The Simple Answers… To Life’s Most Important Questions.
Bible Study Course Lesson 9 – 24
As you learned in Lesson 9-19, Abraham’s first “circumcision” out of his father’s house was in Genesis 12:1-4, at 75 years old. And at 85 Abraham believed the Lord could make him a new person, and became part of His house in Genesis 15, through FAITH (Galatians 3:26, Acts 8:36-38).
His baptism in the cloud of Jesus’ spirit body (Genesis 15:12) was, as for all of us, the moment when his Elohim conception took place. After which, as for all of us, the Lord shielded Abraham from God’s judgment. Raising us as a father raises his children or a master trains his disciples.
We mirror this process today by being immersed in water to walk in newness of life (Romans 6:4). But if our baptism in water pictures the same thing as Abraham’s “horror of great darkness”, then why wasn’t Abraham immersed in actual water?
Easy; water pictures people already in Jesus’ house in whom we are immersed. And at that time… there were no such people! He was the first one! (Galatians 3:7-9). So he had to be immersed directly in Jesus, there being no ekklesia to immerse himself into!
To be sure, there were people who found salvation before this; Noah, Abel, Enoch, probably others; most likely, these people are the 24 elders seen in Revelation 4:4, 5:8-10, etc.; after all, Abel can’t be part of the 144,000, because those are from the twelve tribes of ABRAHAM’S descendants (Revelation 7:4).
And yet none of Abraham’s progenitors sufficiently impressed God to get Him to say “in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven…” (Genesis 22:16-18). None of them earned these special blessings which elevated Abraham above his ancestors through being under the Lord’s hands! (Genesis 14:18).
And so whether or not Shem was still alive and training disciples, Abraham wasn’t one of them; he learned from Melchizedek, either in person or as the Lord Jesus, directly. Thus there was no human water in which to wash Abraham; for there was no ekklesia worthy of teaching him.
Which is why he wasn’t baptized in water, not even in symbol; for he was baptized in the actual body of Christ; it is we who, for our own protection, are baptized in the waters of Moses and Elijah first, before we are immersed in that body of spirit.
THE SHIELD OF FAITH
As usual, God tells us in the very first verse what this covenant is about, in Genesis 15:1; to paraphrase, trust the Lord, and He will shield you; because this covenant was about Christ (Galatians 3:17), who would shield Abraham from His own Lord, the Father (Romans 8:34).
Throughout Genesis 15, only the Lord or the Lord God are mentioned – both titles of Jesus. And every Baptist knows that Jesus is Lord – and whose job is to intercede for us with the Father (Romans 8:26-27).
In Genesis 15, Abraham had been “begotten again”, becoming as a little child before the Lord, entering into bondage to Jesus’ body. Because when you believe the Lord, that’s what happens! (1 John 5:1). You become baptized into Jesus’ house!
By joining His house, Abraham died with Him and became a new creature (Galatians 2:20, 2 Corinthians 5:17), which is how God avoided judging him for his sins (2 Corinthians 5:18-19) – because Jesus had died, therefore Abraham, as part of Jesus, had died too.
It was this baptism into the body of Christ that transferred Abraham’s bondage from the world to Christ, from Egypt to the Lord; but make no mistake, he was entering into bondage! Romans 6:19. For it is only through bondage to Christ’s body that we can escape death (2 Corinthians 5:14).
But that only works if we are His servants, part of His household (2 Corinthians 5:15). For only as a servant of Jesus can you be treated as if you are Jesus by the law (Romans 14:7-9, Matthew 25:40). Thus, for those who are IN Christ – which is to say, legally part of His house – there is no condemnation, for He is our shield (Romans 8:1-3).
Which, again, was the very the first thing He said to Abraham in Genesis 15:1; so by accepting the Lord as his Lord, Master, shield, father, judge and so on (2 Corinthians 5:20), Abraham accepted a shield over him – a perfect body wrapped around him (2 Corinthians 5:21).
This is the covenant that all of us enter by baptism; we enter the body of the Lord, bondage to the house of the Lord. This is the only reason any of us submit to baptism; because through repentance, the realization of what we truly are, we are able to admit we need every shield over us we can get.
And in this house, we are shielded by all the branches above us in the house; every father-figure intercedes for us with every one above him, even if we don’t bear fruit as fast as we should (Luke 13:6-9).
Every head on every branch above us bears some of our sin so that we don’t have to, as they lead us to the light (Proverbs 4:18). Until we can, hopefully, bear the full scrutiny of the light without fainting (1 John 4:13-17).
