In Coming Days YHWH Will Make A New Covenant With His People, A Covenant Written In Their Hearts (Jeremiah 31:31-34).
A covenant is an agreement made between two or more parties which is binding on both. God's covenant is an example of a covenant which is instituted by one party to the agreement as the result of the giving of a benefit, to which the other parties, who have received the benefit, are then bound to comply. But the state of Judah at this time was such that it was clear that the old covenant made at Sinai had failed. As the writer to the Hebrews points out, the assumption was being made here that the old covenant was insufficient for its purpose (Hebrews 8:7-8). It could show men how to live, but it could not enable them to live in accordance with its requirements. YHWH had made with them His first covenant as their Deliverer and Redeemer looking for a faithful response. But, it was an ‘outward covenant' made with men whose hearts had not changed, and as a result, apart from at rare times, they had continually failed in that response and had demonstrated that no amount of gratitude or miracles would make them obedient to YHWH.
Now therefore the time was coming when YHWH would provide them with a new covenant. And He would write the covenant in their hearts in such a way that they would want to obey it and would desire to do His will. In the words of Philippians 2:13, He would ‘work in them to will and to do of His good pleasure'. And the result was to be that many would in that day come to know Him and respond to Him. And when would that day come? ‘The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ' (John 1:17).
The necessity for such a covenant brings out how central the covenant was in YHWH's dealings with His people. Judgment had come on them because of their failure to observe the covenant. Murder, adultery, idolatry, blasphemy were all breaches of the covenant and were constantly cited as reasons for judgment. And each of these required the death penalty. Thus nothing in the covenant as it then was could save them. The covenant could not even provide offerings that would provide expiation and atonement for such offences, as it could in the case of lesser offences. (As David makes clear in Psalms 51, only the mercy of God could do that). Thus if His people were to be restored it had to be by means of a covenant that worked and lifted them above such things.
“Behold, the days are coming, the word of YHWH, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah, not according to the covenant which I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, which my covenant they broke, although I was a husband to them, the word of YHWH.”
YHWH declares that in days to come, at the time determined by Him, He would make a new covenant, a new binding agreement, with Israel/Judah. It would not be like the old covenant because that had failed miserably, and it had failed even though He had not failed them, but had been like a true husband to them. He had redeemed them from Egypt, wooed them to Himself in the wilderness, and bound them to Himself by covenant (had ‘married' them) at Sinai, and had from then on acted as a husband on their behalf. But in spite of that they had rejected Him and had preferred other lovers and had deserted Him (see Hosea 1-3). And although time and again they had come to renew that covenant, seemingly genuinely, it had never been with more than a transient response (see e.g. Deuteronomy 27:9 ff.; Joshua 24; 2 Chronicles 23:4-7; 2 Chronicles 34:29-32). Thus He had ‘recognised' (humanly speaking) that that covenant was insufficient. What was needed was the miracle of the transformation of their hearts and lives. That alone could solve the problem.
“But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, the word of YHWH,
I will put my law in their inward parts,
And will I write it in their heart,
And I will be their God,
And they will be my people,
And they will no more teach every man his neighbour,
And every man his brother, saying, ‘Know YHWH,'
For they will all know me,
From the least of them to the greatest of them,
The word of YHWH,
For I will forgive their iniquity,
And I will remember no more their sin.”
YHWH describes the content of the new covenant that He will make with them (‘House of Israel' is here clearly inclusive of Judah). It will consist of ‘instruction' (torah - law) which He will put in their inward parts and write in their hearts. It will such that it will become a part of them. Using Pauline terminology it will be written on their hearts by the Spirit of the living God (2 Corinthians 3:3). And then He will again be their God, in a different sense from previously because He will be personally involved in their lives, and furthermore, as a result of the Spirit's work within (compare Ezekiel 36:26-27), they will in turn truly be His obedient people, fully responsive to Him. It is important to recognise here that ‘heart' for the Israelite, like ‘inward parts', signifies mind and will as well as emotion. The law will be written in their minds and wills and thoughts. To quote Paul again, they will have ‘the mind of the Spirit' (Romans 8:7). They will be ‘minded' to do His will by the Spirit. In Jesus' own citation from Isaiah 54:13, ‘they will all be taught of God' (John 6:45)
‘And I will be their God, and they will be my people.' The same words were spoken in Leviticus 26:12, but the meaning was very different. There He would be dwelling among them in the Tabernacle and would be their God. Here He would be personally at work within their hearts, and therefore dwelling within them as His Temple (see 2 Corinthians 6:16-18), and would be their God. It is a totally different situation.
