New Covenant

What is the New Covenant?

The Old and New Covenants are closely connected, but they have key differences. The Old Covenant was given to the people of Israel and focused on laws, rituals, and sacrifices to guide their relationship with God. It emphasized external obedience and maintaining purity through actions like offering sacrifices for forgiveness. In contrast, the New Covenant focuses on internal change, where God’s laws are written in people’s hearts, and forgiveness comes through spiritual renewal instead of rituals.

 

You can think of the Old Covenant as the foundation, setting the stage for a deeper relationship with God that is fully revealed in the New Covenant. The Old Covenant established the basic principle of obeying God through laws, while the New Covenant builds on that by offering a more personal and internal connection with God. Just like you can’t understand a story by starting in the middle, it’s important to see the Old Covenant as part of the bigger picture of the Bible. The Old and New Covenants work together—one is the beginning, and the other is the continuation and fulfillment of God’s promises.

Old vs New Covenant

Old Covenant
  • Torah written on stone tablets
  • The blood of animals used for atonement
  • Limited access to God, through Holy of Holies and the priesthood
  • Physical death for breaking Torah
  • Only for Israel
  • Law was given through Moses
  • Earthly Tabernacle
New Covenant
  • Torah written on hearts and minds
  • The blood of Messiah, shed once for all for atonement
  • Direct access to God through Yeshua
  • Grace and forgiveness through Yeshua
  • Gentiles are grafted into Israel
  • Grace and Truth given through Yeshua
  • Heavenly Tabernacle

Series of Covenants

The New Covenant is often misunderstood as replacing or abolishing God’s law. The Bible organizes its teachings around a series of covenants between God and humanity. These covenants reveal God’s plan for salvation and require obedience to receive blessings. The New Covenant does not abolish God’s law but internalizes it in believers’ hearts.

God has made several covenants throughout history:

    • Noahic Covenant (Genesis 9) – Promise never to destroy the earth by flood.
    • Abrahamic Covenant (Genesis 12, 15, 17) – Promise of descendants, land, and blessings.
    • Mosaic (Sinai) Covenant (Exodus 19-24) – Israel’s national covenant based on obedience.
    • Davidic Covenant (2 Samuel 7) – Promise of an eternal kingdom through David’s lineage.
    • New Covenant (Jeremiah 31:31-34, Hebrews 8:8-12) – God’s law written in hearts, not abolished.

 

New Covenant

The New Covenant builds upon, instead of replacing the previous covenants, fulfilling God’s promise to bless all nations. It promises an internal transformation through God’s Spirit. However, in the Old Covenant (Sinai) it required external obedience, but Israel failed to keep it. It relied on the Levitical priesthood to offer animal sacrifices for atonement, which was temporary and required repeated sacrifices to atone for sins. But in the New Covenant, Yeshua, offers Himself as the final sacrifice.  And Salvation is by grace through faith, but true faith leads to obedience to God’s commandments. (Rom 3:31). And the Holy Spirit will empower believers to obey God’s law. The Relationship Between Law and Grace is that the law defines sin (1 John 3:4), and grace provides forgiveness (Eph 2:8-9) while the Holy Spirit helps believers obey the law with love and sincerity.

New Covenant Promise
“The days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and with the people of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them,” declares the Lord.
“This is the covenant I will make with the people of Israel after that time,” declares the Lord. “I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.” – Jer 31:31-33

 

 The Spirit Helps Us Obey
“I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. Ezekiel 36:26-27

 

Yeshua Establishes the New Covenant

He also took the cup after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in My blood, which is shed for you. – Luke22:20

 

He is Mediator

 Therefore he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant. – Heb 9:15

 

The Spirit Helps Us Fulfill the Law

“For what the law was powerless to do because it was weakened by the flesh, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.”

 

The Spirit Gives Life in the New Covenant

who also made us sufficient as ministers of the new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. – 2 Corin 3:6

Reconciliation

Yeshua mediates the New Covenant, fulfilling the Old Covenant’s purpose. Through His sacrifice, Yeshua brings reconciliation between humanity and God. (Heb 9:15)  For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Messiah Yeshua, (1 Tim 2:5)  Through Yeshua both Jews and Gentiles are unified and no longer is there a barrier between the two, but both become one in Messiah Yeshua. Lets look at a few verses below. 

“Son of man, take a stick and write on it, ‘For Judah, and the people of Israel associated with him’; then take another stick and write on it, ‘For Joseph (the stick of Ephraim) and all the house of Israel associated with him.’ And when your people say to you, ‘Will you not tell us what you mean by these?’ say to them, Thus says the Lord GOD: Behold, I am about to take the stick of Joseph (that is in the hand of Ephraim) and the tribes of Israel associated with him. And I will join with it the stick of Judah, and make them one stick, that they may be one in my hand. When the sticks on which you write are in your hand before their eyes, then say to them, Thus says the Lord GOD: Behold, I will take the people of Israel from the nations among which they have gone, and will gather them from all around, and bring them to their own land.And I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel. And one king shall be king over them all, and they shall be no longer two nations, and no longer divided into two kingdoms. – Ezekiel 37:16-22

 

But if some of the branches were broken off, and you, although a wild olive shoot, were grafted in among the others and now share in the nourishing root of the olive tree…Then you will say, “Branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in. (Rom 11:17, Rom 11:19)

 

And if you are Messiah’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise. (Gal 3:29)

 

There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Messiah Yeshua. (Gal 3:28)

 

I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts.

Jeremiah 31:33

Lets Recap

The New Covenant is a renewed covenant where God puts the Torah in our Hearts and minds. And gives us the Holy Spirit to help us keep the Torah. The sacrificial laws no longer apply and the punishment for sin which was of death in the Old Testament is obsolete. We are given grace and forgiveness for sins in the New Covenant through the blood of Messiah, once and for all.