THE COVENANT OF PERFECTION
Like all of us, Abraham had become as a little child in order to enter the kingdom of heaven. Which is why the covenant of Genesis 15 did not require works to be accepted; for what baby has done works before his parents love him? (Romans 4:3-5)
Like every parent, since the spiritual baby Abraham had faith in the Lord, the Lord in turn had faith in Abraham and treated his attitude as if it were the deed knowing He had plenty of time to raise him to DO the deeds of the law!
But fourteen years of raising had passed by the time of Genesis 17; and while not an adult, Abraham was certainly no longer a spiritual toddler. Thus, Abraham’s faith should have – and did – produce works (James 2:17-24). Therefore, the shield of grace need no longer cover him as fully and so it was time for Abraham to face the Father.
Which is why in Genesis 17, the Lord is only mentioned in the very first verse, and only because the Lord had brought GOD to talk to him (verse 3). The Lord does not appear again in this chapter… Because this covenant is no longer about Jesus!
The first covenant was made when Abraham was 85; the second when he was 99. Thus, after fourteen years in Jesus’ body – time enough for two apprenticeships, let me point out, or for a human to go through puberty – the Lord felt that Abraham was ready to meet His own Father! Ready to transcend a generation!
Because it is good for a man to bear the yoke in his youth (Lamentations 3:27); and even the heir of all – which Abraham now was – must pay his dues as a servant (Galatians 4:1-7). One week under a governor, and one week under a tutor. One week to break the heart, and one to break the spirit. And after fourteen years the job was done, in the Lord’s eyes!
Abraham was ready to meet his new Master! Ready to receive Jesus’ promise in John 16:25-27. For in Genesis 17:1, the Lord introduced Abraham to the Almighty God, then stepped out of the picture just like all the father-figures before Him had done… and that meant the shield was no longer separating Abraham and God! The veil was torn! (Hebrews 9:8).
In the first covenant, the Lord was going to be his shield and his great reward; thus, baptism into Jesus’ body, and His spirit (two things!). But in the second covenant, GOD said “walk before me, and be perfect”. Thus, baptism into the fire of God’ spirit.
Thenceforth the Lord would no longer be a cloud shielding him from judgment; Jesus would no longer need to relay Abraham’s prayers to the Father, for now the Father Himself would love him. But this meant he would have to be perfect on his own (Genesis 4:7).
This means the Genesis 15 covenant came before circumcision for a reason; not only for Abraham’s seed’s sakes, but because Abraham couldn’t properly keep the second covenant without mastering the first. Because you must be washed in the spirit of Jesus before being washed in the fire of the Father’s spirit!
COVENANT OF FAITH
I’ve told you before that God created the covenant of works in Genesis 17 as a way to guarantee that Abraham’s seed could have a path to inherit the promises – at least some of them – through the law of Moses. And like most of what I say, that’s kinda true, but it’s not the whole story.
Likewise in the past I’ve referred to the covenant of Genesis 15 as the covenant of faith; which indeed it is. But that doesn’t automatically make it better than the covenant of works. After all, the works and the faith work together to produce PERFECTION, according to James!
Therefore these two covenants are not enemies, but partners; not competitors, but co-workers. And Abraham went through them in precisely the correct order. For we must have the covenant of faith FIRST… and THEN work towards the covenant of perfection.
Yet Paul (somewhat misleadingly) paints the picture that circumcision binds you to obey every letter of the law of Moses (Galatians 5:3), leading us to think the covenant of circumcision is forever deprecated along with Moses’ covenant. And yet how could the Genesis 17 covenant bind Abraham to obey the law of Moses… when Moses wouldn’t even be born for 350 years??
So what letter of what law did circumcision bind Abraham to keep?? If circumcision makes you a debtor to keep the “whole law”, what law was that, since this token was not given for Moses?? (John 7:22).
In Genesis 17 there was no tabernacle; no Levite priesthood; no writings of the as-yet-unborn-Moses; no curse that was against the people! (Galatians 3:10). So what did circumcision bind Abraham to obey?
Paul uses the argument in that same context (Galatians 3:15-17) that a later covenant – Moses’ – could not cancel out the covenant of faith in Genesis 15. But by the same token, Moses couldn’t annul the covenant of circumcision in Genesis 17!
For what Moses didn’t bring into existence, couldn’t be abolished with Moses’ covenant! And Moses didn’t invent circumcision. In fact, after the covenant of Moses was made no one was circumcised for 40 years!! (Joshua 5:2-8).
That’s worth repeating: for the rest of Moses’ life, not a single man was circumcised. In fact, we have no record that Moses ever circumcised one single person! Not even his own sons! (Exodus 4:25-26). So how can we blame circumcision on Moses, when he in fact SUSPENDED all circumcisions for 40 years?
