What is God's covenant?

[Zerg]

God has given us the rainbow as a sign and promise that he would never send a flood to Earth again.

As Christians we are called to holiness.
Some covenants of the old testament have been clarified or taken away in the NT. Such as circumcision and the eating of pork.

The Bible talks about putting “new wine in new wineskins” (I hope I got that quote correctly).

So what is our “covenant” in the modern world as Christians? Or what makes Christians different from other people?

 

[AveOTheotokos]

God has given us the rainbow as a sign and promise that he would never send a flood to Earth again.

As Christians we are called to holiness.
Some covenants of the old testament have been clarified or taken away in the NT. Such as circumcision and the eating of pork.

The Bible talks about putting “new wine in new wineskins” (I hope I got that quote correctly).

So what is our “covenant” in the modern world as Christians? Or what makes Christians different from other people?

The Eucharist

 

[undead_rat]

Thanks for mentioning our Creator’s extermination of mankind through the Deluge. I find it instructive to examine His reason’s for this action:

YHWH saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that the thoughts in his heart fashioned nothing but wickedness all day long. . . .
God said to Noah, "The end has come for all things of flesh; I have decided this because the earth is full of violence of man’s making, . . ."
Genesis 6:5,13

According to Genesis 8:21 YHWH did more than promise no future flood:
"Never again will I curse the earth because of man, because his heart contrives evil from his infancy. Never again will I strike down every living thing as I have done."

I believe that our Creator will keep His word, and He will not Himself destroy mankind by fire. Instead YHWH is allowing mankind’s propensity towards violence to run its natural course.
That natural course ends in the fire of global nuclear war which is, I believe, the fire mentioned by Isaiah 66:15-16 and the disaster of Jeremiah 25:32-33. (See also Luke 12:49).
In other words, the next worldwide catastrophe comes not from God, but from mankind’s own evil inventions. (Psalm 9:15-16).

To give my answer to your question of what is our present Covenant as Christians, I can only surmise that it is to remember and heed the words of our Sacred Teacher, no matter what the cost.
The coming tribulations will put everyone to the test. Will you defend your hideout with your AR-15? Or will you open your store of survival supplies to the desperate refugees from the city?

 

[friardchips]

Thanks for mentioning our Creator’s extermination of mankind through the Deluge. I find it instructive to examine His reason’s for this action:

YHWH saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that the thoughts in his heart fashioned nothing but wickedness all day long. . . .
God said to Noah, "The end has come for all things of flesh; I have decided this because the earth is full of violence of man’s making, . . ."
Genesis 6:5,13

According to Genesis 8:21 YHWH did more than promise no future flood:
"Never again will I curse the earth because of man, because his heart contrives evil from his infancy. Never again will I strike down every living thing as I have done."

I believe that our Creator will keep His word, and He will not Himself destroy mankind by fire. Instead YHWH is allowing mankind’s propensity towards violence to run its natural course.
That natural course ends in the fire of global nuclear war which is, I believe, the fire mentioned by Isaiah 66:15-16 and the disaster of Jeremiah 25:32-33. (See also Luke 12:49).
In other words, the next worldwide catastrophe comes not from God, but from mankind’s own evil inventions. (Psalm 9:15-16).

To give my answer to your question of what is our present Covenant as Christians, I can only surmise that it is to remember and heed the words of our Sacred Teacher, no matter what the cost.
The coming tribulations will put everyone to the test. Will you defend your hideout with your AR-15? Or will you open your store of survival supplies to the desperate refugees from the city?

Think you just answered a question I had for you in another thread (underlined!).

 

[Michael_Mayo]

10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my laws into their minds, and write them on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. 11 And they shall not teach, each one his neighbor and each one his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest. 12 For I will be merciful toward their iniquities, and I will remember their sins no more." 13 In speaking of a new covenant, he makes the first one obsolete. And what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.

— Hebrews 8:10–13

 

[fhansen]

10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my laws into their minds, and write them on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. 11 And they shall not teach, each one his neighbor and each one his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest. 12 For I will be merciful toward their iniquities, and I will remember their sins no more." 13 In speaking of a new covenant, he makes the first one obsolete. And what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.

