“The Noahic Covenant & Common Grace” (Genesis 8:20 - 9:17) | 5/10/20
Genesis 8:20 - 9:17 | 5/10/20 | Will DuVal
Have you ever been offered a deal that seemed to good to be true? That leaves you wondering, “What’s the catch?” Maybe it was a time-share you got suckered into, that you’re STILL trying to find a way out of. I remember getting a cold call that promised if I took a 15-minute survey, I’d win a free cruise for 2 to the Bahamas. You always gotta read the fine-print… Back in February, I was grabbing lunch with Luke Werth, and we were both oblivious to the fact that it was Valentine’s Day; we’re standing in this LONG line at Qdoba, and we noticed the sign ahead advertising “FREE BURRITO!”. We thought: “Cool!” And it wasn’t until we got to the FRONT of the line, that we could read the fine print below: “Free burrito, with purchase of additional entree and a Valentine’s Day KISS!” And we watched the couple in line in front of us smile and kiss each other for the cashier. Luke and I turned and looked at each other…
And I’ll leave the rest up to your imaginations… ;-)
No, the cashier was gracious to us; she let us blow her a kiss instead. We figured that was BIBLICAL - the Bible says, “greet one another with a holy kiss”.
But speaking of grace, we’re continuing our study through the book of GENESIS this morning, and I’ve been driving home this recurring pattern of God graciously providing for humanity, but in our sin, we mess things up; and yet time and time again, God responds with EVEN MORE grace. And we’re gonna see Him do it again in today’s text, but THIS time, THIS deal, TRULY seems too good to be true. It’s GOT to leave Noah wondering, “Okay God, what’s the catch?”
First, let’s quickly recap. ALL of us, Adam & Eve, you and me, we all have 4 Basic Relationships that define our existence:
-There is my relationship to MYSELF.
- My relationship with OTHERS.
-My relationship with the world around me.
-And MOST importantly, my relationship with GOD.
Notice, how each of those plays out in Genesis chs.1 & 2, within God’s original “very good” design of things in the Garden of Eden; we hear Adam & Eve were
-SELF: “Naked and not ashamed” (2:25)
-ONE ANOTHER: “One flesh” (2:24)
-WORLD: “Have dominion over…” (1:26)
-GOD: “God blessed them” (1:28)
But ALL of that changed in an INSTANT, in ch.3, and as a result of Adam & Eve’s sin, a Fall has now occurred, that has forever cursed each of those 4 relationships for all of humanity; we hear:
-SELF: “they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths.” (3:7) And we ALL now experience Guilt... shame...
-OTHERS: “Your desire shall be contrary to your husband, but he shall rule over you” (3:16) Interrelational strife, animosity...
-WORLD: “cursed is the ground because of you” (3:17) Thorns & thistles, natural disasters to this day...
-and most sad of all: “the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God” (3:8) And we’ve been trying to hide ever since...
And then we traced the CONTINUED downward spiral throughout chapters 4-6, “the Fall-OUT”. Remember the one verse summary of the situation, in ch.6, v5: “The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.” Humanity’s total depravity.
And yet, the Flood of chs.6-8 last week was not ONLY an act of JUSTICE by God; Noah found “favor”, found GRACE in the eyes of the Lord, and the Flood is a powerful reminder of God’s offer of GRACE to us as well; like us, Noah was a sinner, but God in his MERCY determined through him to RESCUE humankind.
Now, a quick word about the TITLE: “The Noahic Covenant & Common Grace”. The “Noahic covenant” just means this is “God’s covenant with Noah”. And we’ll return to the idea of “covenant” later, but for now, let’s at least define it: A “covenant” is a promise. It’s a binding promise, an unbreakable pact, between two parties. “Covenant” is arguably the most important theme in all of Scripture - it was the very foundation of interpersonal relationships in the ancient world - but the concept has lost much of its weight and importance in our day. Today, businesses enter into “CONTRACTS” and they write in all sorts of contingency clauses, in the event that one or both parties should ever decide to back out. To BREAK the contract. The closest thing we still have in our day is the MARRIAGE covenant. “Til death do us part”. But even half of marriages end in divorce today.
