Exploring the Mystery of New Covenant Life
Life under the New Covenant is a radical and mysterious departure from anything else we may have experienced.
Life under the New Covenant is a radical and mysterious departure from anything else we may have experienced. It is so wonderfully at odds with life under the Law that most of us find it difficult to grasp or believe. It is mysterious in the biblical sense in that we cannot understand it without revelation from the Holy Spirit. It literally seems to be too good to be true. As a result, many of us never experience its fullness but continue to live as if we are still under the law, vainly trying to earn or maintain a right standing with God through our performance. This always ends poorly. My hope is that what I have written here will help us to gain a greater understanding and experience of all that Christ died to provide for us.
If we were able through extreme dedication, self-denial, and will power to live a life that measures up to God’s standard of righteousness, Christ would not have had to die for our sins.
“I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness comes through the Law, then Christ died needlessly.” Galatians 2:21 (NASB95)
But just as the unrighteous steward could not accept that his extreme debt to his master was fully forgiven, we still think we have a chance of finally getting it right, if we just try again a little harder. The longer we stay on the treadmill of self-effort, the more likely it is we will end up depressed, angry, or extremely deceived.
God gave us the Law to deliver us from all forms of self-righteousness by forcing us to finally come to terms with our desperate sinfulness and need for a savior.
Is the Law then contrary to the promises of God? May it never be! For if a law had been given which was able to impart life, then righteousness would indeed have been based on law. 22 But the Scripture has shut up everyone under sin, so that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe. 23 But before faith came, we were kept in custody under the law, being shut up to the faith which was later to be revealed. 24 Therefore the Law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ, so that we may be justified by faith. 25 But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor. Galatians 3:21–25 (NASB95)
Even though the Bible plainly teaches we are no longer under the dominion of the law and its power to condemn us, we generally find it very difficult to leave this abusive spouse. We seem to prefer to “security” it offers to the freedom available to us in Christ.
Therefore, my brethren, you also were made to die to the Law through the body of Christ, so that you might be joined to another, to Him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God. 5 For while we were in the flesh, the sinful passions, which were aroused by the Law, were at work in the members of our body to bear fruit for death. 6 But now we have been released from the Law, having died to that by which we were bound, so that we serve in newness of the Spirit and not in oldness of the letter. Romans 7:4–6 (NASB95)
We just cannot seem to let go of our need to be able to measure our spiritual standing or progress, which the law seems to provide. We cannot seem to find comfort in being released from the need to measure anything ever again because Christ has perfectly and finally fulfilled the law on our behalf. There is nothing left to do or prove ever again.
For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes. Romans 10:4 (NASB95)
The English word “end” is translated from the Greek word “telos,” which means completion or fulfillment. The NLT accurately translates this verse as follows.
For Christ has already accomplished the purpose for which the law was given. As a result, all who believe in him are made right with God. Romans 10:4 (NLT)
This leaves nothing for us to do regarding the Law. We have been released from its power to condemn us. But all this does is end the futility of striving to gain God’s favor under the old covenant. How then shall we now live under the new covenant? How do we experience what Paul called living in the “newness of the Spirit?”
Jesus: The Fusion of the Eternal with the Temporal
God is not limited by any created dimension, such as time. However, God assigned us to live in a world fenced in by the dimensions of space and time.
Those who put their faith and allegiance in Christ and experience the new birth experience life in another greater reality – the eternal spiritual realm.
By virtue of our tripartite nature (spirit, soul, and body – 1 Thessalonians 5:23), we are uniquely and amazingly designed to interface with both the material world and the spiritual one.
To God, all things are in the present. His revealed name, given to Moses, is the “I Am.” Jesus, the Second Person of the Godhead, has existed from all eternity as the Logos (John 1:1).
In obedience to his Father’s will, Jesus entered our time-space experience as a human being through a miraculous fusion of the eternal with the temporal inside Mary’s womb called the Incarnation.
He was a true extra-terrestrial, being the only person who came from heaven and is truly God and truly man, the “monogenes” or only begotten Son of God. The truth of the Incarnation has been held fast by the church since its inception and is clearly stated in Scripture.
Jesus understood that his “origin” was and is divine and that he has always existed.
And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth. John 1:14 (NASB)
And He was saying to them, "You are from below, I am from above; you are of this world, I am not of this world. John 8:23 (NASB)
"Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it and was glad." 57 So the Jews said to Him, "You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?" 58 Jesus said to them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was born, I am." John 8:56-58 (NASB)
In Jesus the Messiah, the eternal “I Am” became a human being.
As a human, he was subject to the limitations of time and space. He entered the world as a baby and grew and developed into a man in the ordinary way. The mystery of the Incarnation produced a person who was and is truly human and truly God, thus making it possible for the elevation of humanity beyond our comprehension.
