While listening to a debate between Dr. Michael Brown, a messianic Jew, and an orthodox Jewish rabbi named Daniel Freitag, I got some thoughts on the New Covenant I'd like to share with you. Later, I listened to another debate which was also very helpful. Check the links below.
Dr. Michael Brown is a person I consider a great resource for Christians. He is a messianic Jew with a Ph.D. in Semitic languages from New York University. I first heard of him years ago and bought his five-volume set of books titled Answering Jewish Objections to Jesus, which I’ve used ever since. (Brown also has a website, https://askdrbrown.org/ a podcast, and is on Christian TV a lot.) His books are just a treasure chest of biblical information! They give us Christians the knowledge we need to answer most any objection a Jewish person might have to the gospel. But these books aren’t just good if you want to witness to Jews. They’re also great because they help us understand our own faith better.
I have found that whenever we bump up against people of other belief systems and have to interact with them, it always helps us understand what we have and believe as Christians as well. There’s even a verse in the Bible that backs that up. Philemon 1:6 in the NIV says that when we’re active in sharing our faith, it helps us understand better what we have in Christ.
This being said, I’ve recently been listening to some YouTube clips of Dr. Michael Brown debating with Jewish rabbis over whether or not Jesus is the Jewish Messiah. I learned so much by listening to these debates! You can hear them here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=35ABfM2RvTI (with rabbi Tovia Singer) and here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0IThMUEiO4&t=7899s (with rabbi Daniel Freitag).
One of the issues that came up in these debates was the New Covenant. We Christians believe the first covenant which God made was with the Jewish people, and is found in what we call the Old Testament (also known as the Hebrew Bible). We believe we now live in the days of the New Covenant, found in the pages of what we call the New Testament. We still consider it essential to read the Old Covenant. Through understanding it we can better understand the New Covenant and we gain so much insight and knowledge about God. A very true old saying goes, “The New is in the Old concealed, and the Old is in the New revealed.”
Christians (and Dr. Brown), often refer to Jer. 31:31, where God said He was going to bring in a new covenant, not like the old one He instituted at Mt. Sinai. We insist this new covenant is what Jesus instituted on the night He was betrayed, because He Himself said so (see Luke 22:20.) We believe that whereas the Old Covenant was centered around obedience to God’s commandments or Law, and had a Tabernacle (which later became the Temple), a priesthood, and a sacrificial system to atone for sins committed, the New Covenant is centered around Jesus. He is the only Person who ever completely fulfilled and obeyed God’s Law (Ro. 10:4). He “tabernacled” (Jn. 1:14) among us as the very dwelling place of God on earth. He is now our High Priest forever after the order of Melchizedek (Heb. 7:26), and He Himself is the only Sacrifice that God accepts for sin (Jn. 1:29; Heb. 9:13-15, 26). He is now “the Lord, our righteousness” (Jer. 23:6; 1 Cor. 1:30), the only way we can be made truly acceptable to God. We live under a new covenant, a new dispensation of grace and Spirit because of Jesus. He is “the Way, the Truth, and the Life.” He is how we enter into a right relationship with God.
Now rabbi Daniel Freitag, in his debate with Michael Brown, continually insisted that Christians believe the New Covenant means, “Someone came to die for your sins, so you no longer have to obey the Law of God.” He seemed to think that Christian teaching does away with the law completely, so that now, believers can live however they want, do whatever they want, and no longer have to obey God or live righteous lives, because Jesus did away with all that. He said that though this is what we believe, nowhere in the Hebrew Bible was such a system ever predicted. Nowhere does the Hebrew Bible say that in the future, Jews (and others) wouldn’t have to obey God’s law because they could just take the easier path of believing in Messiah. He read verse after verse that clearly taught righteous people were those who obeyed God’s commandments and lived as God said to live.
He even turned to Jer. 31:31 and read it in context, pointing out that, yes, it does announce the coming of a new covenant. “But if you read the verses right after it,” said Freitag, “you will clearly see that the new covenant will not do away with obedience to God’s commandments. It just says that God will write them on minds and hearts and enable people to obey them.” What he said next really got my attention, set me to thinking, and is the reason for this blog.
