Hebrews 8:10-13

Summary retelling of Hebrews 8:10-13

In continuing the quote from Jeremiah, we hear that the New Covenant from God will be that He puts His law into our minds and hearts.  It will not be an external influence, but an internal one.  Furthermore, God promises then that He will be their people and the people of the New Covenant will be His people.  God will be so present with us that we will not need to teach one another to know the Lord.  People will all know Him simply through His presence in our life.  God promises to be merciful to us and forgive our sins.  This second covenant makes the first covenant no longer valid.

Thoughts for Today

First Thought:

God will put His Law into our hearts.  God will be an internal influence upon us.  No longer will the Law be something external that we can ignore at will.  God will be inside of us, guiding us.  He will be our God from the inside out!  I don’t know about you, but I believe that this sounds just like the coming of the Holy Spirit – which Jesus Christ promised to us.  Through the Holy Spirit we can say that God has come to dwell within us!

Is the Holy Spirit easy to ignore?  How do you feel the Holy Spirit in your life?  How does it feel to know that God can literally dwell within you?

Second Thought:

God can be present within us.  God’s Holy Spirit can be our true mentor and teacher.  But this does not imply that we will be perfect.  This does not imply that just because we have God within us that we will no longer sin.  After all, does not Jeremiah (and therefore the author of Hebrews) tell us that God will forgive our sins?  Does it not tell us that God will be merciful towards our iniquities?  If we will be perfect when God comes and dwells within us, why would He need to be merciful towards our iniquities and forgiving of our sins?  No, the truth is that even under the New Covenant we will still be sinful.  But with God within us, we will be driven to humbleness before our God and driven towards repentance – a true internal repentance.

How does it make you feel to think about yourself as a sinner even though you can have God dwelling within you?  How does (or should) this knowledge drive you towards the cross and the forgiveness that comes through it?

Third Thought:

We must be careful how we read verse 13.  Some Bible translations use the word “obsolete.”  For the record, that can be a correct translation.  But when we hear words like obsolete, we have a tendency in today’s modern culture to think that we can throw it away.  This word doesn’t mean that we can discard the Law.  No, the author never makes that case.  What the author is saying is that we should discard (or see as obsolete) is the belief that that salvation comes through the Law.  That understanding is absolutely obsolete.  But the Law still has a function – the same function that over the past two days we’ve seen was actually God’s intent anyway.  The Law reveals our sin and exposes our need for Christ.

I asked this a few days ago, but it is worth repeating.  Why is it so easy for us to want to discard the Law and not worry about having to be obedient?  Why is it so easy for us to simply focus on grace all the time?  What is the danger in that approach to life?

Passage for Tomorrow: Hebrews 9:1-5