THE WHOLE LAW
Was Abraham’s circumcision covenant really such a bad thing? Was it really a stop-gap measure meant to be undone as soon as faith came? Or are we missing something really, really HUGE here? For if circumcision wasn’t the token of Moses’ covenant, what covenant was it a token of?
To what was Abraham bound by this symbol in the covenant of Genesis 17? We could guess and say “10 commandments!” or “1-2-10 law!” or some such. Or… we could just listen to the very first thing God said in Genesis 17:1!
The covenant of Abraham was seven words: “walk before me, and be ye perfect”.
This was the full text of Abraham’s covenant.
THIS is what Abraham was bound to do by his circumcision.
Only this. Every letter of this covenant… but only THOSE letters.
This is one of the most important things you’ll ever learn, so I’m taking this slow. Throughout the rest of the chapter, not a single thing was asked of Abraham except the circumcision itself. He added nothing to the covenant (Galatians 3:15).
Paul told us that circumcision made Abraham a debtor to do the “whole law”. And it did! But what was the whole law to him? There was no law of Moses, no ten commandments written on stone; the whole law God gave him was “walk before me, and be ye perfect”.
Abraham, by circumcision, was agreeing to do that; and God asked nothing but that. Abraham did not agree to keep the ten commandments. He did not agree to offer sacrifices. He did not agree to rituals, washings, or statutes; he agreed to everything God would ask. But only those things God asked.
No less… and no MORE. This is vital: God did not tell Abraham what to do, or what not to do; God demanded only one thing: “walk before me, and be perfect”. As long as Abraham did that, he could not sin! It was literally impossible to sin against the law when that was the ONLY LAW! (Romans 5:13).
Provided only that you were circumcised, there was no way to break this covenant… because the ONLY thing required by the covenant, was having the covenant itself! (Genesis 17:14). That, and “walking before God, and being perfect”.
But what did that even mean exactly? No one but God knew… and that’s the beauty of it!
A LIVING COVENANT
Abraham had to do whatever God wanted, period. Now sure, that might someday include rituals and sacrifices; but if it did, God could tell him that when the time came! And when God said to do them, Abraham would be bound by the covenant to do so.
But since these things were not part of THE COVENANT, when God no longer wanted external rituals He could tell him that, too, and Abraham could stop offering sacrifices… without affecting the original covenant (Galatians 3:17).
God couldn’t be so cavalier about the details of Moses’ covenant, for the sacrifices and ordinances were enshrined in the covenant itself (Hebrews 9:19-21). All these precepts were inseparable from it, and could not be abolished without the death of one of the parties in the covenant (Romans 7:1-6, Hebrews 9:13-18, 22-28).
Likewise in the Genesis 15 covenant between Abraham and the Lord, there had to be death for the covenant to be ratified (Genesis 15:8-10). Because this was the FIRST covenant of Abraham, and it was ratified by BLOOD! (Hebrews 9:17-21).
Therefore to change that covenant would require the same thing it took to ratify it – death and blood (Hebrews 9:15-16, 22-23). Which is why in Genesis 17 God was creating a different covenant! One which contained no curse, and no death!
And to keep that covenant as flexible and forgiving as possible, God was very careful to tell Abraham NOTHING except the most barebones covenant possible: “do what I want, and do it my way”. That way God could modify the details of the covenant at will without one of them dying!
God could always give Abraham something new to do, and would often do so. But once that task was done, it would be fulfilled! (Romans 8:4). And once it was fulfilled, all that would be left was the covenant which included nothing but those seven words, and they would never change.
And it is these words which DEFINE the NEW covenant – not the old! The New Covenant which was, therefore, made in Genesis 17 and NOT Genesis 15!
The Genesis 15 covenant does not picture BEING close to God; it is the first covenant, the one with blood and death, the one which pictures being close to the LORD, who, like His human type David, is a bloody man – a man of war! (Exodus 15:3, 1 Chronicles 28:2-4).
Which is why Abraham wouldn’t know GOD until Genesis 17:1, when the spirit of the Lord led him to meet the Almighty (Ephesians 2:18). Because being close to God requires a new covenant, a covenant that does not involve shedding the blood of others… THE New Covenant.
And when you think about it (facepalm time)… from Abraham’s perspective… wasn’t Genesis 15 Abraham’s old covenant… and Genesis 17 his NEW covenant?
Yeah. Think about that.
FRAMING MISCHIEF
I’ve called Genesis 17 the backup covenant in the past; and, as it was used by Moses, that’s exactly what it was. Paul called it the old covenant and, again, as it was used by Moses, that’s exactly what it was, because it WAS Paul’s first covenant, and it WAS inferior…
But only because Moses limited the Genesis 17 covenant, at the people’s insistence! That was what made it inferior! Because Moses ADDED words to these seven, which limited the bad and the good things they could do and receive within it!
