The New Covenant In Christ Series

Jeremiah was called as a prophet six hundred years before Christ. He is known as the weeping prophet. He pronounced judgment. The refused to listen to Jeremiah. The people from his own town were going to kill him. (Jeremiah 11:21) They put him in the stocks. They tried to sentence him to death. They threw him in a mud pit. There is tragedy and there is grief for Jeremiah.

Now in chapters 30-31 we see a different message. Jeremiah looks ahead to Jesus Christ. He speaks of the new covenant.

This prophecy is considered the high-water mark of all the Old Testament prophecies. This prophecy is quoted in Hebrews 8:8-12.

“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.

32 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.

33 “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.

34 No longer will they teach their neighbor,

or say to one another, ‘Know the LORD,’

because they will all know me,

from the least of them to the greatest,”

declares the LORD.

“For I will forgive their wickedness

and will remember their sins no more.” (Jeremiah 31:31-34)

The first covenant with Moses is found in Exodus 24:1-8. The writer of Hebrews said in chapter 8 that if there had been nothing wrong with the first covenant, no place would have been sought for another.

The Old covenant collapsed. People broke it. The nation strayed. The new covenant could not fail. The new covenant will be, written not on tablets of stone, but on the hearts of man. The time is now. The new covenant is now written in our hearts.

It was this passage of scripture that Jesus alluded to at the last supper. This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. (Matthew 26:28) Jesus was proclaiming that this new covenant prophecy, delivered by Jeremiah was now instituted at the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus.

In chapter 31 we see an important aspect of the New Covenant in Jesus Christ. That is that everyone will be accountable for their own sin.

The days are coming,” declares the LORD, “when I will plant the kingdoms of Israel and Judah with the offspring of people and of animals. 28 Just as I watched over them to uproot and tear down, and to overthrow, destroy and bring disaster, so I will watch over them to build and to plant,” declares the LORD. 29 “In those days people will no longer say,

‘The parents have eaten sour grapes,

and the children’s teeth are set on edge.’

30 Instead, everyone will die for their own sin; whoever eats sour grapes—their own teeth will be set on edge. (Jeremiah 31:27-30)

No one is to blame anyone else for our own sin. We suffer because of the sins of our fathers, but we are not held accountable for them. All have sinned.

No longer will they teach their neighbor,

or say to one another, ‘Know the LORD,’

because they will all know me,

from the least of them to the greatest,”

declares the LORD.

“For I will forgive their wickedness

and will remember their sins no more.” (Jeremiah 31:34)

In the new covenant our personal faith cannot be taught like a rule. It must be experienced to be real. We point people to Christ, and we encourage them to an experience of a relationship with God. The Lord has a pan for your life, and you must individually experience your relationship with God by grace through faith in Jesus Christ.

In the New Covenant, the covenant the focus is on the internal, not the external. When Jeremiah delivered this message that day was coming. For us that day has come. We live in the glorious day that Jeremiah looked forward to.

In Matthew 13 we read that Jesus was sitting in a boat and speaking to large crowds of people. Jesus told them that in him they were seeing what Jeremiah proclaimed and longed for. Not just Jeremiah, but all the prophets. They would trade places with us because we live on this side of what Jesus did on the cross. We live this side of the power of the resurrection.

For truly I tell you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it. (Matthew 13:17)