Exodus (2)
Message Eight
The Blood of the Covenant
Scripture Reading: Exo. 24:4-8; 25:17, 22; 34:27-35; Lev. 16:11-16; Matt. 26:28; Luke 22:20; Heb. 10:19-20
I. The precious blood of Christ satisfies God, it is the believers' access to God, and it overcomes all the accusations of the enemy (Exo. 12:13; Eph. 2:13; 1 Pet. 1:18-19; Heb. 10:19-20, 22; 9:14; 1 John 1:7, 9; Rev. 12:10-11); we need to go further to see that the Lord's precious blood is the blood of the covenant.
II. "Moses took the blood and sprinkled it on the people and said, Here is the blood of the covenant, which Jehovah has made with you in accordance with all these words"— Exo. 24:8:
A. The expression blood of the covenant is also used in Matthew 26:28; this matter comes from the heart of God, but it has no place in the heart of the natural man.
B. Luke 22:20 says, "This cup is the new covenant established in My blood":
1. The Lord's blood, having satisfied God's righteousness, enacted the new covenant and ushers us into the reality of the new covenant—Heb. 10:19-20; Hymns, #551, stanzas 3 and 4.
2. Through the Lord's death His blood enacted the new covenant; by the Lord's resurrection He became the new covenant with all its bequests (Isa. 42:6; 49:8); and in the Lord's ascension He is the Mediator, the Executor, of the new covenant (Heb. 8:6; 9:15; 12:24) and the surety of the new covenant, the pledge that everything in the new covenant will be fulfilled (7:22):
a. Christ, as the embodiment of the riches of the Godhead (Col. 2:9) and as the crucified and resurrected One, has become the covenant of God given to His people; He is the reality of all that God is and of all that God has given to us.
b. God's salvation, God's righteousness, God's justification, God's forgiveness, God's redemption, God's riches, and all that God has and will do have been covenanted to us.
c. As the reality of all the bequests in the new testament, Christ, who is the all-inclusive, life-giving, indwelling, consummated Spirit (1 Cor. 15:45b; 2 Cor. 3:17; Rom. 8:9-11), is in our spirit and has become one spirit with us (2 Tim. 4:22; 1 Cor. 6:17).
III. "Moses wrote down all the words of Jehovah. And he rose up early in the morning and built an altar at the base of the mountain and twelve pillars for the twelve tribes of Israel"—Exo. 24:4:
A. The altar points to the need for redemption, termination, and replacement; because we are fallen, sinful, and corrupt, we need redemption and termination, and we also need to be replaced by Christ.
B. The pillars signify that after God's people have been redeemed, terminated, and replaced at the altar, they can become the testimony of God, reflecting what He is.
C. The blood comes from the sacrifices offered on the altar; it was the blood, not the altar or the pillars, that made effective the enactment of the law—vv. 4-8.
IV. We need to see God's intention in decreeing the law:
A. In decreeing the law, God's intention was to reveal to His chosen and redeemed people what kind of God He is; as the testimony of God, the law is a portrait or photograph of God (16:34; 25:21); therefore, the first function of the law is to reveal that God is a God of holiness, righteousness, love, and light.
B. The second function of the law is to cause His people to realize that they are fallen and far away from God:
1. It was not God's intention to have His people observe the law that He decreed; it is impossible for fallen, sinful, and corrupted people to keep the law—cf. Rom. 3:20.
2. The intention of God in decreeing the law was different from the intention of those who received it; the intention of those who received the law was to keep it—Exo. 24:3, 7.
3. It is only through the redeeming blood (1 Pet. 1:18-19), the blood of the covenant, that God's people are ushered into the Holy of Holies to contact God and have God infused into them (Heb. 10:19-20).
V. We need to see the relationship between the redeeming blood and the presence of God:
A. Moses was fallen, sinful, and corrupt, just as all the other children of Israel were; he could stay in the presence of God and be infused with God on the mountaintop for forty days to become God's ref lection because God had the redeeming blood in view; this was the reason that the skin of Moses' face glowed when he descended from the mountain—Exo. 34:27-35.
B. The only one qualified to enter the Holy of Holies and come to the Ark with the expiation cover was the one who brought with him the redeeming blood from the outer court; this blood, which was the blood of the covenant, brought people into the Holy of Holies to enter into God's presence—Lev. 16:11-16:
1. That expiation cover, corresponding to the propitiation place in Romans 3:25 and Hebrews 9:5, was the lid of the Ark; it signifies Christ as the cover of God's righteous law and also as the place where God meets with His redeemed people and speaks to them in grace—Exo. 25:17, 22.
