Covenant Concerns Series

Several years ago, a national magazine assigned a photographer to take pictures of a forest fire. They told him a small plane would be waiting at the airport to fly him over the fire.

The photographer arrived at the airstrip just an hour before sundown. Sure enough, a small Cessna airplane stood waiting. He jumped in with his equipment and shouted, “Let's go!” The pilot, a tense-looking man, turned the plane into the wind, and soon they were in the air, though flying erratically.

“Fly over the north side of the fire,” said the photographer, “and make several low-level passes.”

“Why?” asked the nervous pilot.

“Because I’m going to take pictures!” yelled the photographer. “I'm a photographer, and photographers take pictures.”

The pilot replied, “You mean you’re not the flight instructor?” (Brett Kays, www.PreachingToday.com)

People in every relationship have expectations of others in that relationship. So, when a person fails to live up to those expectations, the relationship fails. The same is true in our relationship with God. We have expectations of Him, and He has expectations of us.

So, just what are those expectations? If you want a good relationship with God, what can you expect of Him and what does He expect of you? Well, if you have your Bibles, I invite you to turn with me to Exodus 23, Exodus 23, where God lays out those expectations.

Exodus 23:20-22 “Behold, I send an angel before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. Pay careful attention to him and obey his voice; do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him. “But if you carefully obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries (ESV).

Under the Old Covenant, God conditioned His blessings on obedience. If you obey, “I will be an enemy to your enemies” (verse 22). But if you disobey, there is no pardon for your transgressions (verse 21).

Exodus 23:23-25 “When my angel goes before you and brings you to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, and I blot them out, you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. You shall serve the LORD your God, and he will bless your bread and your water, and I will take sickness away from among you (ESV).

There it is again. “You shall serve the Lord your God and He will bless…” God conditions His blessing on obedience under the Old Covenant. If God’s people obey, God will protect them from their adversaries, provide bread and water, and heal their diseases. Furthermore, God says…

Exodus 23:26-31 None shall miscarry or be barren in your land; I will fulfill the number of your days. I will send my terror before you and will throw into confusion all the people against whom you shall come, and I will make all your enemies turn their backs to you. And I will send hornets before you, which shall drive out the Hivites, the Canaanites, and the Hittites from before you. I will not drive them out from before you in one year, lest the land become desolate and the wild beasts multiply against you. Little by little I will drive them out from before you, until you have increased and possess the land. And I will set your border from the Red Sea to the Sea of the Philistines, and from the wilderness to the Euphrates, for I will give the inhabitants of the land into your hand, and you shall drive them out before you (ESV).

In response to their obedience, God promises to give them the Promised Land, to drive their enemies out little by little, and to expand their borders all the way to the Euphrates River. Then God warns His people…

Exodus 23:32-33 You shall make no covenant with them and their gods. They shall not dwell in your land, lest they make you sin against me; for if you serve their gods, it will surely be a snare to you” (ESV).

God warns His people not to make any alliances with the enemy, not even to let them dwell in the land, and certainly not to serve their gods. God’s blessings were conditioned on the obedience of His people under this, the Old Covenant.

The problem is no one could obey the 613 commands in the Old Covenant. In fact, the history of the nation of Israel records one failure after another until they end up in exile in Babylon as God judges them for their idolatry and sin. Then, even after Israel returns from exile, they still have trouble keeping the terms of the Old Covenant, which invites further judgment. Under the Old Covenant, God conditioned His blessings on obedience, but since no one could obey, God instituted a New Covenant (Jeremiah 31:31-34; Ezekiel 36:22-29).