Under this covenant, Abraham had been bound to walk before God, and to be perfect. There is no upper or lower limit on this perfection; the mischief Abraham might get into was not framed by a law (Psalms 94:20-23). Thus, without framing it, there was no sin in that mischief (Romans 4:15).
In other words, when God said to Abraham “be perfect”, He didn’t say what that meant; but He also didn’t say what that didn’t mean. The ways in which he might sin were not spelled out; the ways in which he should do good were not codified into law.
And without spelling out all good things and bad things, there could be no wrath, no curses! (James 4:17). So as long as Abraham simply walked before God, and did so perfectly, no laws were needed (Galatians 3:19, 1 Timothy 1:8-9).
But because his people were disobedient, Moses had to describe the perfection of the law (Romans 10:5). That description, the very act of writing it down, made it less than the Genesis 17 covenant; because the more words you and God say to one another, the more likely you are to write checks your fractions can’t cash (Ecclesiastes 5:1-6).
The more words, the more “thou shalts” and “or elses” that are written in the covenant, the more likely you will, eventually, fall short of the covenant (Galatians 3:10-12). Because the more idle words that are said… the more you will be held accountable for in the day of judgment (Matthew 12:36).
AN IDEAL HOUSE
To illustrate that, let’s say we enter a covenant where you build me a house, and you must build it exactly as I want. This is our entire covenant, sealed with a handshake. Now if I don’t tell you exactly what I want, and leave you to do what seems right to you… is it possible to break my covenant?
Obviously not, since I only gave you one rule: do it my way. If I then leave it up to your discretion, then clearly, whatever you choose to do IS my way! Under these terms, it is possible do something I didn’t have in mind… but it is not possible to sin against the covenant!
So if I come and see what you’ve done, and say “you know what, I’d really rather these cabinets were made of hickory”, then you’d just say “now that you mention it, hickory is nicer; I’ll rip these out and replace them tomorrow”.
You did not sin; I am not angry. Thus you’re walking before me, and being perfect even though you did something that I didn’t really want done.
However, if I describe the house I want you to build, you must do exactly as I say, for you are bound by our agreement to follow every word. To put every screw and every stroke of paint precisely where I want it.
Thus, the more I tell you what I want… the less likely I am to get precisely that. True, the more I describe it, the better you’ll know what I want, and the less decisions you’ll have to make for yourself; but simultaneously, the less likely you are to do it EXACTLY as I asked.
So in making our covenant, we have a choice between you building roughly the house I want, and doing it perfectly; or building my ideal house badly. And it’s far better (for both of us, really) that you build a good house perfectly, than build a perfect house badly.
Which is why when God told Abraham “walk before me and be perfect”, He didn’t spell it out, so that Abraham could do it perfectly – knowing that He would only ask him to do things he could do (1 Corinthians 10:13).
This way, if Abraham failed to guess what God wanted, God would only have Himself to blame.
OF GRACE, NOT WORKS
To continue the metaphor, in the contract above we did not discuss price. I simply said “build me a house”, and you said “sure!” Thus, it was a covenant of mutual trust; I trusted you to do a good job, and you trusted me to pay you fairly for that job.
However, if we had agreed beforehand to a standard of quality and a price, you would be bound to do that quality and I to pay that price; no less, and no more. This sort of contract exists because we can’t trust each other to pay unto others what we would like them to pay unto us – thus, it is a contract of mutual distrust.
In this case, you could not receive more money for pleasing me more, nor less for doing a barely-adequate job. Thus, you would have no incentive to do a better job than necessary to get paid; nor I to overpay you if I was more pleased than expected with the job.
But if you trusted me, and I simply said “go work, and whatever is right I will pay you”, then there is no lower OR upper limit on what you might earn (Matthew 20:1-15). The first laborers negotiated their wage; thus, their payment was of contract… thus, of works!
On the other hand, the laborers who worked 9, 6, 3, even only 1 hour worked by grace. “Whatever is right” was a highly negotiable and subjective contract which required mutual trust and good faith. And because their work was of faith, the head of the house would rather err on the side of generosity lest there be any hint of impropriety, or disagreement!
Just as you, yourself, would give someone who trusted you more, to reward their trust. Which is why these later workers, who worked by faith, received a much higher reward compared to their efforts than those who worked by contract!
Which naturally irritated those who worked by contract! (Verses 11-15). But it was perfectly just, because those who foolishly locked in their wage at a lower (but fair) rate did not need to be paid a cent more than they demanded! (Romans 4:1-5).
