John 8, Jesus said to those who had believed him: “If you hold to my teaching you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth and the truth will set you free.”
God says walk in my presence and be wholly dedicated to my cause. Are we walking with the Lord wholly dedicated to his cause? Abram was not free to live like the Canaanites around him or to be half hearted in his service of his Lord and neither are we. If we’re in Christ we’re free not to live as we please but to live for Christ, to serve him wholeheartedly. Yet so often we can flirt with the world and be half hearted. God called, chose and justified Abram and holiness was to be an intrinsic part of his life. We too are called to be holy (1 Corinthians 1:2). The gospel of salvation by faith in Christ does not jeopardize right living. The New Testament urges us to make it our aim to please the Lord with all the single mindedness of an athlete. Who tonight needs to repent and throw off the sin that so easily entangles and run with perseverance the race marked out for you? It doesn’t pay to stray.

In response to God Abram doesn’t argue but falls down in worship, just as we should. And God gives him a new name, which is my third heading:

3. A NEW NAME

Look at v4&7. God says to him:

“This is my covenant with you: You will be the father of many nations. No longer will you be called Abram; your name will be Abraham, for I have made you a father of many nations… I will establish my covenant as an everlasting covenant between me and you and your descendants after you for the generations to come, to be your God and the God of your descendants after you.”

Whereas Abram meant ‘father exalted’, the new name meant ‘father of a multitude of nations’. Had Abraham been able to look into the distant future, he would have seen countless millions of Christians, saved like Abraham by faith, who were to look to him as their father in the faith, as Paul puts it in Romans 4:16.

The covenant was spiritual. It wasn’t limited to this life, but had eternity in its scope, and extended throughout the generations of Abraham’s descendants for an everlasting covenant. The covenant was also territorial. ‘I will give to you and to your descendants after you the land of Canaan for an everlasting possession,’ says God Almighty.

Here was reassurance and hope. The Lord had brought him to this land. The Lord says he will have a son by Sarai called Isaac. He says, ‘I will be your God and the God of your descendants.’ How does faith come? Faith comes by hearing the Word of God. How do we grow in faith? By hearing, reading and living God’s Word, taking him at his Word. God does not lie. Abraham may have been 99 years old. Sarai may have been barren but God had promised. And in this chapter the stress is on all that the Lord God Almighty is going to do – ‘I have made you…’, ‘I will make…’, ‘I will establish…’ and so on. God keeps his Word. If we have trusted Christ then we are Abraham’s true spiritual descendants and as God promised the Lord God Almighty is our God and in Christ we are a new creation.

God had again stated and defined his unconditional commitment to Abraham and now Abraham had to commit himself and his heirs unconditionally to God and his covenant, which brings us to my final point:

4. THE SIGN OF THE COVENANT

Then God says, “And there’s going to be a sign of this covenant.” Covenants often had signs to be kind of memorials to them. “I want you to be circumcised.” Imagine you’re Abraham and you hear that. You might be thinking, “Noah got a rainbow and we get circumcision!” I can imagine Abraham bringing that fact up! Look at v9-14:

“As for you, you must keep my covenant, you and your descendants after you for the generations to come. This is my covenant with you and your descendants after you, the covenant you are to keep: Every male among you shall be circumcised. You are to undergo circumcision, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and you. For the generations to come every male among you who is eight days old must be circumcised, including those born in your household or bought with money from a foreigner – those who are not your offspring…My covenant in your flesh is to be an everlasting covenant. Any uncircumcised male, who has not been circumcised in the flesh, will be cut off from his people, he has broken my covenant.”

So circumcision was God’s appointed sign of the covenant, which signified Abraham’s covenanted commitment to the Lord and which also marked him as the one to whom God had made covenant commitment in response to his faith, which the Lord credited to him as righteousness (Genesis 15:6). Paul in Romans 4:11 comments that:

“Abraham received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised.”

This physical mark was to further reassure Abraham that he did really belong to the Lord and that the Lord really would fulfil his promises, however improbable that fulfilment might seem. And Abraham accepted it and obeyed. Look at v23-27. On that very day Abraham and every male in his household was circumcised. Each one had the mark of the covenant in his flesh. And it was very important. V14:

“Any uncircumcised male who has not been circumcised in the flesh, will be cut off from his people, he has broken my covenant.”

So our covenant making God takes the initiative and approaches Abraham in sheer grace. Abraham responds in faith: ‘And he believed the Lord; and he reckoned it to him as righteousness.’ The grace of God is met by the faith of Abraham. That is how Abraham was put right with God. That is how we are. There is no other way. You see the righteousness granted to Abraham preceded the law and circumcision – it depended on neither, but depended instead on his belief in God’s promises. In the same way a Christian is reckoned righteous because he believes that God raised from the dead the Lord Jesus Christ, as Paul puts it in Romans 4:22-25. As someone has said:

“Do not believe those who tell you that there was one way of salvation in the OT days (law keeping), but that God has now changed his mind and decided that faith would be a better idea! Men and women were saved in the OT in just the same way as they were in the NT – by the sheer undeserved generosity of God, to which they respond in adoring trust. God’s grace: all of him for us. Our faith: all of us for him.”

Such is the covenant. And God gives circumcision as a tangible proof of the validity of this covenant between God’s free acceptance of Abraham and Abraham’s free acceptance of God.

But notice one more thing about this mark of the covenant. Its efficacy was not automatic. Esau was circumcised, Ishmael was circumcised, but it did them no good. Their hearts were not right in the sight of God. The outer mark did not correspond with the inner reality. Abraham had believed God and had entrusted himself to God without reserve, but not they.
So what does this say to us if we who are Christians are Abraham’s offspring? It says that the Christian life is response in faith and obedience to the God who takes the initiative and comes in sheer grace to seek me out. It says that God gives a mark of belonging to seal that unseen contract between his undeserved love and our wobbly faith. And baptism is the mark of initiation into the New Covenant, just as circumcision was into the Old Covenant. In Colossians 2:11 the Apostle Paul brings these two sacramental acts together and links them with the dying and rising of Christ:

“You were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of flesh in the circumcision of Christ; and you were buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the working of God who raised him from the dead.”

Baptism, then, it would appear in some way corresponds to circumcision under the Old Covenant. It is a mark of the covenant or agreement between God’s grace and our response. Not just of God’s grace, nor just of our response. It is the seal both on God’s initiative and our response. And because of God’s initiative the strong injunction here in Genesis 17 was to circumcise even the very young in Jewish families as well as the adults. There would seem then to be a case for baptising children of believers as we do here at JPC, as well as those who are old enough to answer for themselves. But that is a sermon in itself!

But water baptism doesn’t save you. It is baptism with the Spirit that is key and Christ is the baptizer with the Holy Spirit (Mark 1:8). If our inner attitude of response doesn’t grasp hold of God’s loving initiative then the baptised person no more tastes the reality of salvation than did the nominal, circumcised Jew. Covenant signs are conditional, not automatic. But they are important. Jesus commanded us to go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Peter said in Acts 2:38: ‘Repent and be baptised.’ Are you a true child of Abraham and therefore of God? In other words have you repented and put your faith in Christ? Then you should be baptised. Why not repent and put your faith in Christ tonight and see Jonathan Pryke about being baptised?