The New Birth and the Mystery of Christ in Us
Jesus had a dual nature. He was truly God and truly man. As a man, he was subject to human weakness, but his core identity was derived from his Abba Father. He lived his human life in agreement with his core identity. He never violated his God-ness by catering to his humanity.
In the days of His flesh, He offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the One able to save Him from death, and He was heard because of His piety. 8 Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered. 9 And having been made perfect, He became to all those who obey Him the source of eternal salvation, 10 being designated by God as a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek. Hebrews 5:7-10 (NASB)
Jesus was said to learn obedience because he endured temptation as we do without succumbing to it. By living out from his core identity as God’s only begotten son, he triumphed over sin and temptation in every case, all the way to the cross. He showed us how to live.
Before the new birth, our core identity was rooted in Adam. We were weak and enslaved to sin.
...knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin; 7 for he who has died is freed from sin. 8 Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him, Romans 6:6–8 (NASB95)
When we are born again, our spirits come alive. The Bible says we become a new creation (Galatians 6:15, 2 Corinthians 5:17). We are joined to God in the spirit and become one with him (1 Corinthians 6:17, Galatians 2:20).
God wants us to learn to live out of this new spiritual part of our being and from there derive our identity going forward. This is the mystery and secret of the Christian life – Christ in us, the hope of glory.
For God wanted them to know that the riches and glory of Christ are for you Gentiles, too. And this is the secret: Christ lives in you. This gives you assurance of sharing his glory. Colossians 1:27 (NLT)
Learning to Walk in Step with the Holy Spirit
There was nothing in Jesus that was “out of step” with the Holy Spirit. It was completely “natural” for him to hear his Father’s voice, see what his Father was doing, and follow his Father’s lead without hindrance.
So Jesus said, "When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am He, and I do nothing on My own initiative, but I speak these things as the Father taught Me. John 8:28 (NASB)
Therefore Jesus answered and was saying to them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, unless it is something He sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, these things the Son also does in like manner. John 5:19 (NASB)
"For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me. John 6:38 (NASB)
The eternally perfect Logos became an historically perfect human being over time through continued obedience to his Father.
Our Lord worked out in his time-bound human life that which was eternally true about him on the inside.
He had to make choices along the way to obey his Father, even when it cost him supremely. He learned obedience from the things he suffered as he lived out of his union with his Father.
Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, 6 who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. 8 Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Philippians 2:5-8 (NASB)
This gives us a key to understand how our own sanctification and spiritual transformation takes place.
We too must undergo the process of learning obedience to God over a lifetime during which the Holy Spirit works to transform our thinking, words, character, and behavior to match what Christ already accomplished for us through his death and resurrection. God puts within each of us a newly recreated spirit that is united with God, whose desire is to please God always.
“Keep watching and praying that you may not come into temptation; the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.” Mark 14:38 (NASB95)
For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man, 23 but I see a different law in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other, with my flesh the law of sin. Romans 7:22–25 (NASB95)
Unfortunately, the residue of what the Bible calls the “flesh” still pulls us toward sin. This creates an internal battleground. By placing us in a world governed by time and space, God requires us to believe and live by faith in his promises, to obey the Holy Spirit, to treasure the fear of the Lord, and to rely on the transforming power of grace.
So then, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling; 13 for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure. Philippians 2:12-13 (NASB)
Living by grace is a cooperative effort between us and God in which we too learn to live out what is true spiritually on the inside through the new birth. Jesus the Messiah did the hard lifting at Calvary. However, the salvation he won for us must be actively worked out in our personal histories through belief in the truth and cooperation with the indwelling Holy Spirit.
God was not content to merely forgive us. The Spirit is committed to making what is true spiritually and eternally about us become our experience and history.
The only way this is possible is if we believe the truth that God has removed from us every trace of condemnation.
This is a corollary of the believing that Christ perfectly and finally fulfilled the Law on our behalf. Paul taught that when Jesus died on the cross, we died with him.
Since we are dead now, the Law has no more jurisdiction over us and no ability to point out our faults and condemn our failures.
This is why Jesus and Paul both emphasized that we will never ever again be condemned.
Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life. John 5:24 (NASB95)
Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Romans 8:1 (NASB95)
The judge himself assures us that he will never condemn us. That settles it.
Once the law loses its ability to condemn us, sin loses its power over us.
The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law. 57 But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. 1 Corinthians 15:56–57 (NKJV)
Because of what Jesus did for us through his death and resurrection and through the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit, we are now able to live for God. This is the new covenant mystery of God writing his law on our hearts. (Jeremiah 31:33)
When we learn to live in the power of the indwelling Spirit, we will experience the freedom of what Paul called the “law of the spirit of life.”
Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death. Romans 8:1–2 (NASB95)
This is the outworking of the mystery of new covenant life in the Spirit.
So then, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling; 13 for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure. Philippians 2:12-13 (NASB)
God has given us the responsibility to live by grace in a dynamic cooperation between us and the Holy Spirit as we steadfastly hold on to the truth of God’s Word.