They would have been far better off with a less restrictive covenant, that neither spelled out their works nor their rewards; that placed no lower bounds on their obedience nor upper bounds on God’s reward for said obedience (Romans 11:6).
But since there is also no upper bound on your own obedience, you would not want to enter into such a contract with anyone you didn’t TRUST. And these men didn’t trust the master to be generous, so thought they would be better off with a guaranteed reward, even though that reward was lower!
Unlike them, Abraham BELIEVED God and that was counted as if it were righteousness! Which is why Abraham didn’t demand that God spell out the contract, as Israel later would; because if you trust God, then you know that God be more than generous with you (Romans 8:18).
Again, if you trust God, you know He will not ask things of you that you cannot do (1 Corinthians 10:13). You also know that He will not ask you to do something you find unpleasant or dangerous without good reason (Lamentations 3:33). Which means if He asks you to do something you don’t want to do, it is for your own good, and for the good of others you care about.
Finally, if God asks you to lay down your life or the life of your only son, then if you trust Him, you’ll be certain that this act is necessary to save others in the house; vital to serve a purpose that you yourself would approve of; even though you may not know that purpose up front! (Hebrews 11:17-19).
NOT MIXED WITH FAITH
Lacking faith, Israel feared such a blank-check relationship with God (Hebrews 4:2). So they demanded that He define this perfection to them, through Moses (Exodus 20:19). So that they could know, up front, all the fine print they were agreeing to in case maybe they wanted to not do some of it!
By spelling it out, it did give them a much better idea of what God wanted; but by spelling it out, Moses made the covenant far more restrictive. And God, knowing their hearts and spirits were not yet tamed, didn’t want to put them under such grievous burdens as those which came from Moses’ seat (Matthew 23:2-4).
Which is why the first thing God said to Israel at Sinai was Exodus 19:3-6 – which if you are paying close attention, is a direct paraphrase of Genesis 17:1! For Abraham’s children were being offered the same covenant as Abraham himself, precisely as God promised in Genesis 17:7-8!
Note that though the Lord is often speaking in Exodus 19, as in Genesis 17:1, the chapter is about meeting GOD (Exodus 19:3, 17). And like Abraham, their FULL COVENANT would have been to “obey my voice and keep my covenant”. To walk before Him, and be perfect!
And at first, in Exodus 19:8, they accepted this covenant. They agreed to “obey his voice indeed”, and that was all. No upper or lower bounds on that obedience, nor on how awesome “a peculiar treasure” they might be, nor just how far “above all people” they would be!
But then in Exodus 20 they received God’s first commandments. The first specific things He wanted them to do, as part of the simple Exodus 19:5 covenant. Exodus 20, therefore, was NOT the covenant! They had already agreed to the covenant, God was just giving them their first tasks to obey, their first test (Exodus 20:20).
Not trusting God, Israel became terrified and demanded Moses explain what God wanted; they wanted to make sure they heard Him clearly. Which meant more details added to the original covenant (Exodus 20:19). So rather than draw nigh to God, as Abraham had, Israel moved AWAY from the Father ( Exodus 20:21).
Moses tried to calm them down, tried to convince them to trust God, but Moses failed. Because Moses could not make us perfect; for it is only by the terms of the Genesis 15:1 covenant, by joining the body of Christ and NOT the body of Moses (1 Corinthians 10:2) – that we can draw nigh to God (Hebrews 7:19).
All God wanted from the Israelites was to build Him a good house perfectly, which is why He gave them the ten commandments, the blueprints for that house. But they refused to even try to build it, so God grudgingly had Moses spell out His perfect house for them (Hebrews 8:5). Which, sure enough, they built badly.
THE WHOLE LAW
The challenge with obeying the law of circumcision is expressed in James 2:10 – whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. And for Moses’ law, that was REALLY hard (for, at their insistence, he filled BOOKS with points of the law!).
But Abraham’s WHOLE LAW was, to paraphrase “do what I say, and do it my way”. So as long as Abraham does WHAT God tells him, HOW God tells him… how could he screw that up? He couldn’t, for there was no curse in this covenant!
God simply asked Abraham to walk before Him, and be perfect… as God would continually define it for him. In other words, to submit himself to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. For Adam, too, was given a single rule “don’t eat from that tree”.
Thus, the only sin it was possible for Adam to commit was the one Adam committed; which was the violation of precisely this covenant: “walk before me, and be ye perfect”. Instead, they chose to do their things, their way.
Up until then, like any child, the misunderstandings and mistakes Adam might have made could be easily forgiven – for as long as you do God’s things, God’s way, you cannot sin; because those are the full terms of the covenant. And God had not told them anything else not to do!
