ARE WE STILL UNDER THE
NEW COVENANT - Part Two
ARE WE STILL UNDER THE NEW COVENANT? – Part Two
Why is it so hard for many believers to accept that today, in the “dispensation of the grace of God” (Eph. 3:2), we are saved out of death and sin only by grace through faith which itself is the gift of God?
Since publishing the first study in this series, “Are we still under the New Covenant?” I have been challenged to further prove my contention that believers today are not under, neither obliged to obey, either the Old or New Covenants. Accordingly, I put forward the following scripture-based interpretation for your consideration.
First though let me explain why the issue is one of extreme importance. Today the professing “church” is split by multiple fragmentations. There is no one overriding doctrine that unites all. True, most of Christendom acknowledges “Christ died for our sins”, and that is essential. But on almost everything else Christianity is divided.
In particular there is division over whether believers should obey God’s injunctions to Israelites and to Gentiles saved under Israel’s “umbrella” in the Acts period or whether the bringing in of the “dispensation of the grace of God” (Eph. 3:1-4) has done away with such requirements.
Fact is that in the “grace age” God brought in through the Apostle Paul nearly 2,000 years ago, and still in force today, there is one paramount message that in his time swept the world and united true believers. It is found in Col. 1:5-6:
For the hope which is laid up for you in heaven, whereof ye heard before in the truth of the gospel , which is come unto as it is in all the world; and bringeth forth fruit, as it doth also in you, since the day ye heard of it, and knew the grace of God in truth.
Now, most everybody would agree that today we are saved by grace, but we have to ask ourselves do we really hold to that as absolute truth? Or do we instead fall back on promises made to the once chosen people Israel, now set aside, as the first study in this series explained?
May I suggest one passage that firmly forbids doing so, Col. 2:13-19:
And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath He quickened together with Him (Christ), having forgiven you all trespasses.
Note that the “saints and faithful brethren at Colosse” (Col. 1:2) have already been made alive unto God (i.e. quickened) and been forgiven of all trespasses. And this without repentance, water baptism, confession of sin or any form of religious ritual. Thus a huge change of heart and spiritual status has been performed by God without any form of human assistance.
Does that mean believers need not repent of sin or continually strive to “work out your own salvation with fear and trembling” (Phil. 2:12). Of course not. But we must first acknowledge that, the Lord Jesus Christ has already saved us and that we are “complete” in Him (Col.2:10) and that it is He “worketh in you both to do and to will of his good pleasure” (Phil. 2:13). So how best do we do that? Col. 2:6 has the answer:
As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in Him, rooted and built up in Him and stablished in the faith as ye have been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving.
Remember how you were saved? How God changed your heart to love Him? How you came to know Him, want more of Him And all this without repentance, water baptism or any other human religious performance on our part. You see, our Lord wants us to all our lives walk in what He did when He “quickened” us, not what we do.
Moving on, verse 14 makes clear that the laws and regulations required of Israel under its two covenants, and which applied to Gentiles added to chosen nation in the Acts period, are now abolished under grace. So, while quickening us and forgiving us all trespasses our Lord was also …
…Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross.
Verse 15 says our Saviour also “spoiled principalities and powers … triumphing over them”. Thus we are now told in Col. 1:12 that the Father has …
…made us meet (fitted) to be to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light … delivered us from the power of darkness and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son.
So it’s a done deal. We are already saved, sealed (Eph. 1: 13), seated in heavenly places (Eph. 2:6).
As said in Part One of this study both Old and New Covenants required obedience. The main difference was that the New Covenant supplied the Spirit to help believers keep the statutes. Thus, speaking of the New Covenant Jeremiah prophesies:
But this shall be the covenant 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 … I will forgive their iniquity and remember their sin no more (Jer. 31:31-32).
How did the Lord do that? Answer: By pouring out his Spirit on the day of Pentecost. But repentance and water baptism were required. As the Apostle Peter said:
Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ (NB: not the “Father, Son and Holy Ghost”) for the remission of sin and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost (Acts 2:38).
But did this blot out their sins at that time? No, for in Acts 3:19 Peter states that such blotting out will only take place “when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord”. And that hasn’t happened yet for Israel.
Fact is that with their sins not yet blotted out even the “gift of the Holy Ghost” did not persuade Israel as a nation to keep the New Covenant. In Acts 7 the martyr Stephen told the Sanhedrin Council of Jewish rulers: “ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always resist the Holy Ghost, as your fathers did, so do ye … who have received the law by the disposition of angels, and have not kept it”.
Was there anything wrong with the New Covenant that it couldn’t save? No for, as Paul, says a very small number of Israelites heeded the message and were saved:
Even so at the present time also there is a remnant according to the election of grace (Rom. 11: 5).
He then concludes that “…blindness has happened in part to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles be come in Rom. 11:25).
But God was not only gracious but also merciful, giving Israelites 40 years to repent (i.e. change their minds) before setting them aside in Acts 28:28 and sending salvation away from Israel to the Gentiles. And in 70AD he destroyed both Jerusalem and the temple as He had warned He would:
Therefore I say unto you the kingdom of God shall be taken from you and given to a nation (people) bring forth the fruits thereof (Matt: 21:42).
But when the king heard thereof He was wroth and he sent forth his armies and destroyed those murderers and burned up their city (Matt. 22:7).
And that is exactly what the risen, glorified Lord Jesus Christ did as Almighty God in 70 AD. Today then neither the New or Old covenants are in force as instruments of salvation or sanctification. It is only by grace through faith that we are saved (Eph. 2:8-9).
John Dudley Aldworth
Email: john.aldworth@hotmail.com
Please visit the website "Day of Christ Ministries" for further dispensational truth.