2. Hence, the expiation cover on the Ark in the Holy of Holies equals the throne of grace, the very Christ who dwells in our spirit; the pure gold of which the cover was made signifies Christ's pure divine nature—Heb. 4:16.
3. That God met with His people and spoke to them from above the expiation cover and between the cherubim signifies that God meets with us and speaks to us in the propitiating Christ as His testimony—Exo. 25:22; cf. 2 Cor. 3:8-11, 18.
4. Thus, the expiation cover with the blood of the sacrifices sprinkled on it on the Day of Expiation (Lev. 16:14-15, 29-30) portrays the redeeming Christ in His humanity and the shining Christ in His divinity as the place where fallen sinners can meet with the righteous, holy, and glorious God and hear His word, thereby being infused with God as grace and receiving vision, revelation, and instruction from Him— Exo. 25:20-22.
VI. Moses was a man who knew God's heart and His intention; therefore, he enacted the law not according to the intention of the children of Israel but according to the intention of God:
A. God's way was to reveal what He is and then to show the people that, in His sight, they were fallen, sinful, and corrupted (altogether hopeless and helpless) and that they desperately needed His redemption and forgiveness.
B. After they received redemption and forgiveness, the redeeming blood would bring them into God's presence where they could contact Him, receive Him into them, and be constituted into pillars as a living testimony of God, a ref lection of what He is.
C. The Lord has accomplished redemption for us, and His blood is available to cleanse us and bring us into His presence; now He is waiting for us to repent, turn to Him, and receive His redemption and forgiveness.
D. According to the revelation in the New Testament, we are not only brought into God's presence—we are brought into God Himself; the redeeming and cleansing blood brings us into God!
E. This gives us the ground and standing to receive God, to enjoy God, and to eat and drink of God; eventually, by partaking of God in this way, we will become pillars, His living testimony.
F. The way to become pillars is the way of enjoying God; it is the way of eating of Him as our life supply (John 6:57; Rev. 22:14) and drinking of Him as our living water (John 7:37-39; 4:10, 14; 1 Cor. 12:13); by eating and drinking Him, we enjoy Him and are constituted with Him.
G. This is a basic principle of the divine economy that operates in the universe unto this day:
1. The basic concept of God's economy is not that God's people should keep the law; the law was decreed by God not that His people might observe it but that through it they might come to know God in a positive way and know them- selves in a negative way.
2. Having a proper knowledge of God and of themselves, they would then repent and receive God's redemption through the redeeming blood, and they would be brought into the presence of God to receive the infusion of God to become pillars as a living testimony and ref lection of what God is— cf. Rom. 8:4.
VII. The blood of the covenant is primarily for God to be our portion for our enjoyment—cf. Psa. 27:4; 1 Cor. 2:9; Heb. 10:19-20:
A. In the new covenant God gives us forgiveness, life, salvation, and all spiritual, heavenly, and divine blessings.
B. When this new covenant is given to us, it is a cup, a portion for us: "This cup is the new covenant established in My blood, which is being poured out for you"—Luke 22:20:
1. The Lord shed His blood, God established the covenant, and we enjoy the cup, in which God and all that is of Him are our portion—1 Cor. 10:16a.
2. The blood is the price that Christ paid for us, the covenant is the title deed that God made for us, and the cup is the portion that we receive from God.
3. "In this portion we have God, / Whom we lost thru Adam's fall; / By the shedding of Thy blood, / God becomes our all in all. / In this portion all we have— / Life and peace, redemption sure; / All that God has planned and willed, / In this portion we secure"—Hymns, #223, stanza 3.
VIII. Eventually, the blood of Christ as the blood of the new covenant (Matt. 26:28; Luke 22:20) ushers God's people into the better things of the new covenant, in which God gives His people a new heart, a new spirit, His Spirit, the inner law of life (denoting God Himself with His nature, life, attributes, and virtues), and the ability of life to know God (Jer. 31:33-34; Ezek. 36:26-27; Heb. 8:10-12).
IX. Ultimately, the blood of the new covenant, the eternal covenant (13:20), enables God's people to serve Him (9:14) and leads God's people into the full enjoyment of God as their portion (as the tree of life and the water of life) both now and for eternity (Rev. 7:14, 17; 22:1-2, 14, 17).