Covenant Theology 3: The Covenant with Abraham (Gen 12, 15, 17)

 

You can believe all the right things, do all the right things, be in the right church and still not be a Christian if you do not have a relationship with Jesus. Memorizing the Bible, knowing all the right answers, developing amazing self-control so that you sin less than others is not Christianity. Repeating the Lord’s Prayer, memorizing the Apostle’s Creed, being a good citizen, does not make anyone a Christian. It is all about a relationship with God. He is our Father in heaven and he wants us to know that we are his prized possession, the apple of his eye, his beloved sons and daughters. Living as a Christian is living out of God’s love for us! Our right beliefs, conduct, and spiritual practices feed our relationship with God. Without the relationship, they are vanity of vanities! The Bible’s way of talking about our relationship with God is through Covenants. If we are in a covenant with him, He has made us part of his family. He calls us friends. Nothing is more important in this life than having a personal relationship with the living God. For us to understand our relationship with God, we must understand the covenants in the Bible that build up into the New Covenant that we are part of. 

So far, we have seen the Covenant of works/life, the covenant of grace, and the covenant with Noah. When God created Adam and Eve, they had to be perfectly obedient to inherit eternal life. Once humanity failed, God graciously promised a savior. No matter how badly mankind fails, God will provide a savior. God’s covenant with Noah teaches us that only those who trust in God and submit to his will escape judgment our sin deserves. After the flood, God promises he will never again wipe out sinful humanity with a flood. The rainbow, the sign of the covenant is a reminder for all creation, that God is patient and merciful and does not give us the punishment we deserve. God is slow to anger, but there will be a day where anyone who does not trust in Christ as savior and submit to him as Lord, will be judged for their sin. As he commanded Adam, God commanded Noah to be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth. 

In Gen 11, Noah’s descendants rebel against God. They gather in one place to build a tower to make a name for themselves. God is merciful. He does not wipe them out. He confuses the languages which forces them to scatter over the earth. Humanity has a perpetual sin problem, and a question remains. Who will be the son of Eve who will crush the head of the serpent? The answer we get in Gen 12 is Abraham! God enters into a covenant with Abraham in Gen 12–17, and we will see why Abraham is so loved in the NT (e.g., Matt 1:1, Gal 3:16 - Jesus is the Promised Son of Abraham; Rom 4, Gal 3 - Salvation by faith, Jam 2 - faith must work: Abraham trusted God so much that he entrusted the life of his son, Isaac to him).

In Gen 12, God promises offspring, blessing, and land. Gen 11:27 begins the story of Abraham. In Gen 12:1, God asks Abram to trust him, and go wherever he tells him. Abram obeys and God promises him children, blessing, and land. These three elements relate to the past covenants. God promises to bless Abraham, and that in him, all the families of the earth will be blessed. Even though his wife is barren, Abraham will have many children. If we take these promises together, we can assume that a descendant of Abram will be the son of Eve who will destroy the works of the devil (1 John 3:8). In Gen 12:7, God promises Abram the land of Canaan. This land reminds us of the Garden in Eden. It is described in ideal terms as the land flowing with milk and honey (Exod 3:8, Deut 11:10). There are explicit parallels between Eden and the Promised Land in Isa 51:3 and Ezek 36:35, Joel 2:3 “the land is like the garden of Eden.” 

Application: What does it mean for us today, that in Abraham, God would bless all the families of the earth? It means that God wants to bless everyone. We know that the way he blesses all the families of the world is by sending Jesus, the descendant of Abraham to die for our sins. We have a role to play. We are part of the families of the earth who were blessed in Abraham because we heard the gospel, we believed, we trusted in Christ’s atonement for sin, and submitted to his Lordship. We now have a job to do. We are to continue to spread the blessing, by making disciples of all people. We do this in intentional relationships. We grow, we help others grow, and we pray that God would put us in awkward situations in which we can share how wonderful Jesus is! If we do not think it is for us, maybe we need to change.  

In Gen 15, Abraham is saved by faith, and God formalizes his relationship with him through a Covenant. Covenant language appears in Gen 15 and 17: Gen 15:18; 17:2, 4, 7, 9, 10, 11, 13, 14, 19, and 21. Abraham was 75 when God promised him children (Gen 12:4). We know his wife is barren (Gen 11:30). We wonder how God will keep his promises. In Gen 15:1, the word of God comes to Abram in a vision: “Fear not, Abram, I am your shield, your reward shall be very great.” Abram responds: “O Lord God, what will you give me, for I continue childless.” The Lord reaffirms his promise saying (Gen 15:4) “your very own son shall be your heir” and then (Gen 15:5), his descendants will be as many as the stars. Gen 15:6 is a golden verse: “[Abram] believed the Lord, and [the Lord] counted it to [Abram] as righteousness.” Next, the Lord repeats the promise of land in Gen 15:7. Abram responds: “O Lord God, how am I to know that I shall possess it?” To give Abram assurance, the Lord enters into a covenant with Abram. In Gen 15:9, Abram brings five animals, cuts them in half (except the two birds), lays each half opposite each other. While Abram is sleeping God speaks to him. He begins with “Know for certain” and then gives him details about his descendants being slaves in Egypt and that they will return to possess the land.” In Gen 15:17, “a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch passed between these pieces [of the animals cut in half].” A covenant is a formal relationship or partnership where different parties had responsibilities to uphold. To enter into a covenant, they would cut animals, walk through the middle to communicate: “if I do not keep my end of the deal, may what was done to the animals be done to me.” Abram does not walk through the animals, only God does. We see that God enters into a covenant with Abram to give him the assurance that his descendants will indeed receive the Promised Land. This is like the promise of a Messiah in Gen 3:15, or the guarantee there will not be another cosmic flood. God makes a promise that is not tied to human obedience. It will absolutely happen. 