This way, if Adam did something God didn’t want, like using maple cabinets instead of hickory, He could simply say “let’s do that different” and they can change without having ever sinned against the law or broken the covenant!
They had ONE RULE! Obviously that one rule couldn’t cover all bad behavior; because it wasn’t supposed to! Because if He had fenced off other behavior, that would have just been more ways to earn death. There was only one rule in order to allow them to learn without dying from bad behavior.
If Adam had lied, that not having been spelled out by law, God could have said “I don’t like that, stop it” and punished him appropriately. But not being part of the covenant, that would not have required Adam’s death to pay for it.
It always bugged me; what magical thing must happen at the resurrection that will make it impossible for us to sin, as 1 John 3:9 implies? How is it possible that simply having God’s breath in you will make it impossible for you to do something wrong – not even slightly incorrect?
And the simple answer, the wonderful answer is, it doesn’t! Because sin is framed by LAW, and without law there is no sin. Thus, without knowing the commandments of God, we cannot break them (Romans 3:20-21, Romans 7:4-11).
And THIS is the relationship with God that Jesus is preparing us for! (Matthew 5:48). A covenant without laws, a covenant where it is literally impossible to sin since the only possible sin is to say “no God, I won’t”, and the only people who make it that far have proven they would never do that.
NOT UNDER THE LAW
Here, elated beyond imagination, a Protestant interrupts me, jumping up and down with glee to exclaim “Exactly! That’s what I’ve been saying all along, we shouldn’t even try to keep the law! That’s why Jesus nailed it to the cross for us!!”
But that’s not what I mean at all. For the law tells us how to build a house, as you learned in Lesson 9-10. Would I have hired you to build my house, if you didn’t know how to hold a hammer or use a level? Of course not.
I would never have hired you unless I knew you could build a house that wouldn’t fall over in a stiff breeze. Choosing a paint color I don’t like because I didn’t tell you what I wanted is one thing; the roof collapsing and killing someone is very different.
So the only reason I was able to trust you with such a permissive covenant, was that I knew you were competent in house-building in general. How did I know that? Because your teachers witnessed that you had mastered the subject of architecture, along with all the related fields you must understand before you can be an architect!
And once you have proved yourself competent in the eyes of your teachers, I can trust you with a very broad instruction like “build me a house”; and you cannot sin against me if you do exactly that… no matter what sort of house you actually build!
Protestants are desperate to be in the Genesis 17 covenant, where they only have to “give their heart to Jesus and love God”. But here’s the problem: they cannot keep that covenant, for they have no idea who God is!
They don’t know what He’s like, what He wants, nor would they understood if He spoke to them! (Romans 3:10-11). Can you enroll in college without a high school diploma? Obviously not; so before you can join the Genesis 17 covenant, you must be prepared for it – by a schoolmaster! (Galatians 3:21-26).
Because here’s the thing… the covenant God made with Abraham was “walk before me, and be ye perfect”. Could Abraham have kept that covenant if he couldn’t walk? If he couldn’t see the path? And if he couldn’t hear what God was telling him to do? Obviously not.
So God made sure he could do all these things first, and do them WELL, through successive stages of bondage… before offering him this covenant!
LIBERTY AND BONDAGE
It bears repeating that before you become an architect you first have to know how to build a house. So also learning to keep the 1-2-10 laws, and learning their spirit, and that of the statutes and judgments, must be done before you enter such a generous covenant.
Because before you can be trusted with true freedom, you must first be excellent at practicing carefully supervised freedom under the bondage of your parents! (Lamentations 3:27).
Bondage to Moses compels you to stop sinning; bondage to Peter or Elijah compels you to rule your fractions; bondage to Jesus’ spirit constantly pressures you to do the right thing. And until you master the demands of these houses, until their bondage is no longer felt, you can’t advance to the next one above them!
You must prove yourself to God through His prophets, apostles, and finally His Son! Which means by the time God offers you the Genesis 17 covenant, you will have spent sevens of years proving that you have MASTERED the law, mastered the statutes, mastered the judgments!
Only then will you be ready to be a son of God, safely freed from their bondage because you no longer need it to compel you to do the right thing. Because God won’t have to bind you to do something that will literally be part of your nature.
Do you need to be reminded to wash your hands after using the toilet? You did, once, but do you now? Do you need bound to hold a fork properly, not to say “ain’t”, not to run with scissors? No, because these things are part of your nature.
You needed bondage to learn these good habits; but what if someone is trapped in their seatbelt in a burning car? If you are forbidden by law from running with scissors, you would have to carefully walk to them and cut them out – at which point, they might already be dead.
