Day 24: The Promise of a New Covenant

Posted on: April 1, 2025
by: Gerrit Dawson, Senior Pastor

Every day, pray aloud worshipfully this golden thread that weaves through the entire tapestry of God’s intent for us.

Behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD,

when I will make a new covenant with the

house of Israel. . . .

I will put my law within them,

and I will write it on their hearts.

And I will be their God, and they shall be my people.

They shall all know me, from the least of them

to the greatest. . . .

For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will

remember their sin no more.

(Jeremiah 31:31, 33-34)

Daily Scripture

Jeremiah 24:5, 7; Jeremiah 31:31-34; 32:39-41

“Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel. . . . I will give them a heart to know that I am the LORD, and they shall be my people and I will be their God, for they shall return to me with their whole heart.”

“Behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the LORD. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the LORD. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”

“I will give them one heart and one way, that they may fear me forever, for their own good and the good of their children after them. I will make with them an everlasting covenant, that I will not turn away from doing good to them. And I will put the fear of me in their hearts, that they may not turn from me. I will rejoice in doing them good, and I will plant them in this land in faithfulness, with all my heart and all my soul.”

Picking Up the Thread

Today we have in context the verses from Jeremiah we have been saying every day. We’re right at the center of the tapestry of Scripture, and the essential pattern flows from core passages like these. God promises a new covenant agreement. It will be written not on stone but inside our hearts. From within, we will experience what it means to be people who belong to the LORD. We will live out what it means to make our way through the world knowing in our bones that God has given himself to us forever. This is the restoration to what humanity was meant to be.

And how we need it! Through the centuries, the people of the LORD experienced deep frustration with their human frailty. God gave them the law that makes for an abundant, just life in the world, and he made and enacted clear promises of external blessings for obedience. He also declared explicit warnings of external punishments for disobedience. And the relationship between these two was not subtle! But despite their most earnest attempts, consistent obedience was impossible.

Like God’s people, we cannot do the good we intend. And we keep doing the bad we promise to avoid. Paul sums up our dilemma:

For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. . . . Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? (Romans 7:18-20, 24).

For Israel and for us, just trying harder has never worked.

Jeremiah wrote on the eve of Israel’s exile to Babylon. These seventy years of captivity in a foreign land came after decades of warning from the prophets. The idolatry and injustice within the people of God triggered the enacting of judgment. Once God took away his protective hand, his special nation fell. Their political prowess, their military might, their dedicated temple worship and their flourishing culture could not save them from the stronger Babylonian army. They lost their temple, their homes and their land. They could not generate the holiness required to save their nation.

But amid this tragedy, news of hope also came through the prophet. The LORD spoke through Jeremiah of a new covenant that was coming. New terms of relationship would be enacted between God and his people that would create a change from within. In this new “deal,” sin would be forgiven. Hearts would be changed. The Creator would restore intimacy with his creation. Reconciliation would occur.

This was more than just the promise that the seventy years of exile would end. That did indeed happen on schedule. The people returned and rebuilt their temple and their land. But the full enactment of the new covenant would still be some centuries away. As we will see tomorrow, the eternal Son of God himself would have to come down to establish this new relationship.

Stitching It In

The centuries of Israel’s life under the law reveal that it is impossible for us to create our own righteousness. We cannot save ourselves. The very system of the old covenant of the law given through Moses perpetually shows us our inadequacy. Perhaps one reason the LORD allowed this system to continue for so many centuries was to reveal definitively that no one can generate right standing before God. Nor can we solve the problems of our lives by ourselves. As humans, we have no choice but to seek a savior. The core issue is not other people nor difficult conditions nor bad turns of fortune. My deepest problem is within my own heart. To own that reality is to reach a place of fundamental surrender to our need to live on God’s terms not our own. The very frustration we undergo can open our eyes to welcome the deep change God desires to make within us.

We see all the way back in Deuteronomy how the LORD reveals this long-term plan. God sets the right path before his people and urges them to choose the way of life. But he knows they will disobey and what will happen when they disobey. Therefore, he speaks to them of a time far in the future when he will restore them. God will apply the external sign of the covenant, circumcision, to their heart: “And the LORD your God will circumcise your heart . . . so that you will love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live” (Deuteronomy 30:6). Tomorrow we’ll explore how God does it.

Praying Along the Pattern

Oh my Father, I need a new lease

On the terms of my life.

I have tried living only for my every want.

I have tried being good enough in myself.

I have tried proving my value to you.

Even when others have rewarded me,

Awarded me, applauded me, thanked me.

I know inside I am not enough.

I cannot pay the rent.

I cannot make a worthy return.

Only you can make a new arrangement.