Application: Abraham believed and was counted righteous. This doesn’t mean that his works do not matter. God made an unconditional promise to Abram. Because Abram trusts God, he must submit to God’s will. So, it is with us. We are saved by Christ alone, through faith alone. But good works will accompany true faith. We see Abraham’s faith at work. Though he was 99 years old, and God had promised that he would have children. Believing that God was faithful meant he would have sexual relations with his wife in order to conceive. Abram was not perfect. He tried taking matters into his own hands and had a child with another woman. Abraham also acts faithfully as one who blesses all the families of the earth when he intercedes for Sodom and Gomorrah, that God would not punish the righteous (Gen 18–19). Again, in Gen 22, because God promised him that he would have many descendants, he believed that if God asked him to sacrifice his son Isaac that surely, God would have to raise him from the dead to keep his promise! (Heb 11:19). Our faith leads us to action. There once was a young man who worked full-time as an engineer, and when he went home, he played video games until he went to bed. He was part of a men’s Bible Study group, and at the end of each meeting, they shared prayer requests. This young man shared that he really wanted to meet a godly woman to begin a relationship. The other men suggested that he stop playing video games after work, but that he would go out into the world to go meet women! The Christian life is never one of just sitting back. Faith means we act on God’s promises.

Gen 17 has more covenant elements. We have already looked at promises of offspring, blessing, land, and righteousness through faith. Now, in Gen 17, we briefly look at (1) the parties, (2) the sign, (3) the terms, (4) and the curses of the covenant. 

(1) The parties of the covenant are God, Abram, and his children. Abram becomes Abraham, the father of many nations, so any foreigner with the faith of Abraham is welcome. The sign of the covenant is given to Abraham’s male servants, so they are included. 

(2) The sign of the covenant is circumcision. The sign is a requirement for all males. It is a reminder like the rainbow. For Abraham who was still childless when he looked at his reproductive organ, he was reminded that God promised his wife would conceive a child. Rom 4:11 says circumcision was the sign that Abraham was saved by faith. It was a reminder that Abraham and his children would have many children and live in the Promised Land. Because the promises are all tied, circumcision also reminded Israel that among their children the Messiah Jesus would come to offer the forgiveness of sins, a blessing for all the families of the earth. Application: The Messiah has come. We no longer wait for the promised son. There is no more need to circumcise. Baptism is the sign of the washing away of sin, the reality of being dead to sin and alive in Christ for those who have faith. The signs of circumcision and baptism are given to whom the promise is given. So even though there was no guarantee that Abraham’s children would walk in faith, they were given the sign of the covenant. When Christians have babies, there is no guarantee that those children will grow up loving God. But because the promise is for them (Acts 2:38–39) that if they believe they will be saved, they get the sign of the promise as well. 

(3) We’ve already seen that one of the terms of the covenant was faith. In Gen 17:1, God commands Abraham to walk before him and be blameless. So, salvation by faith and keeping God’s law are not contradictions. Gen 17:14 states that a male who is not circumcised has broken the covenant, and will be cut off. 

(4) This is the covenant curse. Just because God made unconditional promises, does not mean we live as we please. Those who did not keep the covenant are excluded from it and will not benefit from its blessings. Another element of curse is that in Gen 15, only God walked through the animals cut in half. God was saying he would be cursed if he does not keep his promises of offspring, blessing, and land. His promises are guaranteed to come to pass. Application: The New Covenant has similarities. In the same way, God walked through the dead animals to guarantee he would keep his promises, in the New Covenant, Jesus takes the covenant curses on himself. The requirement for eternal life is to live a perfect life that none of us lives. The punishment for failing to live a perfect life is the curse of eternity in Hell. By dying on the cross for us, God took our curse on himself so that we would not have to experience the curse ourselves.

Conclusion: This is the Covenant with Abraham. It continues the story of God’s relationship with humanity and points to Jesus and the New Covenant. It states clearly that the way to have a relationship with God is by faith. The signs of the covenant, circumcision, baptism, or communion remind us of the promises of the Covenant: the coming of Jesus, and the forgiveness of sin. In the New Covenant, Abraham’s Land Promise is expanded. Jesus sends his disciples who lived in the Promised Land to go make disciples of all nations! God promised Abraham that in him all the families of the earth will be blessed! Having been blessed by Jesus, we now go out in the world and share this blessing with the gospel!