Sermon Text: Genesis 9: 8-17
It used to be that a handshake meant something. One kept one’s promise no matter the cost. Sometimes it seems like those days are over. And how easy it is to conveniently “forget” a promise made. One father was skeptical of his teenage son’s newfound determination to build muscles as he went with the boy to the store to buy some weights. They found a set of weights and the boy pleaded with his Dad: “Please, Dad, I promise I’ll use them every day.” Dad replied: “I don’t know, Michael. It’s really a commitment on your part.” Michael: “Please, Dad.” Dad remarked: “They are not cheap.” Michael: “I’ll use them, Dad. I promise. You’ll see.” Finally won over, Dad paid for the equipment and headed for the door. After a few steps, he heard his son behind him saying: “What? You mean I have to carry them to the car?”
In Genesis 9, God establishes his covenant with Noah, with Noah’s descendants and with every living creature that is with Noah—that “never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of a flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.” God gave Noah a sign of the covenant that He made with Noah and his descendants and with every living creature with Noah—a rainbow---“when I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow is seen in the clouds, I will remember my covenant.”
A covenant is a legally binding obligation (promise). Throughout history God has made covenants with his people. One of my Bibles lists seven covenants found in the Bible:
• Genesis 3: 15 In the Garden of Eden. God promises that Satan and mankind will be enemies. The sign of the covenant is pain at childbirth.
• Genesis 9: 8-17 To Noah. God promises that he would never again destroy the earth with a flood. The sign of the covenant is the rainbow.
• Genesis 15: 12-21/17:1-14. To Abraham. God promises that Abraham’s descendants would become a great nation if they obeyed God. God would be their God forever. The sign of the covenant was the smoking firepot and the blazing torch.
• Exodus 19: 5-6. At Mount Sinai. God promises that Israel would be God’s special people, a holy nation. But they would have to keep their part of the covenant—obedience. The sign of the covenant was the exodus.
• Numbers 25: 10-13. To the priesthood. God promises to Aaron’s descendants that they would be priests forever. The sign of the covenant was the Aaronic priesthood.
• 2 Samuel 7: 13; 23:5. To David. God promises salvation would come through David’s line through the birth of the Messiah. The sign of the covenant would be the Messiah born a descendant of David.
• Hebrews 8: 6-13. The New Covenant. God promises forgiveness and salvation are available through faith in Christ. The sign of the covenant is Christ’s resurrection.
I found this to be an interesting list---one that I want to delve into further. Two other lists in this Bible are also interesting. One is a comparison between the Old Covenant and the New Covenant:
1. The Old Covenant is placed upon stone but the New Covenant is placed upon people’s hearts.
2. The Old Covenant is based on the law but the New Covenant is based on the desire to love and serve God.
3. The Old Covenant must be taught but the New Covenant is known by all.
4. The Old Covenant is a legal relationship with God but the New Covenant is a personal relationship with God.
The second comparison between the Old and New Covenants revolves around Hebrews 8 and 9 and points toward the Old Covenant being a “shadow of the real Christ”. In the Old Covenant, gifts and sacrifices were required by those guilty of sin. One went to worship God in a physical building. The Old Covenant was a failed agreement by us/the people. The Old Covenant required continual sacrifice. Forgiveness was to be earned.
The New Covenant changed things dramatically. In the New Covenant—Christ died for you. Christ is in the believer’s heart and is directly involved in your life. The New Covenant is a faithful agreement by Christ. His sacrifice was perfect and final. We have true and complete forgiveness—and forgiveness is freely given in Christ.
There is so much on this topic that it is impossible to “condense it down” to a 15 minute sermon. Here are a few more Scripture verses to consider:
• Genesis 21: God’s promise to Sarah: “Now the Lord was gracious to Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did for Sarah what he had promised. Sarah became pregnant and bore a son to Abraham in his old age, at the very time God had promised him.”
• Numbers 23: “God is not human, that he should lie, not a human being, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and then not fulfill?”
• 1 Chronicles 16: “He remembers his covenant forever, the promise he made, for a thousand generations, the covenant he made with Abraham, the oath he swore to Isaac. He confirmed it to Jacob as a decree, to Israel as an everlasting covenant: ”To you I will give the land of Canaan as the portion you will inherit.”
• Psalm 145: “The Lord is trustworthy in all he promises and faithful in all he does.”
• Jeremiah 31: “The days are coming,” declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and with the people of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them,” declares the Lord. This is the covenant I will make with the people of Israel after that time. 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.”
• Luke 22: “In the same way, after the supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you.”
• Hebrews 9: “For this reason Christ is the mediator of a new covenant, that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance—now that he has died as a ransom to set them free from the sins committed under the first covenant.”
Now that your mind is inundated like the flood waters through all those scripture verses pertaining to the covenants, let’s now step back and try to look at the big picture, at the “grand plan” that God has.
There’s a story of a man who keeps a gift book on his desk—this one being “America’s Spectacular National Parks”. He recounted that he had had the book open to a photo of the Grand Teton Mountains. It was an extra-wide photo that filled the left page and crossed over to the right page. It was a majestic display of deep blue sky; rugged, gray, snow-capped mountains; and a calm lake in the foreground. Then one day he decided to turn the page to the next picture and discovered that he had missed something. The right hand picture of the Grand Tetons was instead an extra-long page folded over, covering a part—and he had not noticed it. When he opened the picture up, it added some sixteen inches to the width of the photo. The Grand Tetons became even grander. The Christian life has unfolding moments like that, when we discover there is much more to God and his kingdom than we knew, much more to his purpose for us than we imagined.
In this Lenten season, let us open our minds to the fact that God has more in store for us and for our church than we can imagine, let us open our hearts to him in obedience and let him guide us on our way, and let us remember that over and over again in his Word, he lets us know that he is ever faithful to his promises and that he loves us.