— Hebrews 8:10–13

This is it! Hebrews quotes Jer 31:33-34 here, the most important New Covenant prophecy. With the Old Covenant man does his own writing, so to speak; he attempts to fulfill the law by his own efforts. Under the New Covenant, under grace, the individual comes to know God for himself; a relationship of faith, hope, and love whereby man and God commune as was always meant to be the case, and then *God *can begin the work of transforming us, of putting His law in our minds and writing it on our hearts. Jesus sums this up simply in John 15:5, “Apart from Me you can do nothing”, echoed in Matt 19:26, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”

And the sacraments are formed around this understanding of this relationship so that post #2 can sum up the whole thing in the same vein: communion with God is essential to man having life at all- and life abundantly, to paraphrase John 10:10. And, if we turn away from God by some serious sin, what happens? We break fellowship and lose communion with Him, so that reconciliation must take place again, with the *sacrament *of Reconciliation, so that we may commune again, by partaking again, of the Eucharist.

Of course we can do this all mechanically, on auto-pilot, without real faith or contrition, etc, in which case the relationship will be compromised, perhaps even non-existent in reality, but in any case the promise of the New Covenant involves communion, between man and the Trinity, first and foremost.

 

[jcrichton]

God has given us the rainbow as a sign and promise that he would never send a flood to Earth again.

As Christians we are called to holiness.
Some covenants of the old testament have been clarified or taken away in the NT. Such as circumcision and the eating of pork.

The Bible talks about putting “new wine in new wineskins” (I hope I got that quote correctly).

So what is our “covenant” in the modern world as Christians? Or what makes Christians different from other people?

Hi!

…the Covenant has not changed:

26 I shall make a covenant of peace with them, an eternal covenant with them. I shall resettle them and increase them; I shall settle my sanctuary among them for ever. 27 I shall make my home above them; I will be their God, they shall be my people.

(Ezekiel 37:26-27)

13 But now in Christ Jesus, you that used to be so far apart from us have been brought very close, by the blood of Christ. 14 For he is the peace between us, and has made the two into one and broken down the barrier which used to keep them apart, actually destroying in his own person the hostility 15 caused by the rules and decrees of the Law. This was to create one single New Man in himself out of the two of them and by restoring peace 16 through the cross, to unite them both in a single Body and reconcile them with God; In his own person he killed the hostility. 17 Later he came to bring the good news of peace, peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near at hand. 18 Through him, both of us have in the one Spirit our way to come to the Father. 19 So you are no longer aliens or foreign visitors: you are citizens like all the saints, and part of God’s household. 20 You are part of a building that has the apostles and prophets for its foundations, and Christ Jesus himself for its main cornerstone. (Ephesians 2:13-20)

14 how much more effectively the blood of Christ, who offered himself as the perfect sacrifice to God through the eternal Spirit, can purify our inner self from dead actions so that we do our service to the living God. 15 He brings a new covenant, as the mediator, only so that the people who were called to an eternal inheritance may actually receive what was promised: his death took place to cancel the sins that infringed the earlier covenant. (Hebrews 9:14-15)

9 The Word was the true light that enlightens all men; and he was coming into the world. 10 He was in the world that had its being through him, and the world did not know him. 11 He came to his own domain and his own people did not accept him. 12 But to all who did accept him he gave power to become children of God, to all who believe in the name of him 13 who was born not out of human stock or urge of the flesh or will of man but of God himself. (St. John 1:9-13)

16 The temple of God has no common ground with idols, and that is what we are – the temple of the living God. We have God’s word for it: I will make my home among them and live with them; I will be their God and they shall be my people. (2 Corinthians 6:16)
Maran atha!

Angel

 

[Augustine3]

Some covenants of the old testament have been clarified or taken away in the NT. Such as circumcision and the eating of pork.

Just for the record, circumcision has not been done away with. It has been transformed into Baptism. Circumcision was the sign of entrance into God’s covenant as is Baptism. Of course there’s sanctifying grace with baptism and other benefits