LORD made several covenants in the Bible.
As LORD is ever faithful in his promise, He will not alter the words that proceeded out of His mouth. Therefore we should cherish all the more LORD's promises.
LORD to Abraham :As for you, you shall keep my covenant, you and your descendants after you throughout their generations. This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your descendants after you : Every male among you shall be circumcised. You shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you. [Gen 17:9-11] |
For marriage ceremony, usually the couple will go to church. That is a "sign" only. The real substance is that the two become one : they love each other, they care for one another, and they endure hardship together, ... (usually the wife will be "helper" to her husband).
In the old times, people would circumcise their foreskin as a "sign" that they will not follow fleshy passions. Our pursues in this life are : righteousness of LORD, His kingdom, Natural sciences, .... and NOT pleasure from sex, pleasure from good food.
LORD even made a rule that people who are not circumcised in heart should not be allowed into His sanctuary,
LORD's word to Ezekiel
"Son of man, mark well, see with your eyes, and hear with your ears all that I shall
tell you concerning all the ordinances of the temple of the LORD and all its laws; and
mark well those who may be admitted to the temple
and all those who are to be excluded from the sanctuary. And say to the
rebellious house, to the house of Israel, Thus says the LORD GOD: O house of
Israel, let there be an end to all your abominations, in admitting foreigners,
uncircumcised in heart and flesh, to be in my sanctuary, profaning it,
when you offer to me my food, the fat and the blood. You have broken my covenant,
with all your abominations. And you have not kept charge of my holy things;
but you have set foreigners to keep my charge in my sanctuary. |
Nowadays, there is no need to physically cut off the foreskin (see [Acts 15:28-29]), but circumcision in HEART is still required. (Note : to parents, if you want to circumcise you son, which is advisable as it could prevent him from playing with his elastic and long foreskin at youth and thus ruining his health, you should wait at least ONE week after birth, or else the blood will not curdle and the boy will bleed to death.
THERE HAS NEVER BEEN SUCH THING AS FEMALE CIRCUMCISION IN THE BIBLE !)
LORD to ancient Israelites (but equally true to us now) :If you walk in my statutes and observe my commandments and do them, then I will give you your rains in their season, and the land shall yield its increase, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit. .... But if you will not hearken to me, and will not do all these commandments, if you spurn my statutes, and if your soul abhors my ordinances, so that you will not do all my commandments, but break my covenant, I will do this to you : I will appoint over you sudden terror, consumption, and fever that waste the eyes and cause life to pine away .... [Lev 26] |
King David :
But the steadfast love of the LORD is from everlasting to everlasting upon those who fear him, and his righteousness to children's children, to those who keep his covenant and remember to do his commandments. [Ps 103:17-18]
LORD's promise to David :
The LORD swore to David a sure oath from which he will not turn back : "One of the sons of your body I will set on your throne. If your sons keep my covenant and my testimonies which I shall teach them, their sons also for ever shall sit upon your throne." [Ps 132:11-12]
LORD's words to His servants :
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To the eunuchs who keep my sabbaths, who choose the things that please me and hold fast my covenant, I will give in my house and within my walls a monument and a name better than sons and daughters; I will give them an everlasting name which shall not be cut off. And the foreigners who join themselves to the LORD, to minister to him, to love the name of the LORD, and to be his servants, every one who keeps the sabbath, and does not profane it, and holds fast my covenant - these I will bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer; ... [Is 56:4-7] |
LORD's words about Jesus :
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Behold my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul delights; I have put my spirit upon him, he will bring forth justice to the nations. He will not cry or lift up his voice, or make it heard in the street; a bruised reed he will not break, and a dimly burning wick he will not quench; he will faithfully bring forth justice. He will not fail or be discouraged till he has established justice in the earth; and the coastlands wait for his law ... I am the LORD, I have called you in righteousness, I have taken you by the hand and kept you; I have given you as a covenant to the people, a light to the nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness. ... [Is 42:1-7] |
LORD's promise to those who repent and believe in Jesus :
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And he will come to Zion as a Redeemer, to those in Jacob who turn from transgression, says the LORD. And as for me, this is my covenant with them, says the LORD : my spirit which is upon you, and my words which I have put in your mouth, shall not depart out of your mouth, or out of the mouth of your children, or out of the mouth of your children's children, says the LORD, from this time forth and for evermore. [Is 59:20-21] |
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Behold, the days are coming, says the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant which I made with their fathers when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant which they broke, though I was their husband, says the LORD. But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD : I will put my law within them, and I will write it upon their hearts; and I will be their GOD, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each man teach his neighbour and each his brother, saying, 'Know the LORD', for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the LORD; for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more. [Jer 31:31-34] |
Therefore for those who truly believe in Jesus and repent from their former transgressions, LORD will give them the HOLY SPIRIT ( = Spirit of TRUTH). This may be compared to a piece of "computer software that does righteousness". (Note : all our "hardware" and "software" are given to us by LORD. Just as there are "virus software" and "good and user friendly commercial software" in computer, there are "bad software that does evil" as well as "good software that does good" in human!)