Freitag said that Christians say, “If you accept Jesus, He will write His laws on your heart and mind, and you’ll find that you just “naturally” obey them. Well, some of us do kind of say that, don’t we? But then he asked, “How many of you Christians in this room obey the commandment of keeping the Sabbath?” Obviously, we Christians have different views on Sabbath-keeping, and most of us don’t keep it very literally or very well. We say it has changed to Sunday, and we do give God a couple of hours on that day when we go to church, but that’s about it. We don’t diligently abstain from any sort of work or non-spiritual activity, and we sometimes (or often) don’t even go to church, worship, sing, pray, read scripture, etc. We don’t really devote the day just to God.
The rabbi’s point was that Christians, despite what they say, don’t just “naturally” obey God’s commandments once they’ve “accepted Jesus.” In fact, he said, most Christians don’t even really bother to know what all those commandments are. (Most rabbis agree there are 613 of them.) For this reason rabbi Freitag doesn’t believe the New Covenant has been instituted yet. No one really demonstrates that they have God’s laws written on their hearts or minds. He says the fact this hasn’t happened yet proves Jesus isn’t the real Messiah, because when the real one comes, this situation will change dramatically.
His argument really provoked me to think more about all this! I’d like to share some of my thoughts as I wrestled with this issue of what the New Covenant really is. In particular, I would like to address two issues. First, do Christians really believe that the New Covenant message is “someone will die for your sins so you don’t have to worry about God’s law anymore? It doesn’t matter how you live now. You don’t have to ‘try’ to be righteous. God has done it all for you by sending Jesus to die?”
Second, does accepting Jesus really change us so that now, we just “naturally” obey all of God’s laws because He lives inside us by His Spirit? I believe it is to our benefit to ponder these questions, not just because one rabbi brought them up, but because many different people and groups have this mistaken notion of the gospel message. Besides that, since we live in the days of the New Covenant, it is essential that we know what it is for our own spiritual wellbeing.
To address the first misconception, I believe we need to properly understand the purpose of God’s law. The laws laid out in the Old Testament are not arbitrary. In other words, God didn’t just say, “Well, let’s see. I’ve called these people out of Egypt, and I need to give them some rules to live by, just to see if they’ll do what I say, or just because I can.” The law of God was given as a guide, to show human beings how to live by revealing how God lives. His law is really an expression of His nature and will, meant to show human beings how to be like God and have fellowship with Him. For example, we cannot walk with God if we have other “gods” beside Him, other things we worship or look to for meaning or to meet our needs. We also need to be faithful in our relationships, not lie, steal, kill, commit adultery, etc. We need to not misuse His holy name. We need to devote one day in seven to worshiping Him and drawing near to Him. We are to be holy, because He is holy. We need to understand and conform to the law in order to be like God.
The problem with the law is not really a problem with the law. The problem is that, while the law is holy and right and good, we human beings are flawed, imperfect, and weak, and we simply don’t always obey and live like God. We fail to do so. Fortunately, God knew this would be the case, and provided a sacrificial system and a priesthood to offer up sacrifices of atonement or expiation to deal with it. In this way, law breakers could be restored to fellowship with God by recognizing their failure and bringing a sacrifice to the priest. Their sin was in that way “transferred over” onto a substitute. In that way, the Israelites could understand the seriousness of their failure, yet at the same time, have their guilt absolved and their fellowship with God restored.
