(On behalf of Harvey Mayne) Hallo everyone! I am coming to the end of the module Reading and using the Bible and have just done the unit on the relationship between OT and NT. It seems to me that it is assumed that we should know what the new covenant is (Duvall and Hays mention the new covenant all the time in their text book). But it doesn't seem to be explained anywhere! I can find references to Jer 31 and Hebrews 8, but not any explanation of how these texts have been fulfilled in Jesus. Does anyone have an idea where I could find a concise, simple explanation, preferably from a NT perspective, rather than an explanation of Jer 31? regards Harvey Mayne
(On behalf of Harvey Mayne)
Hallo everyone!
I am coming to the end of the module Reading and using the Bible and have just done the unit on the relationship between OT and NT. It seems to me that it is assumed that we should know what the new covenant is (Duvall and Hays mention the new covenant all the time in their text book). But it doesn't seem to be explained anywhere! I can find references to Jer 31 and Hebrews 8, but not any explanation of how these texts have been fulfilled in Jesus. Does anyone have an idea where I could find a concise, simple explanation, preferably from a NT perspective, rather than an explanation of Jer 31?
regards
Harvey Mayne
Hello, Harvey.
Concise and simple? But this is a theological question! Are you looking at it from a prelapsarian, postlapsarian, infralapsarian or metalapsarian point of view? Not sure, but I may have made one of those up.
Anyway, there is a helpful entry on the idea of covenant in the IVP New Dictionary of Theology (worth getting if you don't have it - a recommended text for the module Studying Theology and cheaply available second hand). The explanation there is that the substance of the old and new covenants is the same "in that they contain God's promise that he will be the God of his chosen people ... by redeeming them in Christ." The difference is in the way the covenants are administered by God: the old covenant was mediated by God-given law (so our side of the covenant was to follow the law), whereas the new covenant is mediated directly by God in the person of Christ and through the Spirit (so our side is to enter into the ongoing relationship God offers us).
In Galatians 3:23-26, Paul explains it like this:
"Now before faith came, we were imprisoned and guarded under the law until faith would be revealed. Therefore the law was our disciplinarian until Christ came, so that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer subject to a disciplinarian, for in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith." (NRSV)
So for a concise and simple statement of the new covenant, visit John 3:16.
That's how it seems to me, but I suspect you will get as many answers to your question as there are people prepared to post replies.
Kind regards.
John