THE TWO COVENANTS by John Gottlieb Matteson

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA · Apr 22, 1880

THE TWO COVENANTS.

By John Gottlieb Matteson

BY ELD. J. G. MATTESON.

(Concluded.)

3. What the new covenant contains. This we have already partly considered, but we will now more particularly notice each point which the Lord has introduced in the great sum of the new covenant. This contains four things:—

(1.) "I [the Lord] will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts." (2.) "And I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people." (3.) "And they shall not teach every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord; for all shall [or they shall all] know me, from the least to the greatest." (4.) "For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more." Heb. 8:10-12.

The very first proposition in the new covenant is to love the law of God, the ten commandments. This proves clearly that those believers who preach or write against the holy law of God, or speak of it lightly, or set it aside have gone astray. They have turned aside from the true order of the divine covenant.

But how do you prove that the ten commandments are the law of the Lord, and that they are given to convince of sin under the new covenant? They are the only law which the Lord has spoken publicly with his own voice and written with his own finger. Dent. 4:12, 13; 5:22. They were separated from all other laws. Ex. 25:10, 16, 21; 26:33. And they are that law which the apostles pointed to in the New Testament in order to convince men of sin. "Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law; for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet." Rom. 7:7. "Behold thou art called a Jew, and restest in the law, . . . which hast the form of knowledge and of the truth in the law. Thou, therefore, which teachest another, teachest thou not thyself? Thou that teachest a man should not steal, dost thou steal? Thou that sayest a man should not commit adultery, dost thou commit adultery? Thou that abhorrest idols, dost thou commit sacrilege?" Rom. 2:17-22.

None can misunderstand that the apostle in these two texts speaks of the ten commandments. And this is the very law which even under the new covenant stops every mouth, and makes all the world guilty before God. Rom. 3:19, 20. The same is proved by James 2:10, 11. This law the Lord now proposes to write in the hearts of his believing children, that they may be able to love the law of God. Then it is not a yoke of bondage unto them to obey the Lord; for they have "received the spirit of adoption," and

can say with the apostle, "This is the love of God, that we keep his commandments, and his commandments are not grievous." 1 John 5:3.

Those who thus with the mediator of the new covenant learn to say, "I delight to do thy will, O my God; yea, thy law is within my heart" (Ps. 40:8), are the children of God. They are the children of the covenant; Acts 3:25; the Israel of God; Gal. 6:16; the people of God, and the Lord "will be to them a God." Heb. 8:10.

The next condition in the new covenant which is just as necessary to salvation as the first, is to know the Lord. So soon as our faculties are developed, and we have personal responsibility, so soon must we seek personal fellowship with the Father and the Son in order to be saved. 1 John 1:3. Thus testifies our Saviour: "And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou has sent," John 17:3. And the prophet testifies of the children of the new covenant: "And all thy children shall be taught of the Lord; and great shall be the peace of thy children." Isa. 54:13; Gal. 4:26.

With this agree the words of the beloved apostle: "I write unto you fathers, because ye have known him that is from the beginning. . . . I write unto you little children, because ye have known the Father." 1 John 2:13. The children of the new covenant need not teach one another to know the Lord; for no one can become a member of the new covenant until he knows the only true God, and believes in his Son, our Saviour. Heb. 8:11.

Then follows the last blessed proposition in the new covenant,—God "will be merciful to their unrighteousness." Heb. 8:12. This blessed promise belongs certainly to those who love the law of the Lord, and believe in his dear Son, those who "keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus." Rev. 14:12.

May the Lord bless his word in your heart, kind reader, and make it a living word by his good Spirit. And may you willingly open the door to Him who stands and knocks, that you may overcome, even as he also overcame (Rev. 3:20, 21), and soon with the "Israel of God" "receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away." 1 Pet. 5:4.