The reason the rabbi was wrong in saying Christians believe someone died for their sins so now they don’t have to obey the law is that both new and old testaments teach us the law is good (Ps. 19:7; Ro. 7:16; 1 Tim. 1:8). His notion of Christianity implies that Christians think the law is unnecessary or even bad, so it is done away in Christ. Though some may mistakenly believe this, it’s simply not the case. Christ didn’t die for us so we could live lawless lives and do whatever we wanted! He died for us because none of us perfectly keeps the law, so we have incurred a debt of guilt and deserve punishment and exclusion from God’s presence. He died for us to take away that debt, that guilt and condemnation we deserve and enable us to have a new start with God. He died so we could come back into God’s presence and receive His Spirit, so that we could begin to live more in line with His law. Jesus Himself said He had not come to abolish the law but to fulfill it (Matt. 5:17). Paul says clearly in Romans 3:31 that we do not abolish or nullify the law by believing in Christ, but rather, we uphold the law by our new faith.
God did not send Jesus so we could live just as the world lives! He sent Him to purify us and create a new people who are zealous for good works, a people who want to do what is right and live as God intended (Eph. 2:10; Titus 2:14.) What Christians will admit however, is that we all fail at this in many ways, so we need God’s mercy and grace to forgive us and lift us back up and keep us on God’s “track” of righteous living, so to speak. We need God’s Spirit and power to enable us to live as He intends. Jews say it’s all up to us. Rabbi Freitag said we can keep God’s laws, and even if we fail, we only need to repent, ask forgiveness, and get back into the game. Honest prayer is all that’s needed.
The Bible simply does not teach this. Just repenting and “trying harder” is not enough. There is an essential “ingredient” Freitag is leaving out. Something has to be done to atone for our failures. They are that serious. A blood sacrifice is necessary to atone for them. This has not been done away with, just because there is no longer a Temple in Jerusalem or a priesthood and sacrificial system. It’s just that today, Jesus is that blood sacrifice, instead of the bulls and goats and lambs which the Jews had to offer continually.
Jesus offered Himself as the perfect Sacrifice, the Lamb of God, and He did it once for all. All the “elements” of the first covenant He now fulfills for us under the New. He is our Sacrifice, our High Priest, our Temple, and He is our righteousness, because He fulfilled the law in our place, took the punishment for our failure to fulfill it upon Himself, and works by His Spirit to enable us to live out the law now in day-to-day life. If we trust in His sacrifice and come to God through it, our sins are forgiven, we are cleansed and restored (even our consciences), and we can continue to live in God’s presence day by day.
Jews think there is no longer any need for sacrifices, but they are sorely mistaken in this notion and need to study their Hebrew Bibles more carefully. Holy Scripture says “without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sins. This is written in Lev. 17:11, and is repeated and backed up by Heb. 9:22. All people have sinned, and all need forgiveness. But we can only ask for it and receive it because a Substitute took our place and atoned for our sins.
Now then, to the second issue the rabbi raised – Christians don’t just “naturally” obey God’s law now that they’ve accepted Jesus, so the new covenant has not yet been established. You know, when I heard him say this, I had to give him credit. I think we are too flippant about this. We act like as soon as anyone accepts Jesus, they’re just “naturally” empowered to live right. Well, let’s be honest. If we look at 2,000 years of church history and our own daily experience, it seems to me we have to admit this isn’t exactly so. If it were, then all Christians would have halos and would be obviously better people than all non-Christians. We all know that’s not the case.
We all know Christians can sin as well as non-Christians. We’ve seen the history. We know Christians fought wars with each other, launched crusades, committed all sorts of sexual and other sins, and continue to sin today. In fact, this is one of the biggest hindrances to non-believers, they see the sinfulness of people who claim to have been saved from sin. We’re not perfect, by any means. We all struggle with wrong thoughts, attitudes, and behaviors. So how can we say that God has written His laws on our hearts and minds and now we just automatically obey them?
It seems to me the answer to this is a bit complicated, but worth thinking through. See if you agree with what I’m going to say. The truth is, we aren’t perfect, don’t even know all God’s laws and requirements, and often fall short of keeping the ones we are aware of. But at the same time, I know that every person who has truly repented and come to faith in Christ has experienced a great change in their lives. I was intoxicated on drugs and alcohol all the time, was profane, and basically lived an unrestrained life with no sense of direction or purpose. But when Jesus came into my life, so much of that changed. I was truly made a new creation (2 Cor. 5:17). The chains of addiction broke off of me, my speech changed, my sense of purpose and direction changed, and I began to live very differently. At the same time, I have to admit that I still wrestle with many things in my life. I am tempted to do what I know I shouldn’t. I often struggle with thoughts or attitudes that are ungodly. I blow it in things I say sometimes and wish I could take my words back. I can’t always love as I would like to or lay down my selfishness as I would wish. How about you? So how can I possibly say God has written His law on my heart and mind, or that the Holy Spirit now empowers me to live like Christ?