And the result will be that there will be no need of anyone to teach them to know Him, because they will all know Him, from the least to the greatest. They will be Spirit enlightened (compare Isaiah 54:13; Matthew 11:25-27). If they were to ‘know God' this would be essential for ‘no one comprehends the thoughts of God apart from the Spirit of God' (1 Corinthians 2:11). It will be a part of what He has implanted within them (Isaiah 61:3). Indeed Jesus tells us that it will be His own work, for ‘no one knows the Father but the Son, and those to whom the Son pleases to reveal Him' (Matthew 11:27). Furthermore, to truly know God, is to be known by Him (Galatians 4:9).
Such will be the new relationship that He will forgive their iniquity and no more remember their sin. There could be no such experience of God unless sin were truly dealt with. It is not that He will ‘forget' their sin. It is that He will thrust it from His mind. He will deliberately and positively no more remember it. It will be for ever gone, not to be dredged up again. As far as they would be concerned this forgiveness would be on the basis of the necessary cult offerings and sacrifices, but as Isaiah 53:5-6; Isaiah 53:10 makes clear, it would finally be consequent on the Servant of YHWH, as representative of His people, offering Himself as a guilt offering (compare Mark 10:45).
In these words we have a clear outward revelation of what must always have been true in the hearts of true heart believers, otherwise they would not have persevered as believers. But this is the first time that it has been spelled out. It was, however, intrinsic in such prayers as ‘create in me a new heart, O God, and put a new and right Spirit within me' (Psalms 51:10) and ‘teach me to do your will, for you are my God. Let your good Spirit lead me on a level path' (Psalms 143:10). Compare also Psalms 37:31; Psalms 40:8; Isaiah 51:7 Without such an experience, known in the New Testament as ‘birth from above' or ‘birth of the Spirit' (John 3:3-6), there could have been no salvation for anyone, for no man could save himself or do this work within himself. It had to result from the ‘circumcision of the heart' by YHWH (Jeremiah 4:4; Deuteronomy 30:6; Romans 2:29). To put it in Paul's words, ‘if any man be in Christ Jesus he is a new creation. Old things are passed away. Everything has become new' (2 Corinthians 5:17).
The writer to the Hebrews makes clear that it is these very promises which are central to Christian experience (Hebrews 8:8-13). It is because Christ has, through the eternal Spirit, offered Himself without blemish to God, and has thereby become the Mediator of the new covenant, that we can enjoy such an experience (Hebrews 9:14) through the working of the Spirit of God. It is this which was lacking in the teaching of the Rabbis, and in the teaching of all who believe in salvation by doing good things.
There was, of course a sense in which ‘those days' came at the time of the return from exile. Many of those who returned did so because of God's working in their hearts, otherwise they would not have come. Much of their activity was ‘not by power, nor by might but by My Spirit, says YHWH' (Zechariah 4:6). What happened at that time was earthshaking (Haggai 2:21). But it did not result in a fully transformed nation. That awaited the coming of John the Baptist and Jesus Christ Himself, when large parts of the nation were stirred and a ‘new nation' was formed which replaced the old (Matthew 21:43), the Israel within Israel (Romans 9:6). And that nation went out to transform lives in all parts of the world. It was that that began the complete fulfilment of this prophecy. There is now no other true nation of Israel other than the one then formed, the body of believers who responded to the Messiah. This promise is not given to those who call themselves the nation of Israel in Palestine. For whilst, of course, many of them could partake in it by responding to Jesus Christ, there is no guarantee that they will do so (although we can hope that it will be so). The ‘all Israel' who will be saved are the Israel within Israel, the elect, and they include all true believers.
And yet even this cannot be seen as the final fulfilment of these words, for I have been in many churches, and learned of many more, and have never found one where all the people (or even some of the people all the time) were fully like this. It is rather the ideal which is in process and is coming. Indeed we must ask, when will we be like this, living in such total obedience to His will? And when will we fully know God? And the answer can only be, ‘in the new heaven and the new earth'. Thus as always this is a prophecy which will be fulfilled in stages. (It will certainly not be fulfilled in any so-called Millennium which, if it ever were to exist (and Jesus, Paul and Peter clearly knew nothing of it), will according to its adherents end up with almost everyone following Satan).