Systematic Theology – Covenant

The Blood of the Covenant

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Systematic Theology

Lesson: 05-22

Genre: Speech

Track: 5 of 22

Dictation Name: 05 The Blood Of The Covenant

Location/Venue:

Year:

Almighty God our Heavenly Father, we come to Thee rejoicing that Thou art on the throne. That all power and authority are with Thee and Thou wilt in Thine own good time confound all the workers of iniquity. Oh Lord our God defend us in this day from the wrath of those who would destroy Thy church, forbid the preaching of Thy word and work against Thy kingdom and Thy Son. Make us bold in faith, confident in our victory in Jesus Christ and in Him may be more than conquerors. Grant us this we beseech Thee in Jesus’ name, Amen.

Our subject for the first session is The Blood of the Covenant and our text is in Hebrews 10:26-31. Hebrews 10:26-31.

“For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins,

27 But a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries.

28 He that despised Moses' law died without mercy under two or three witnesses:

29 Of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace?

30 For we know him that hath said, Vengeance belongeth unto me, I will recompense, saith the Lord. And again, The Lord shall judge his people.

31 It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.”

As we have seen in our previous studies the doctrine of the covenant is the basic doctrine of scripture. God’s relationship with man is a covenant relationship, a covenant is a treaty of law and in God’s case it is a treaty of law between one who is greater than man by far, infinitely greater and between a creature. So that it is in the scripture not only a covenant of law but a covenant of grace. For God to give His law unto man, His creature, and enter into a relationship with him whereby He promises blessings for obedience is an act of grace. The bible is a covenant book. From beginning to end the Bible gives us the word, the law, God’s terms concerning the covenant. Our faith thus is a covenantal faith. There is no understanding of the bible apart from the doctrine of the covenant. Now there are certain basic premises to understanding the covenant, first, the law of the covenant regulates man’s relationship with God. Man can only approach God on God’s terms, man can never say I will do thus and so and it should be pleasing to God. God has told man that which alone will please Him and man cannot depart from that that given the prescribed way without God’s judgment. And our Lord says I am the way. This is His word and so we hear His word for He is the truth and He is the way. One of our problems today which has led to the downgrading and neglect of the doctrine of the covenant is democracy. Religion has become democratic, everyone feels in a church that they are entitled to have their say, to tell the preacher what he should preach and what he should not preach, to have an opinion on what they like in the pulpit.

Let’s have more preaching from John and less from the Psalms, or more from Revelation and less from Matthew and so on and on. The spirit of the age is the spirit of democracy and it sets aside the dignities of approach to superiors and we can never approach God except on his own terms. That is why we pray in Jesus’ name, we have no standing before God except in Jesus Christ and Christ lays down the terms in terms of which we have any standing in him whereby alone we can have standing with God. I was told once of a high school boy who when a very distinguished person of seventy, a person of national note, was visiting in the home spoke familiarly with this distinguished person, calling him by his first name. His parents very mildly rebuked him and the boy was surprised. Why shouldn’t I be friendly with him, I like him, I think he’s great. Not thinking for a moment of the difference between him, a school boy, and a national figure in his seventies. People approach God the same way. I like God, I think He’s great, or as one actor said some years ago ‘I think God’s a living doll’ and too many assume that because they define themselves as having a good heart that commends them to the Lord. The doctrine of the covenant says that the word, the law word of the covenant, this by which every man must live, every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God, our approach to God is determined. God is always the Lord, man always the creature. Though we are made sons by the adoption of grace we must remember that in those days the relationship of a Father and Son was very different from what it is now. The Father’s authority was very great and no son dared be disrespectful.

The covenant opens up communion with God on God’s terms, not mans. It is arrogance to think that we can ever approach God on our terms. Then second the covenant not only governs man’s relationship with God it governs the relationship of man to man. The bible tells us what our relationship to our fellow believers as well as to the unredeemed is to be. It also tells us what our relationship to ourselves is to be because we are not our own. We are not only made by God and our his property but we have been redeemed at the price of Christ’s blood, so that our relationship to other believers, to other man and to ourselves is governed by the covenant. This is why the covenant also governs our relationship to God’s earth as well as to our bodies, laws of diet, laws with regard to farming, laws with regard to sex and marriage, children, war, peace, everything, because God says you are stewards and your stewardship is not only over the earth but over all that you are and have including your own life. Third all this is because God is the creator and the author, the Lord of life. We are never outside of His government and therefore never outside of His covenant. It is the impossible dream of fallen man to believe that He can somewhere under the sun find a place, an area that he can call his own and say ‘I’ll step in here and God can’t touch me’. No, not in the recesses of our mind or any place under the sun. Though I make my bed in hell behold Thou art there, the psalmist says and then fourth, the penalties for offenses against God’s covenant differ in terms of the relationship of the offense whether it is to God or to man.