I believe the answer to this dilemma is the “already, not yet” argument. What do I mean? Well, consider what Christians believe about the Kingdom of God. We say the Kingdom is “already here, but not yet.” The Kingdom is where the King reigns, right? So Jesus said, “The Kingdom of God is within you” (Lu. 17:21, KJV). Well, it is, isn’t it? God directs our lives now. We’re no longer under Satan’s dominion. We know God. He has sent His Spirit to live in us. We know our sins are forgiven and we’ve received the gift and promise of eternal life.
But at the same time, the Kingdom has not really come yet, has it? I mean, the wolf and lamb don’t lie down together yet, do they? Nations haven’t beat their swords into plowshares yet. Jesus isn’t totally Lord over all aspects of this world yet. Not by a long shot! We are still earthly. We still have to deal with our flesh. We see things as if through a dim and blurry mirror. Our bodies still get sick, get old, suffer, and die. So you see, the Kingdom of God is already, but not yet. It has begun and we’ve experienced many of its blessings, but it has not yet been fully manifested, either in our lives or in the world at large.
Surely we must say the same about the New Covenant and God’s laws being written on our hearts and minds. Thank God, we don’t have to go Jerusalem to the Temple when we sin now! We don’t have to bring a goat or a calf to sacrifice. That temple was destroyed, so if we had to go there, man, we’d be in big trouble! Jesus is now our Lamb, our Sacrifice. He is our High Priest. We now live as God wants, not by our own efforts to keep the Law, but because the Spirit lives within us. Our hearts are truly different. We have been changed drastically and we now love God and find ourselves desiring to live righteously, to please our heavenly Father. So then, the New Covenant has surely “already” been initiated!
At the same time, we have to admit that it has “not yet” come in fullness. We have to admit there’s a “not yet” to the New Covenant, just as there is to the Kingdom. It has begun, but it’s still being worked out in our lives day to day. We do live under God’s New Covenant, yet we’re still learning how to live it out. We’re still wrestling with the flesh and our sinful tendencies to not fulfill God’s law. We have been changed, but we’re still not completely changed, not completely spiritual or holy.
I think it’s important to understand these things, lest we become discouraged or take the wrong approach. The New Covenant isn’t a “light” version of God’s way, an easier path for those who don’t like to hear about God’s commandments or living a holy life. No, we’re still called to a life of righteousness and godliness. We’re still called to be like God and walk in the light as He is in the light, to be holy as He is holy. We just have a “new and living way” to get there. We live under a New Covenant, a better covenant. Rabbi Freitag was dead wrong when he said the New Covenant hadn’t come yet; it most definitely has! It’s possible to come into this covenant relationship with God and enjoy it now. We don’t have to wait for it to come in the distant future.
At the same time, it’s important to be honest and admit that the New Covenant hasn’t made us some kind of angelic beings. We’re not perfect, and we don’t just “naturally” obey God’s laws all the time. We must learn to continually depend upon and trust God for this to be worked out in our lives. Let’s not brag and act like we’re “super saints,” far above all the “mere worldlings” around us. But at the same time, let’s rejoice in what we “already” do have in Christ. We are in right relationship with God under His New Covenant, which is far better than the old. Our sins are forgiven, we’ve been made new. We have a new spirit, a new family, a new desire to live righteous lives, and a new way to walk and live. The New Covenant is truly good news! It’s truly “the Greatest Story Ever Told!” It has started us on a new path in life. We just need to keep walking on that path till we get to the final destination!
Interesting!