But when GOD makes a promise, he KEEPS his word. And in Genesis 9 this morning, we witness the first covenant in human history, between God and Noah. And in this covenant, God pledges FOUR things to Noah. God vows to redeem EACH of our 4 basic relationships, that have been marred by the effects of sin. 4 examples of what we call God’s “COMMON GRACE”. Common grace is just that: it is GRACE - God’s undeserved favor - that is COMMON - shared by ALL people. It’s universal. Jesus observes in Matthew 5:45 that God “makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust” alike. The most faithful Christian and the most godless heathen are BOTH blessed with the same beautiful sunset. With air in their lungs, food in their bellies, work for their hands, passion in their hearts - God gives good gifts in abundance to ALL people, and his covenant with NOAH here in Genesis 8-9, is the bedrock for it. For Common Grace.
So would you stand with me at home as you’re able… Genesis 8:20 - 9:17
Then Noah built an altar to the Lord and took some of every clean animal and some of every clean bird and offered burnt offerings on the altar. 21 And when the Lord smelled the pleasing aroma, the Lord said in his heart, “I will never again curse[a] the ground because of man, for the intention of man's heart is evil from his youth. Neither will I ever again strike down every living creature as I have done. 22 While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.”
And God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. 2 The fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth and upon every bird of the heavens, upon everything that creeps on the ground and all the fish of the sea. Into your hand they are delivered. 3 Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. And as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything. 4 But you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood. 5 And for your lifeblood I will require a reckoning: from every beast I will require it and from man. From his fellow man I will require a reckoning for the life of man. 6 “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in his own image.
7 And you,[a] be fruitful and multiply, increase greatly on the earth and multiply in it.”
8 Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him, 9 “Behold, I establish my covenant with you and your offspring after you, 10 and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the livestock, and every beast of the earth with you, as many as came out of the ark; it is for every beast of the earth. 11 I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of the flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.” 12 And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: 13 I have set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth. 14 When I bring clouds over the earth and the bow is seen in the clouds, 15 I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh. And the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh. 16 When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.” 17 God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant that I have established between me and all flesh that is on the earth.” This is the word of the Lord (LET’S PRAY...)
-
Now, the most important verse in this whole passage is ch.8, v21. We’ll start with it and END with it today. For starters, note the phrase: “the intention of man's heart is evil from his youth”. Now that’s almost IDENTICAL to what we heard back in ch.6, v5 - “every intention of the thoughts of man’s heart was only evil continually” - the very REASON God sent the Flood in the first place! Sometimes you’ll hear people explain, I myself have been guilty of this in the past, explaining the Flood as God’s cleansing the world of sin. Sin had gotten SO bad by Genesis 6, that God hit the “Reset” button. A fresh start. Clean slate. But according to ch8, v21, if that was God’s intention in the Flood, then He failed. Because first thing off the BOAT, we hear: “the intention of man's heart is STILL evil from his youth”. Noah was NOT Eve’s long-awaited, curse-breaking, sin-bearing, serpent-stomping offspring promised in Genesis 3:15. The Flood didn’t cure humanity’s sin problem. You and I are living PROOF of that!
No, God’s purpose in sending the Flood, was NOT to eradicate sin, but rather, to reveal BOTH God’s just punishment of sin, as well as His merciful offer of rescue from it.
