Unfortunately, few these days seem to know the difference between the Old Testament and the New Testament and as a result, they get very confused, condemned, and frustrated.

When you pick up your Bible, you will see a nice heading page in front of the book of Genesis, which says: “Old Testament.” We know that the word “testament” means will or covenant.

Genesis 15:18On the same day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying:“To your descendants I have given this land,

The Old Covenant didn’t actually begin in Genesis 1:1. The history of God’s dealings with man started then, but the first covenant He made, with an individual man, didn’t appear until Genesis 15.

covenant with. Although it

was a personal covenant, it also would include the coming of the Messiah through the people of faith.

God did make promises to other men before Abraham, such as with mankind in general when he told Noah that He wouldn’t flood the earth again.

Let’s look at Abraham’s covenant and see how the benefits of that covenant are still in place today.

Notice it said “for an everlasting covenant”.

How long is everlasting?

Forever!

Galatians 3:15-2915My friends, I will use an everyday example to explain what I mean. Once someone agrees to something, no one else can change or cancel16the agreement. That is how it is with God’s promises to Abraham and his descendant. The promises were not made to many descendants, but only to one, and that one is Christ.17What I am saying is that the law cannot change or cancel God’s promise that was made 430 years before the law was given. If we obey the Law to receive God’s blessings, those blessings don’t come to us because of God’s promise. But God was kind to Abraham and made him a promise.19What is the use of the Law? It was given later to show that we sin. But it was only supposed to last until the coming of that descendant who was given the promise. Angels gave the Law to Moses, and he gave it to the people. There is only one God, and the Law did not come directly from him.21Does the Law disagree with his promises? No, it doesn’t! If any law could give life to us, we could become acceptable to God by22obeying that law.   But the scriptures say that sin

The promises are still in effect for Abraham and his descendant.

The first thing we see here is that Jesus is the descendant or seed of Abraham that was promised all of the blessings contained in the Abrahamic Covenant.

Today, because you have accepted Jesus by faith, then all of those blessings, including the Holy Spirit, are yours. You are now in Christ, so today all of the blessings are yours.

In the timeline of things, there is the Abrahamic covenant then along came Moses and the Children of Israel. Israel was given a separate situation. As a nation, it was promised certain things, such as the land in which the nation is to rule and reign.

As New Covenant Christians, those land promises are not literally for us. The physical land belongs to the Israelites.

When you read the books of Isaiah and Jeremiah, you will see future promises concerning that land that will come about during the Millennial Reign of Jesus here on the earth.

Getting back to Moses.

A set of Laws were given concerning the Children of Israel for when they were in the wilderness and even when they took on the Promised Land.

These laws had to be kept in the right standing as a nation with God. Those laws were summarized in the Ten Commandments given to Moses on Mount Sinai.

When the nation failed to keep the rules, they were in breach of their Mosaic Covenant. God had no choice but to allow the curses of the Law to come on them.

That’s the way a covenant works. You keep up your part of the covenant, and all the blessings come to you. You break the covenant, and all the curses come on you.

This is dramatically set out in Deuteronomy 28. The first 14 verses are the blessings, and the last 15 to 68th verses are the curses.

Look at verse 15:

Who is Moses talking to? He is talking to the Nation of Israel. He’s talking to a nation not to individuals.

So perhaps you are thinking “How come you quote those verses from such passages as Psalm 91, about the blessings coming on us when they were addressed to the nation of Israel?”

It is because all of the blessings have been passed on down to the Body of Christ. The curses have been removed.

Galatians 3:13-14

We are redeemed from the curse but get all the promised blessings.

1RZ KRZ JRRG LV WKDW”

Note these verses again. Galatians 3:18-1918If we obey the Law to receive God’s blessings, those blessings don’t come to us because of God’s promise.

Referring back to that passage, we looked at Galatians 3:15-29 about the Law and the Promises. The Law was given to Moses, and the Promise or Covenant was given to Abraham and to his descendant, or Christ.

Paul is saying that the Law was like a layer over top of the Covenant. It was for a time until the “descendant” came.

Let’s look now at what we call the New Covenant. Here is where many seem to get quite confused.

The New Covenant did not start at Matthew 1:1.

You might ask, when did the Old Covenant end and the New Covenant begin?

