Monday, June 5, 2017

The Two Marriage Covenants of Pentecost (Part Five)


The Jews made a covenant with God at Mount Sinai in which they agreed to keep all His commandments. This holy day is called Pentecost. The Jews call it Shavuot.

The Jews look at the day of Pentecost as the day they made a marriage covenant with God. Just as the bride says, “I do”, the Jewish people said, “We do”.

Exodus 24:3 ¶ And Moses came and told the people all the words of the LORD, and all the judgments: and all the people answered with one voice, and said, All the words which the LORD hath said will we do.

God also recognizes the day of Pentecost as the day he made a marriage covenant with the Jewish people. In Jeremiah 31:31-34, God refers to himself as their husband.

Jeremiah 31:31 ¶ Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah:

Jeremiah 31:32 Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day [that] I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith the LORD:

God speaks here of making a new covenant with the Jewish people. God ordained a new and better covenant, a marriage covenant of mercy. God said, “I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more”.

Also, in this new covenant there would be a closer relationship between God and His people. God would reveal Himself to them. Because He was forgiving their iniquity, they could receive the infilling of His Spirit. This is how we know Him.

Jeremiah 31:33 But this [shall be] the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people.

Jeremiah 31:34 And they shall teach no more every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the LORD: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the LORD: for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.

There is one issue, however. How can God and the Jewish people be released from their marriage covenant of the Law that they entered into at Sinai?

Paul addresses this in Romans 7:1-6.

Romans 7:1 ¶ Know ye not, brethren, (for I speak to them that know the law,) how that the law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth? [the law applies only while a person is living, not after he is dead.]

Romans 7:2 For the woman which hath an husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth; but if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband. [the laws of marriage no longer apply to her.]

Romans 7:3 So then if, while her husband liveth, she be married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress: but if her husband be dead, she is free from that law; so that she is no adulteress, though she be married to another man. [But if her husband dies, she is free from that law and does not commit adultery when she remarries.]

The only way that the Jewish people could be released from their marriage covenant of the Law with God is for God to die. Therefore, God robed Himself in flesh and His flesh died on the cross. By the death of God’s flesh, the Jewish people were set free from their Sinai marriage covenant with God, which is the covenant of the Law.

The Jew releases God when he dies with Christ by repentance and baptism in Jesus name.

Romans 7:4 Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God. [The Jew becomes dead to the Law and His first marriage covenant with God by repentance and burial with Christ in baptism. He then becomes the Bride of Christ who is risen from the dead, bringing fruit unto God acceptable to Him.]

Romans 7:5 For when we were in the flesh, the motions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death. [controlled by our old nature, sinful desires aroused by the Law were at work within us, producing fruit of sinful deeds resulting in death.]

Romans 7:6 But now we are delivered from the law, that being dead wherein we were held; that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter. [released from the Law, for we died to it, no longer captive to its power, we serve the new way of living in the Spirit, not in the old way of obeying the letter of the Law]

Romans 6:3 Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?

Romans 6:4 Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.

On the day of Pentecost, Peter gave the message of the New Covenant that set the Jews free from the Law to become the Bride of Christ. (John 3:29, 2Corinthians 11:2)

Acts 2:38 Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.

Acts 2:39 For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call.

That day, the day of Pentecost, there were added into the New Covenant and the Bride of Christ about three thousand souls. (Acts 2:41)

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