Having "good software" doesn't mean we may break LORD's Laws and Commandments at will! If you break LORD's Laws deliberately/high-handedly, Jesus' blood will have no effect on you. But most Christians would not break LORD's Laws willingly, mostly because of weaknesses or ignorance, they break LORD's Laws. Then LORD will do as he said to David in [2 Samuel 7:14] "I will be his father, and he shall be my son. When he commits iniquity, I will chasten him with the rod of men, with the stripes of the sons of men; but I will not take my steadfast love from him, .... "
My experience is that LORD's words is true : LORD will not take away His steadfast love from us, BUT his rod and his stripes are terribly painful! Therefore let us be careful to keep his Laws and Commandments and His Covenant.
In [Num 25], it was recorded that the Israelites befriended with Moabite girls, and ate food sacrificed to Moabite's gods, and had sex with them.
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And behold, one of the people of Israel came and brought a Midianite woman to his family, in the sight of Moses and in the sight of the whole congregation of the people of Israel, while they were weeping at the door of the tent of meeting. When Phinehas the son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest, saw it, he rose and left the congregation, and took a spear in his hand and went after the man of Israel into the inner room, and pierced both of them, the man of Israel and the woman, through her body. Thus the plague was stayed from the people of Israel. Nevertheless those that died by the plague were twenty-four thousand. And the LORD said to Moses, "Phinehas the son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest, has turned back my wrath from the people of Israel, in that he was jealous with my jealousy among them, so that I did not consume the people of Israel in my jealousy. Therefore say, 'Behold, I give to him my covenant of peace; and it shall be to him, and to his descendants after him, the covenant of a perpetual priesthood, because he was jealous for his GOD, and made atonement for the people of Israel.'" [Num 25:6-13] |
LORD's name is : merciful, gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, forgiving, and jealous against iniquity/evil. One of the qualities that a priest should have is : jealous against iniquity/evil. People who are apathy to evil should never be allowed to be priests, because he would tolerate evil, and thus the moral standard of the whole congregation will get lower and lower.
One Bible example is Eli.
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Now Eli was very old, and he heard all that his sons were doing to all Israel, and how they lay with the women who served at the entrance to the tent of meeting. And he said to them, "Why do you do such things? For I hear of your evil dealings from all the people. No, my sons; it is no good report that I hear the people of the LORD spreading abroad. If a man sins against a man, GOD will mediate for him; but if a man sins against he LORD, who can intercede for him?" |
Eli should know LORD's Laws : adultery is punishable by death, and how much more adultery by priests! Yet Eli took no action other than admonished them.
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LORD : ... Behold, the days are coming, when I will cut off your strength and the strength of your father's house, so that there will not be an old man in your house. Then in distress you will look with envious eye on all the prosperity which shall be bestowed upon Israel; and there shall not be an old man in your house for ever. The man of you whom I shall not cut off from my altar shall be spared to weep out his eyes and grieve his heart; and all the increase of your house shall die by the sword of men. And this which shall befall your two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, shall be the sign to you : both of them shall die on the same day. And I will raise up for myself a faithful priest, who shall do according to what is in my heart and in my mind; and I will build him a sure house, and he shall go in and out before my anointed for ever. ... [1 Sam 2:27-36] |