If you have not studied the Gospels with the understanding that the New Covenant began at the cross, or in other words, following the death of Jesus, then take a look at them again.

What once may have seemed to be apparent contradictions between the teachings of Jesus and the Apostle Paul, should now make perfect sense in light of the covenants under which they each taught.

Jesus taught under the Law of Moses. Jesus held, among other things, the office of a prophet under the Old Law.

Jesus put the Law in its proper perspective by raising it to such a level that those who had ears to hear would realize their pending doom trying to live up to it.

His goal was to show the self-righteous that no one could possibly achieve the demands of the Law.

Galatians 4:4-54But when the time was right, God sent his Son, and a woman gave birth to him. His5Son obeyed the Law, so he could set us free from the Law and we could become God’s children.

Jesus was born under the Law, so that He might redeem those under the Law and that we might receive the adoption as sons:

Christ showed even the most self-righteous their need and then met that need in Him through the work of the cross.

Jesus was teaching the Old Law to the Jewish people and showing them that they couldn’t keep the Law and that He was going to be their Saviour from that Law.

Consider this. …

Had Jesus already been crucified, buried, and raised when He told the multitudes that (Matt. 5:20) “unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you shall not enter the kingdom of heaven”?

Was the cross a past or future event when He taught (Matt. 5:28) “everyone who looks on a woman to lust for her has committed adultery with her already in his heart”?

Look at what some call the Lord’s Prayer.

Hebrews 9:15-1715Christ died to rescue those who had sinned and broken the old agreement. Now he brings his chosen ones a new agreement with its guarantee of God’s eternal16blessings! Agreeing to this kind is like writing a will. This is because the one who makes the will must die before it is used.   In other words, will doesn’t go into effect as long as the one who made it is still alive.   The New Covenant didn’t come into effect until AFTER the death of Jesus.

The only hope those under the Law had for salvation was not through giving a superior performance for God but by simple faith in Him.

If you don’t forgive others, God won’t forgive you for your sins. Well, we know that He, through the cross, has forgiven us of all our sins.

Galatians 2:1616But we know God accepts only those who have faith in Jesus Christ. No one

Those passages from the Gospels were clearly “under the Law teachings.”

So the answer to these questions is no, He had not yet been crucified, buried, and risen. Jesus was preparing His listeners for the good news to come.

Were Jesus’ teachings during His earthly ministry then not true? Of course, they were true! Jesus is the truth! He taught the truth. But He taught under the Old Covenant, revealing it for what it truly was…the ministry of condemnation.

Therefore, you and I need to know that the New Covenant began with completing one unique, never-to-be-repeated event on Calvary in 33 A.D. The dividing line of A-L-L human history was the cross of Christ.

There, our sins were forgiven, we were released from the Law, and we were set free from the power.
And that none of it has to do with us today? NO!

Alongside teaching the demands of the Law, Jesus was also teaching principles of holy living – and we should all desire to lead a holy life. Not by trying to keep the rules out of fear of Godly punishment, we live a holy life out of love for God and man. Not out of fear but by faith in the ability of Christ to live within us.

“The just shall live by faith”

Woven in amongst the teachings of Jesus concerning the Law were principles of faith, hope and love that are timeless.

Remember Jesus said:

John 13:34

He was speaking into the New Covenant that was to come.

That’s why we need grace.

We can’t keep the whole Law.

There are many powerful basics for Christian living laid out in the Gospels and even in the Old Testament, but for the day-to-day living as a New Covenant believer, recipients of the grace of God, we have the New Covenant that ranges from the Book of the Acts of the Apostles to the Book of the Revelation of Jesus to John. Therein lie the goals and guidelines to live under grace rather than under the Law.

If you have been trying to keep all of the Laws stated in the Old Covenant, including those laid out in the Gospels, you will be very disappointed and frustrated. You will constantly feel condemned at your inability to do it.

Stop living under the Old Covenant, move out and enjoy the grace and freedoms that are yours as a SET FREE recipient of the New Covenant.

of sin, and we were made new creations in Christ, to name just a few of the blessings we have received in Him.

The cross of Christ is the ultimate demonstration of God’s awesome and matchless power.

It was at the cross that through the power of God, the old is done away with, and the new has come.

Does this mean we don’t read the Old Testament, which includes the Gospels? Does it mean that everything Jesus said was just for the Jews that He was addressing at that time