But if you yourself agree that running with scissors is bad but understand that letting someone die is worse, you can run with scissors as often as necessary, because your parents trust you to make the judgment that it’s more important to save someone than to follow their statute about scissors.
And you have the FREEDOM to make that call because you are not BOUND BY A CURSE never to run with scissors, no matter the reason (Galatians 3:10). Unfortunately, Moses’s people could not be trusted with that freedom, because God knew they DIDN’T agree with the law (Romans 7:16-17).
So He dared not give them the liberty to decide for themselves when it applied and when it didn’t, lest they completely ignore the law and do whatever they wanted… just like the Protestants do to this day.
HEARING, SEEING, WALKING
Before you have such a permissive covenant with the Father, He will need to know that the law is indelibly inscribed on your heart, and that your spirit is capable of hearing and speaking only truth. And that your soul is capable of leading both fractions down the path of righteousness. Only then will He take it upon Himself to show you where that path is TODAY.
Which is why Moses washed your hands, to teach you not to commit sins (2 Samuel 22:21). Why the apostle had to wash your head with oil, and teach you to rule your fractions (Psalms 23:5, Psalms 141:5). And why Jesus washes your feet, to teach you to walk properly (John 13:5-14).
There was no reason to wash Peter’s head and hands; Moses and John had already done that. Nor did it matter that much if the hands were spotless at this moment, provided the feet would walk the hands to the destination that would, eventually, get them clean (Mark 7:1-23).
The point Jesus was clearly making was that, while dirty hands might not be ideal, having a soul capable of guiding the heart and spirit would solve these problems in time – since God knows that a soul that can make good choices will always cleanse itself in time (James 4:8).
You do God’s work with clean hands, and cleansing them is the job of Moses – to prevent you from doing bad things.
The double MINDED have their hearts and spirits purified by the ekklesia, who teach you not to be double minded thus, WASHING YOUR HEAD!
And you walk down the path and draw nigh to God with your feet, and washing them is the job of the spirit of Jesus – which He won’t bother with until the other jobs are at least mostly done.
Then, only then, does the Father take over; for the Father’s NEW covenant for you will be “walk before me, and be ye perfect”. How can you do that… until AFTER you have learned to walk?? And SEE the path to walk down? And HEAR Him tell you which path it is?
So until God knows, by these two or three witnesses (Moses being optional), that you can see, hear, and walk… why would He make a covenant with you that requires you to HEAR, SEE, and WALK PERFECTLY??
Ezekiel 16:9 Then washed I thee [feet] with water; yea, I throughly washed away thy blood from thee [hands], and I anointed thee [head] with oil.
Only then can He trust you with the words “walk before me, and be ye perfect”; knowing that you have proven yourself capable of hearing, seeing, speaking, and doing the truth while under bondage… and thus it is now in your NATURE, as it is in His, to always see, hear, and do the truth without being told to by covenant.
A NEW NAME
Paul was called in 34 AD or so (Acts 9); but Paul was chosen by God’s holy spirit, made an apostle, thus a father-figure, in 48 AD or so (Acts 13:1-2). Which, if you’re paying attention, you’ll have noticed is exactly 14 years!
After 14 years, God commanded them to SEPARATE Paul (and Barnabas) from the Apostles; thus, to circumcise them out of the houses of the apostles, making them FREE! Because this was Paul’s SECOND CIRCUMCISION, his entering into the Genesis 17 covenant with GOD!
Which is why this graduation is when Paul’s name was changed (Acts 13:9), because now he would be head over his OWN house (Romans 11:13), spiritually mature enough to raise children called by his own name!
Likewise, after spending 14 years proving himself as a faithful servant, Abraham received God’s holy spirit and became God’s son, and God’s friend (Proverbs 29:21). And when that happened, Abram became Abraham (Genesis 17:5); a new name, because he was now ready to have his own house.
The Genesis 15 covenant promises had all been about Abram, not his children. Which is to say, he was promised physical children for his own sake; but nothing was said of their quality, or promises made to them! He would have many children, but not necessarily converted children.
Remember, Abram was a type of God the Father; his very name means “exalted father”. But the father of not-necessarily-faithful sons! He was later renamed AbraHAm, which means “father of a multitude”; a change that happened when he became “the father of the faithful”… which happened in Genesis 17:4-8!
In Genesis 17, the promises were to Abraham “and to his seed afar off”. Because in order to have children who are converted, you must be converted yourself… and Abraham had only just begun that process in Genesis 15 so the promises were ONLY TO HIM!
But 14 years later he was ready to start having spiritual children, which is just the age when human children have finished puberty; so God gave him a new name that would reflect the character or purpose of that house; a name that would reflect the way he would raise his children.
