GOD’S COVENANT – HIS WILL

GOD’S COVENANT – HIS WILL

“But now hath he obtained a more excellent ministry, by how much also he is the mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better promises.” Heb. 8:6

The outstanding word here is the word "covenant," for it includes everything which accrues to the believer through the priesthood of Jesus. The writer had employed it once before (Heb. 7:22). Now he turned back to it, and from this point it constantly recurs to the end of the letter. It is important that we should recognize its real value. The Latin Vulgate invariably renders the word testamentum, and our Revisers always marginally suggest testament as an alternative rendering. This is suggestive, and indeed important. When we employ the word covenant, we think of a contract, into which two parties have entered, and which involves obligations and responsibilities on both sides, and all this is true in the use of the word in this connection. But the idea is not that of a covenant made after discussion, or by mutual concession and arrangement. 

A covenant is literally a testament, or disposition made by one, in the making of which the other is not consulted, but the benefits of which that other can only appropriate as he fulfills the terms laid down by the one. Our modern word "will" exactly conveys the idea. The covenant between God and man which Christ Jesus has mediated is the disposition of God on behalf of man, the benefits of which man can only appropriate as he obeys the terms of that testament or disposition. To put the truth somewhat roughly, and perhaps, therefore, all the more forcefully-the better covenant is not one arrived at after bargaining with God. It is all of His grace. There are no "if's" in this covenant. This one is "unconditional."  This covenant allows the priests to do their service under grace instead of under law. This changes everything. We serve under His authority, His priests, with His Spirit within us, with His promise of security in the holies of holies.