But understand right up front that God does NOT bless humanity with this great covenant in chapter 9 because of our goodness. Again, that would undercut the very DEFINITION of grace - undeserved favor. No, God makes it CLEAR: “Man is still sinful; evil from his youth”. And YET, not because of but IN SPITE OF you, God says, “I will bless you.” And what is God’s blessing? 4 common graces:
#1- God blesses our relationship to the world around us: CREATION. Or RE-creation, as it were. The Flood reshaped the entire LANDSCAPE of the earth. Many think this is when Pangaea, the supercontinent that once contained ALL of earth’s land mass, broke apart into the 7 continents we know today, separated by 4 oceans. Noah stepped off the ark, 1 year and 10 days after boarding it, to a VERY different world. A re-created world. And in like manner, God graciously reshaped humanity’s relationship to that world as well. Remember, in Genesis 3, God had CURSED the ground - “ in pain Adam would eat of it all the days of his life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field. [Adam was CURSED to be a vegetarian!]” (vv17-19). And then in chapter 4, Cain further cursed the earth by POLLUTING it with the blood of his brother Abel; God said, “The voice of your brother's blood is crying to me from the ground. 11 And now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand. 12 When you work the ground, it shall no longer yield to you its strength.”
See, our sin doesn’t just result in OUR OWN Fall; Romans 8 explains “the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now.” (22) That “creation itself will [one day] be set free from its bondage to corruption” (21). Our sin has corrupted ALL of Creation. Tornadoes & earthquakes, coronavirus & murder hornets: they are ALL a result of our sin. WE are to blame. ALL of us. And in God’s eyes, our sin, and the earth’s stain are integrally intertwined.
But NOW, in Genesis 8, God promises: “I will never again curse the ground because of man… Neither will I ever again strike down every living creature as I have done. While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.” (21-22) Note: the curse of Genesis 3 isn’t totally undone here; we still deal with viruses and hornets, with weeds in our flower beds. But God has put a LIMIT on the EFFECT of the curse. And he promises never again to destroy the entire earth, until he does so in the last days, when Christ returns to recreate ALL things, the new heaven and new earth, as we hear in 2 Peter 3: “the world that then existed was deluged with water and perished. But by the same word the heavens and earth that now exist are stored up for fire, being kept until the day of judgment… the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed.” (vv6-10)
But UNTIL that day, God has promised to BLESS us with the common-grace gift of His glorious CREATION. Psalm 19 exclaims “The heavens declare the glory of God,
and the sky above proclaims his handiwork… Their voice goes out through all the earth,
and their words to the end of the world.” (vv1, 4) God’s fingerprints are EVERYWHERE. It truly is a gorgeous world that He’s given us; may we not take it for granted. I hope you’re getting EXTRA opportunities to take advantage during this quarantine. Have we EVER had a spring this nice in St. Louis? With this many sunny days in the 70s? Praise God! Get out and ENJOY it; it’s God’s gift to you, to ALL people.
Consider also ch.9, vv2-3: “The fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth and upon every bird of the heavens, upon everything that creeps on the ground and all the fish of the sea. Into your hand they are delivered. 3 Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. And as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything.” TWO common graces there:
Do you realize, if the lions and tigers and bears, oh my, if God HADN’T put the fear and dread of us in them, there wouldn’t have BEEN an “us” to speak of for very long. Remember: 8 humans on the earth. 2 lions, 2 tigers, 2 bears, 2 wolves, 2 elephants, 2 hippos, you start to do the math, and it does NOT add up in our favor. We’re talking the days before tranquilizers, before knives, and guns. I’m guessing Noah’d be relying on a sharp stick to defend himself. So God graciously gives him an even BETTER defense: fear. But God goes beyond that, and says...
In v3: “I now bless you to go hunt THEM... for FOOD”. You wanna talk about common grace: Genesis ch9, v3 paves the way for the Chick-fil-A spicy chicken sandwich! For the Ruth’s Chris filet mignon. For my father-in-law’s cedar-plank SALMON - God is so gracious he can even make FISH taste good! But you don’t get ANY of that til after the Flood. Can’t you just imagine Noah, who’s been eating nothing but plants for 600 years, tasting his first bite of steak, and thinking, “Yep, the Flood was TOTALLY worth it…”
#2 - God blesses our relationship with others: COMMUNITY. Once cursed with enmity and strife in ch.3, and we saw that play out GRAPHICALLY in chs4-6 with Cain, with Lamech, with the Nephilim; but here, once again, God offers humanity a chance at renewed community. He restores right relationship between people. In fact, God repeats his original command, the very first mandate he had decreed back in ch.1, he repeats here verbatim, 3 times for emphasis: in Ch.8, v17 - he commands it of the ANIMALS, and then here in ch.9, vv1 & 7, God says twice to NOAH: “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.” / “And you, be fruitful and multiply, increase greatly on the earth and multiply in it.”
