THE TWO COVENANTS by Uriah Smith

Pacific Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Oakland, California · May 30, 1878

THE TWO COVENANTS.

By Uriah Smith

(To be continued.)

"For firding fault with them, he saith, Behold the days come, saith th Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah." Heb. 8:8.

In the prophecy as originally given, and as quoted by Paul, it is plainly stated with whom the Lord would make the new covenant: "Behold the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a new covenant," not with the Gentiles, but "with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah." The new covenant, therefore, is made with the very same people with whom the old was made.

Paul elsewhere mentions this fact in a number of places. In Rom. 9:3-5, he says, "For I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh." There is no question but Paul is here speaking of the literal seed of Abraham. He continues: "Who are Israelites; to whom pertaineth the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises; whose are the fathers, and of whom, as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God blessed forever."

These are very important and lofty distinctions conferred upon that people. Let us for a moment consider them. To them pertained "the adoption." God adopted Abraham as his friend, and his posterity as his children, because when all others had apostatized from him, Abraham alone was found faithful; and of him God bore testimony that he had obeyed his voice, kept his charge, his commandments, his statutes, and his laws. Gen. 26:5. So that people were set apart to be the depositaries of God's law, and preserve the worship and the knowledge of the true God in the earth.

And to them pertained "the glory;" that is, the manifestation of God's glory among men. This was exhibited at the giving of the law, when Moses was obliged to put a vail over his face to hide the glory of his countenance; and after that in the visible appearance of God's glory in connection more especially with the ark and mercy-seat.

And to them pertained "the covenants," plural, both of them, the old and the new. He does not say that to them pertained "the covenant" referring to the old, while the new pertained to some other people; but both were theirs. "And the giving of the law." Then the law was distinct from the covenants. "And the service of God, and the promises." All the promises came through the same channel. No promise is made to any one who is not in some sense a member of the Israel of God.

And, finally, our Lord himself, as concerning the flesh, came from that people. Many seem to think that all they need to say about the Sabbath is that it is Jewish; and they look upon anything to which they think they can apply this term with apparent if not real abhorrence. But in what condition should we find ourselves to-day, had not the Jews acted the part they have acted in our world's history? They received the lively oracles to commit unto us. By them truth was kept alive in the world. They were for long ages the only conservators of the knowledge of the true God, and of revealed religion in the earth. And our Lord said that salvation is "of the Jews."

Those things did not become Jewish by being for a time in the charge of that people. The law did not become Jewish, because they alone were found worthy for a long period to be its depositaries; nor was our Lord, merely a Jewish Saviour, because, as pertaining to the flesh, he sprang from that people.

Let us not despise the Jews, but honor them for the high distinction they once enjoyed, pity them that through blindness they rejected the blessings of the gospel, and pray for them, that they may yet, some of them, come to the light and be re-united to the good olive tree.

Away with this cry of Jewish; for the new covenant itself was made with Israel and Judah. How, then, do the Gentiles come in to share in its blessings? Paul explains in Eph. 2:13-15. After speaking of the Gentiles as aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise, he says, "But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us, having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances, for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace." In verse 19 he adds, "Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God."

Thus plainly is it stated that through Christ the Gentiles are brought into such a relation to God that they are no longer strangers from the covenants of promise. The middle wall of partition between the Jews and themselves was broken down by what Christ abolished on the cross.

We have already noticed that it was the old covenant that was abolished, and nothing but the old covenant. Now if that covenant was the ten commandments, the text should read, "Having abolished in his flesh the enmity even the ten commandments." But it does not read thus. It does not even intimate a change of those commandments. It reads, "Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances;" and no one who can lay claim to any respectable degree of common sense, will for a moment contend that there was anything in the ten commandments pertaining to ordinances, or that could come under the head of what is here said to have been abolished.

These ordinances point unmistakably to the services and ceremonies of the Jewish worship, which constituted the body and substance of the old covenant. These peculiarities of the Jewish worship, their circumcision, priesthood, and offerings, for a time hedged in that people, as by an impassable wall of separation, from all other nations. This was the middle wall of partition which kept them separate. And this being broken down, what is the result?

Here a most ludicrous and ridiculous blunder is made by some opponents of the Sabbath, even those who claim to be ministers of the word. They assert that the wall of partition was broken down in order that the Jews might come out where the Gentiles were, and partake of their liberty and blessings, the privileges of the gospel, and the first-day Sabbath.

This is just exactly the opposite of the truth. The Gentiles had no blessings to offer. We have already seen from Paul's testimony that they are without God, without Christ, and without hope, and have no interest in the covenants. The gospel was not theirs, but was preached to Abraham, to Moses, and the Hebrews, all through their history; and all its blessings were included in the new covenant, which, like the old, was made with that people. Gal. 3:8; Heb. 4:2.

No! the middle wall of partition was broken down that the Gentiles might go in where the Jews were, and be partakers of the blessings and promises which they had in their possession. Through Christ they enter in. He hath made both one so far as they will accept of his work and his offering. The Gentiles who thus come in, are then no longer Gentiles, but members of the commonwealth of Israel; no longer far off, but made nigh by the blood of Christ; no longer strangers, but fellow-citizens with the saints.

That the Gentiles are then reckoned as Israel in a certain sense, Paul, elsewhere very clearly shows. Rom. 9:7: "Neither because they are the seed of Abraham, are they all children; but in Isaac shall thy seed be called. That is, they which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God; but the children of the promise are counted for the seed."

In harmony with this, he testifies to the Galatians: "And if ye be Christ's then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise." Gal. 3:29. All who are Christ's then, are the children of Abraham, not literally but spiritually, and are accounted for the seed. So we hear him saying to the Romans in language still more pointed: "For he is not a Jew which is one outwardly; neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh; but he is a Jew which is one inwardly, and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter, whose praise is not of men but of God." The inward work of grace, then, in the heart, under the gospel, constitutes one a Jew in reality, and an Israelite indeed.

Nothing need be added to such plain statements of the apostle, yet he uses a figure in Rom. 11, which beautifully illustrates this point, and is entitled to a passing notice. He there represents the Jewish people, while they were the children of God, by a tame olive tree, and the Gentiles by a wild olive tree. The branches of the tame olive tree were broken off, and grafts from the wild olive tree, the Gentiles, were inserted in their places. Did this change the tree and make a Gentile tree of it? No; it was the same tree; but now the Gentiles are brought in to be a part of it, and thus partake of its root and fatness, the blessings of the new covenant, the promises of God through Abraham and his seed.

U. S.