And I will cause you to pass under the rod, and I will bring you into the bond of the covenant:
The bond of God's covenant is open to anyone who is willing to enter it, and whosoever will may come into it by choice. Those who enter it share in His purpose and identify themselves with His purpose in creation that the earth be inhabited by beings whose existence is a blessing to themselves and to one another and an honor to their Creator, becoming the people He formed for Himself to show forth His praise.
The verse belongs to a pattern in which God brings deliverance through judgment, for the plagues fell on Egypt just before and during Israel's deliverance from bondage, pointing to the last plagues falling on the wicked just before and during the deliverance of the saints. In the time of trouble God will bring His people into the bond of the covenant by speaking from heaven and delivering the everlasting covenant, which His people will hear and celebrate, including a blessing for those who have kept His Sabbath holy.
The bond is a protective shelter in which parents who love and fear God are to keep their children within sacred influences made possible through redeeming blood. There they are to guard them from harmful companionship and from associations that misshape character and divert from unselfish service. As Israel was commanded to gather their children inside their own homes marked with blood on the doorposts before the death of the firstborn in Egypt and to abide within the protection assured by that token, so children are to be kept within the covenant shelter.
The bond of God's covenant is open to anyone who is willing to enter it, and whosoever will may come into it by choice. Those who enter it share in His purpose and identify themselves with His purpose in creation that the earth be inhabited by beings whose existence is a blessing to themselves and to one another and an honor to their Creator, becoming the people He formed for Himself to show forth His praise.
The verse belongs to a pattern in which God brings deliverance through judgment, for the plagues fell on Egypt just before and during Israel's deliverance from bondage, pointing to the last plagues falling on the wicked just before and during the deliverance of the saints. In the time of trouble God will bring His people into the bond of the covenant by speaking from heaven and delivering the everlasting covenant, which His people will hear and celebrate, including a blessing for those who have kept His Sabbath holy.
The bond is a protective shelter in which parents who love and fear God are to keep their children within sacred influences made possible through redeeming blood. There they are to guard them from harmful companionship and from associations that misshape character and divert from unselfish service. As Israel was commanded to gather their children inside their own homes marked with blood on the doorposts before the death of the firstborn in Egypt and to abide within the protection assured by that token, so children are to be kept within the covenant shelter.