Covenants -- to Catholics and non-Catholics

[Bezant]

To Catholics and non-Catholics,

Why does God make covenants? And for those of you belonging to non-covenant religions, why doesn’t a covenant part of your religion?

 

[ltwin]

I think it is because our God is a personal God. He is immanent and transcendent. He knows and can be known. He chooses to reach out to us and relate to us through covenant relationship. Because God chooses to relate to us through covenant, we can have full assurance and faith that He will keep His promises. We know that He never changes. Even God’s names reveal His covenant promises:

Jehovah-Jireh: “the Lord will provide” (Genesis 22:14), "My God shall supply all your need according . . . " (Phil. 4:19)
Jehovah-Nissi: “the Lord our Banner” (Ex. 17:15), “His banner over me was love” (Sg. 2:4), “Greater love hath no man than this . . .” (Jn. 15:13)
Jehovah-Shalom: “the Lord our Peace” (Jgs. 6:24), “For he is our peace” (Eph. 2:14)
Jehovah-Raah: “the Lord our Shepherd” (Ps. 23:1), “I am the good shepherd” (Jn. 10:11)
Jehovah-Tsidkenu: “the Lord our Righteousness” (Jer. 23:6), “Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us . . . righteousness” (1 Cor. 1:30)
Jehovah-Shammah: “the Lord is present” (Ez. 48:35), “I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee” (Heb. 13:5)
Jehovah-Rapha: “the Lord thy Physician” (Ez. 15:26), “The prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up” (Jas. 5:15)

God never changes, and He keeps His promises–even when we don’t.

 

[Ubenedictus]

To Catholics and non-Catholics,

Why does God make covenants? And for those of you belonging to non-covenant religions, why doesn’t a covenant part of your religion?

the answer is simple God is love. I like to think of him as a family ‘guy’, he just doesn’t stop untill he has fathered his people. Remember the story of adam and eve? How he created them as his people and he was their God?, man chose the opposite and God loves him too much to let him go, that’s the reason for the convenant. God of love offers man a means to reach him and lastly he fathered his people and opens the ‘door’ to all thru his son Jesus christ.

 

[Newsy]

Scott Hahn’s book, “A Father Who Keeps His Promises”, addresses this issue well. We could spend years discussing the purpose of covenants, and only scratch the surface. A covenant makes a family. God’s covenant with us makes us part of His family. Society has always centered around covenants, take marriage and adoption for examples. The covenant was an easy way for God to show us His love, by making us adopted children.

Our biggest problem, today, is that we think a covenant is the same as a contract.

 

[rinnie]

To Catholics and non-Catholics,

Why does God make covenants? And for those of you belonging to non-covenant religions, why doesn’t a covenant part of your religion?

To me when I think of covenants I think of a marriage, It is a covenant between a woman and a man and they become one.

That is the covenant God has with us. We all become one with him. Its live a big warm fuzzy blamket that keeps us warm in the family of God our Father. He always keeps his promises to us, we have to remember that and never give up hope.

 

[Lokabrenna]

I wouldn’t say that my tradition has “covenants” per se. We have oaths, which are taken very seriously, and I suppose you could call an oath a form of covenant, but those are typically initiated by humans, not the gods themselves, and one person’s oath isn’t generally binding on anyone else. In Asatru, some Kindreds have Oaths of Profession, which is basically an oath affirming their commitment to the Aesir and Vanir (forsaking all others), but this is optional (and actually discouraged) according to the Kindred closest to me, anyways. People are discouraged from making oaths in general, actually, because they are taken so seriously.