Christian life is about learning to trust God simply because of His unfailing love towards us as His children, and also for God’s faithfulness in keeping promises throughout history. The reason why trusting and believing in God is essential for us to persevere in faith is because we’re incapable of handling circumstances and uncertainties in life by our own strength and wisdom. This passage shows us how we’re called to keep believing in God’s promises especially when the situation might appear unfavorable.
How do you view your relationship with Christ? Do you relate yourself to Him as a sinner or as a saint? If you relate to Him as a sinner then you’re unlikely to experience the joy of forgiveness: justification, adoption (into God’s family), and the certainty of eternal life. However, relating to Christ now as a new creation (saint) also does not negate the fact that you’re a sinner. In this passage, we learn what kind of identity we are given in Christ and the implications of that in our daily lives.
Covenant Theology is an interpretation of the Bible from within a covenantal framework. It essentially seeks to set forth how God brings about the history of redemption in Christ through covenants (promises). As Derek Thomas puts it -“Covenant theology is, in one sense, an understanding that God relates to human beings by way of covenants—successive covenants—and that the Bible has two principal covenants: a covenant of works and a covenant of grace.” In this passage, we learn how the New Covenant (grace) is superior to the Old Covenant (works), and what it means for Christians today.