Because as we celebrated back in ch.1, our God is a God of LIFE! He himself created life, and then he goes BEYOND that and He gives US the ability to RE-create life, to PRO-create! God didn’t just bless us with other people to keep us company; He blessed us with the amazing privilege of actually helping MAKE those people - the gift of family, that we celebrate today on Mother’s Day. We can PRODUCE kids, and grandkids, to fill the earth and fill our homes with joy. And as if THAT weren’t blessing enough, not only does God give us the opportunity to “be fruitful and multiply”, but we get to have FUN DOING it! -- God could have made sex boring. He could have made it no different from brushing your teeth. But that’s not the kind of God we serve. He is GOOD. He’s SO good to us. John 10:10 - he wants us to have life to the FULLEST! (By the way, if you’ve got kids watching with you this morning, and this is the first they’re hearing about the proverbial birds and the bees, and you need to pause the video at this point to have that conversation, my philosophy is: “Better that they hear it here first” - Where better than at CHURCH, from your pastor?! Have the talk, parents!)
Now, I want to take just a minute here to be sensitive to those of you, like my wife and I, who struggle with infertility. For whom this commandment to “be fruitful and multiply” stings. It hurts.
Those who have LOST a child.
Those who DON’T enjoy God’s gift of physical intimacy. Perhaps some trauma from your past has robbed you of the joy of sex.
Or maybe you CAN’T enjoy it, because you’re single, NOT by choice.
I know we’ve got some West Hillians listening to God’s blessing of COMMUNITY while you’re STUCK there at home by YOURSELF in quarantine, some of you may not have had a genuine, human-to-human, in-person interaction in MONTHS now.
And to ALL of you, I simply want to say: I get it. I see you. I hear you.
Sometimes common grace feels more common to other people than it does to us, doesn't it. And the reality is we are living under BOTH the curse of sin AND the blessing of God’s grace, simultaneously today. The curse of sin hasn’t yet been FINALLY broken, completely eradicated. Just as CREATION still awaits final redemption, so too does community. So without trivializing or minimizing, let me just offer you this promise from God, as hope you can CLING to this morning in the midst of your present trials: “the light momentary afflictions [of THIS life] are preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison” (2 Cor 4:17); When you and I experience TRUE community, and perfect communion, with the almighty God of the universe, in Heaven, for all eternity.
But even in the here and now, as we saw in Genesis 1, we have been MADE in God’s Trinitarian image for relationship with others. We really do NEED each other. And I think we’ve ALL realized just how TRUE that is, especially in these isolating days. Sometimes “you don’t know what you’ve got til it’s gone”, right? I know I miss you all DEEPLY, and it’s encouraging to ME to hear, as I continue to call and check in on y’all, just how much you miss each OTHER as well. I had a pastor friend try and tell me the other day that this virus is going to be a Blockbuster vs. Netflix moment in church history. That churches are going to just start shifting exclusively online after this. I said, “Clearly you’ve never been at West Hills”. He’s WRONG. Dead wrong. Anyone who thinks that church CAN be, long-term, an “online thing”, clearly doesn’t appreciate the extent to which God has wired us for and GIFTED US WITH community.
#3 - God blesses our relationship with ourselves through our CONSCIENCE. Look back with me at vv4-6 of ch9: “ But you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood. And for your lifeblood I will require a reckoning: from every beast I will require it and from man. From his fellow man I will require a reckoning for the life of man. “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in his own image.” What’s going on there?
In short, God’s emphasizing the SANCTITY of life here. Life is sacred. ALL life. Even animal life. That’s the whole IDEA behind sacrifice in the Bible. Furry lives matter. If they DIDN’T, animal sacrifice would be MEANINGLESS.