Now there are a variety of penalties for offenses against our fellow creatures. Some we are told that God will deal with, for example, tale bearing or gossip. Others require corporal punishment and some things require capital punishment, many things require restitution. So that there are gradations of punishments for our violation of God’s covenant where our fellow man is concerned, but there is no gradation with regard to offenses against God. All offenses against God are treason and the wages of sin in relationship to God are always death. All sin is treason to God and the offense merits death. In Genesis 2:17 we are told that when man began to sin dying he shall die, the process of death begins. The judgment of God which is death on all sin begins to operate in sinning man. The sad fact today is that men regard sins against God as trifles and the serious offenses of our day and age are sins against man. Crimes against humanity are regarded as the horrible fearful offenses but all sin, the Bible says, is in essence against God, against Thee, Thee only have I sinned and done that which is evil in Thy sight. Then next we must recognize that the doctrine of the covenant has central to it blood. In Leviticus 17:11 we read:

“For the life of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul.”

And again in Hebrews 9:22 we read:

“And almost all things are by the law purged with blood; and without shedding of blood is no remission.”

Just a word of explanation on the sentence from Hebrews it says almost all things are by the law purged with blood. The almost refers to the fact that some things, not persons but things, were ritually purged by fire and water but man in his sin requires blood atonement. But the blood of man can never make restitution. The scripture says that man must pay the death penalty for all sin against God but his blood will not make restitution nor will it affect atonement, it’s simply the penalty. Only the blood of Jesus Christ meets the requirement of the covenant to make atonement for our sins. So that the sinner’s blood must be shed, he is to be executed in due time by God. All men must die but the death of no man makes atonement, it is only the blood of the appointed sacrifice, Jesus Christ. All men without exception are bound by the covenant with Adam, therefore all men without exception are under the death penalty that fell upon Adam. Christ in His atonement releases us from the curse of the law, death, and all the penalties of sin before God but not before men. The bible tells us there is a double price, a civil price and a theological price. A murderer can repent and be forgiven by God but he must still die in the courts of men. The covenant with Adam was a blessing, the covenant with Christ therefore is a double blessing and this is the meaning of the scripture we read, Hebrews 10:26-31. What Paul tells us here is if we sin willfully, deliberately with a high hand, after that we have received the knowledge of the truth there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins but only judgment.

The one who sins deliberately and with a high hand manifests that he is not redeemed and he tramples underfoot the Son of God and counts the blood of the covenant wherewith he was sanctified an unholy thing and he does to spite the spirit of grace. Then we are told that anyone who sinned against the law of Moses died at the mouth of two or three witnesses but they who sin willfully against God after their supposed conversion may not have two or three witnesses but God knows and it is He who says vengeance is mine, I will recompense says the Lord, the Lord shall judge His people, His people. It is a fearful thing to fall in to the hands of the living God. Now, these words tie in with what Peter says in 1st Peter 4:17 that:

“For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God?”

Why? Because the sins of the church, the sins of the Christian when they sin willfully are doubly offensive to God and therefore they bring a more fearful judgment. It takes priority over the judgment of others, hence when the times of judgment come in history judgment must begin at the house of God. And our Lord gives us the reason for that: for unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required. And to whom men have committed much, of him they shall ask the more. This is the law of the covenant. Are there any questions now? Yes?

[Question Unintelligible]

[Rushdoony] It means that there is no more an atonement for those who despise the word of God who are supposedly Christians and who willfully sin. This does not mean sinning through ignorance or sinning through weakness, it has reference to a willful high handed sin.

Any other questions or comments, yes?

[Question] In verse twenty eight it talks about Moses’ law, does he mean like civil law? Does that apply to civil law?

[Rushdoony] He means anything and everything in Moses’ law, yes. The emphasis would probably be on the civil law, which said there could bbe a conviction in the church or in the state, only at the mouth of two or three witnesses. His point is when we sin against God in this way it isn’t going to take two or three witnesses and it’s going to be infallible. Human courts are not perfect you see and sometimes people can sin and get away with it because there aren’t two or three witnesses but not before God, His judgment will fall.

[Question Unintelligible]

[Rushdoony] Yes but the distinction he’s making here is the law here, the bible, deals with things that men must do whether it’s in the church or in the state or in the family in some cases. There we have to follow the laws of evidence. We may know that a man is a murderer, for example, and I have one police official once, he knew two murderers walking the streets, he knew they were murderers and they knew that he knew but he could not get proof that would stand up in court. Now God requires strict laws of evidence because man cannot be trusted, if it were not at the mouth of two witnesses or more man would perpetuate all kinds of injustice. But then God doesn’t need two witnesses, He knows all things. We may sin willfully and no man may know but God knows and the point is, over here for all these things in human society and the family, church, state and so on it’s going to take some digging by people if there’s evidence, but you aren’t going to get away with anything with God. He knows infallibly. Vengeance is mine, I will recompense sayeth the Lord.

Yes, was there another question? Yes?

[Question Unintelligible]

[Rushdoony] Yes, I’m going to deal with curses and blessings in our second period but let me say there are gradations of rewards as well, yes. Both in this world and the world to come, very definitely we’re taught that. Well if there are no further questions now we’ll take a break for about five or ten minutes.