See, God gives us our lives to be used for HIS glory, to be given BACK to him in whole-hearted worship and devotion. But in our sin, we’ve all FAILED to. So a “life DEBT” exists now, the gap between the life we owe God and the life we’ve actually given Him. So God says, “The life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it for you on the altar to make atonement for your souls, for it is the blood that makes atonement by the life.” (Lev 17:11). And if ANIMAL life is that sacred, that it could under the OT Law make ATONEMENT for our SOULS, how much MORE sacred is HUMAN life. Remember when Cain asked God in ch.4: “Am I my brother’s keeper?”? God essentially answers here in ch9: “From his fellow man I will require a reckoning for the life of man.” YES. We ARE responsible, not only for not KILLING one another, but for helping preserve the lives of our fellow men as well. This is really the basis for ALL of the horizontal, person-to-person commandments in Scripture. Not just “do not murder,” but our care for the poor, the widow, the orphan, the sojourner, “love your neighbor as yourself” - it’s ALL about protecting and nurturing LIFE in others, because ALL life is sacred. Made in God’s image.
So much so, that v6: “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed.” Formerly, God had marked Cain and FORBID anyone from killing. God alone was supposed to execute justice. But now, as a common grace, to ALL people, God gives us our conscience as a moral guide, and institutes human governance and the human execution of justice as a check and balance on our sinful, Fallen nature. Genesis 9:6 is the foundation for the death penalty found in the Bible, and still found in our country’s legal system today. You take someone ELSE’S life, you forfeit your OWN right to life. And our consciences bear WITNESS to this fact. We all innately know how horrific something like murder is. We WANT murderers to be punished.
But here’s the thing: then we start to extrapolate out from that and we realize that ALL sin is an affront to a holy God. Our consciences convict us of our OWN sin. Jesus says in Matthew 5 ““You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder; and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.’ But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother[c] will be liable to judgment… and whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be liable to the hell[e] of fire.” (vv21-22)
And see, that’s the issue with ALL of these wonderful, common grace gifts of God, is that in the end, in the absence of SAVING grace - there is COMMON grace, universal to ALL, and then there’s SAVING grace available ONLY through Jesus - in the absence of SAVING grace, creation, community, conscience… they all actually just end up condemning us even MORE. Paul says of our conscience in Romans ch.2 “When Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves… They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse them.” (vv14-16) In other words, God has given EVERYONE a conscience, an innate sense of right from wrong, and the ability to KNOW they are sinners in need of a Savior, such that NONE will be without excuse when they stand in judgment before the Lord.
Paul says the same thing about the common grace of CREATION just one chapter earlier: “What can be known about God is plain to [all], because God has shown it to them. 20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world,[g] in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. 21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God” (Rom 1:19-21) Everyone knows, deep down, that there is a God. That much is self-evident. The question is: will you HONOR him as such? Worship Him? Lay down your pride and your desire for control and surrender to HIM, as God - as Lord and Savior.
But here’s where common grace #4 comes in: COVENANT. God blesses our relationship with HIM through covenant, but this is SO important. I’m running short on time, but fortunately, it’s SUCH a central theme of Scripture that we’ll have more time to discuss it in greater DEPTH here in a few weeks when we study the Abrahamic covenant, in chapters 15 and 17 of Genesis. Then there’s the Mosaic covenant (Ex 19-24), the Priestly covenant (Num 25), the Davidic covenant (2 Sam 7), and finally, the NEW Covenant prophesied in Jeremiah 31 and fulfilled in the New Testament Gospels by Jesus.
But God’s covenant with NOAH here is CRUCIAL. The word for “covenant” - berit - is repeated 7x in vv8-17 for emphasis. And it’s also UNIQUE: it is distinct from the other 5 biblical covenants in at least 3 ways:
#1 - this covenant is Universal: The Abrahamic covenant is just for the people of Israel; the priestly covenant is just for Israelite PRIESTS. But in vv9-10, God says, “I establish my covenant with you [Noah] and your offspring after you, 10 and with every living creature that is with you… it is for every beast of the earth.” It’s for EVERYONE. Not just everyone, every THING. Even the ANIMALS get blessed, by God’s promise that he will not destroy the earth again.
#2 - the Noahic covenant is Unilateral. It is one-sided. The Mosaic covenant is BI-lateral: God says, “IF you obey my commandments, THEN you will be my treasured possession among all peoples.” But not here with Noah. There’s no “if-then” clause, no quid pro quo, if you will, in Genesis 9. God simply says, “I establish MY covenant with you.” And the SIGN of this covenant - the RAINBOW - further highlights this fact. Did you know it’s scientifically impossible to walk underneath a rainbow. To find the END. That’s why you can speculate all you want about how much gold the leprechauns have stashed there, because you’ll never find it. It’s like God is reminding us of the fact that we played NO part in this covenant. It is TOTALLY his doing.
By the way, two other quick observations on the rainbow: notice the phrase in v13; the Hebrew reads “ I have HUNG MY BOW in the clouds...” The word for “bow” there is the same word for the weapon - like a bow and arrows. So every time you see a rainbow in the sky, that is God symbolically reminding himself of his conscious decision in the wake of the Flood to lay down his weapons, to hang up his bow, and NOT carry out His righteous war against sin that would otherwise result in our utter annihilation. That’s good news, friends. Talk about common grace! And the second thing we ought to remember every time it rains, is that not ONLY does God promise not to wipe us off the face of the planet, he actually REDEEMS the very weapon he used to ALMOST do it the first time - the rain, the floods - God now uses it for our good. The very thing God used to nearly destroy the whole world, he now uses as our most vital, necessary BLESSING. Rain. To water our crops, to give life to the earth. Our God is redemptive. He is SO good.
-His covenant is universal, unilateral, and it is UNCONDITIONAL. V16: “When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature.” There is NOTHING you or I or ANY living creature could EVER do to revoke God’s promise of blessing here. And praise God, because you can rest assured if there WAS a way to mess it up, in our total depravity, we would find it and DO it!
They say, “If an offer seems too good to be true, it probably is”. And that may be true with everyone else in your life. Your cell phone carrier, that get-rich-quick scheme. But friends, not so with God. There is NO fine print in his covenant here. But here’s what you DO need to understand about it, in closing. Common grace is a beautiful thing. But as the book of Romans told us: it’s not enough. No one has ever seen a beautiful sunset, a RAINBOW… no one has EVER experienced the common grace love and affection of a fellow human being… no one has ever felt the pinch of their conscience, the conviction of SIN, and thereby been SAVED FROM IT. Been spiritually reborn, into God’s kingdom. That can’t COME through common grace; the best you get is a recognition of your NEED for a Savior.
Remember I told you ch.8, v21 was the most important verse in this passage… What instigated this amazing, too-good-to-be-true covenant in the FIRST place? The covenant itself is unconditional… unilateral. But what prompted God’s gracious promise? “Noah built an altar to the Lord and took some of every clean animal and some of every clean bird and offered burnt offerings on the altar. 21 And when the Lord smelled the pleasing aroma, the Lord said in his heart”
And friends, you need to recognize today that on your own, try your very hardest, and the best offering you can bring before God can only EVER inspire him to common grace. And he’s already promised you THAT anyway! But hear the GOOD news this morning: that there is a new and better covenant.
It is ALSO Universal to the extent that all have been invited, “God desires that NONE should perish, but that ALL should reach repentance”...
It is Unilateral in that Jesus Christ did what ONLY he could do; you and I come empty-handed to the table, we contribute NOTHING to our own salvation.
Jesus + Anything = Nothing, but
Jesus + Nothing = EVERYTHING
But the NEW covenant is NOT unconditional. There TWO and ONLY two conditions: Jesus said, “Repent and Believe in the gospel”.
You must turn from your sin, acknowledge your need for a Savior, and trust JESUS to be that Savior for you.
Will you do that today? Let’s pray...