Children who, thanks to his own training as a servant, he could now ensure would never NEED bondage to anyone else! That is to say, they would never need bondage to anyone else after their own childhood of benevolent bondage to his house.
THE FINAL CIRCUMCISION
When God says “be perfect”, no verbal description could ever capture the perfection He has in mind. So the less God says, the better. Which is why the verse that sums up this lesson (besides the obvious, Genesis 17:1), is Proverbs 10:19.
Is God not wise? Thus He refrained His lips, knowing that the more sin He described, the more sin there would be (Romans 3:20-22). And yet, beings made of mud couldn’t possibly be expected never to sin; any more than a baby can be expected to know how to walk without falling.
God’s solution to this problem was to have multiple layers of houses, successive types of less-and-less-and-ever-less restrictive types of bondage, to teach us safely how not to sin by nature so that we would not have to be forced not to sin by law.
But that inevitably meant that, in these various bondages, we WOULD be under laws. And these laws must be binding, and must have penalties – in some cases, death. And Jesus died so that, when we finally entered Jesus’ house, we would be dead to the penalties of the laws incurred in these other houses.
And yet we would still be sinners. God could pretend otherwise and let Jesus hide us, but the reality is we are still sinners (1 John 1:8-10). Someday, somehow, that would have to change for us to dwell with Him (Revelation 22:14-15).
So God let these houses bind us; change us; correct us; convert us. He made sure that we had the capacity to obey Him, the ability to meet the minimum standards of living in His house, by nature; made sure that we are the kind of people who, by nature, love the Golden Rule as much as He does.
The rest is details… details He can easily explain to us when the time comes (Revelation 2:24-25). Provided we have that basic feature in our nature, no other laws are necessary, for God knows we will do what He asks when the time comes (Genesis 22:12).
And once God is convinced of that, bondage to other houses… ALL other houses… are unnecessary. All the laws and curses and statutes that came with those houses become a hindrance, not a help. Which is why God freed Abraham from them in Genesis 17.
Genesis 15 had bound Abraham to obey every word of the Lord; and for 14 years, that’s exactly what he did. But the rules and statutes that the Lord made for Abraham were not necessarily eternal Truth, laws that are applicable in every situation in every possible future (Ezekiel 20:25).
The statutes Abraham was given by the Lord were exactly the laws Abraham needed to follow, to become the person God wanted him to be. And doing them was exactly what Abraham, at that time, should do, and we should all be so lucky as to have such laws (Deuteronomy 4:7-8).
And yet naming sins makes them deadly; it means that a mistake, even a bad judgment call, means eternal death. Children can’t learn without some examples about what sin is; but giving those examples inevitably binds them to obey them “or else”.
So it was not good for us that we be under that bondage for ever; which is why Christ promised to make us free by leading us to a NEW covenant with the Father. Which is what happened in Genesis 17, when God circumcised him.
Now remember, circumcision symbolizes being cut out of a house. So if Abraham had been cut out of Terah’s house in Genesis 12:1-4, out of whose house was he being cut in Genesis 17? From whom was God circumcising Abraham?
The house where Abraham had been bound for 14 years.
The house of the Lord.
Thus the Genesis 17 covenant symbolized circumcision OUT OF JESUS and into the FATHER!
Out of a body of death and into a body of life.
SAFE SPACES WITHIN SAFE SPACES
Israel at Sinai demanded God spell out statutes, judgments, and commandments for them; because they wanted to make sure they UNDERSTOOD God CLEARLY, so they wouldn’t make a mistake and be killed!
Not realizing that under the covenant God had made with them in Exodus 19:5 there was no death, no curse, no possible way to sin… EXCEPT by refusing to obey the command itself. But they sought to bury the talent which was actually the ONLY way to break the covenant! (Luke 19:21-22).
Those who don’t trust God want a detailed covenant; but for those who would trust God, the seven word contract “walk before me, and be ye perfect” is a far greater covenant; it is a perfect law of liberty; for it allows you to do absolutely anything God doesn’t tell you not to do (James 2:8-12).
And yet just because anything is permitted by the covenant doesn’t mean you should do whatever you want; because you can’t even get to that covenant without already learning what not to do! (1 Corinthians 6:9-12).
And that finally explains what Paul meant when he said “all things are lawful unto me” there and in 1 Corinthians 10:23; because with the clear exception of “provoking God to jealousy”, i.e., walking before someone else, obeying God was the only rule (James 4:13-17).
God didn’t tell him to eat, or not to eat, meats offered to idols; because God didn’t care. Paul had ONE rule! Because Paul was under this same covenant as Abraham was, having fulfilled his ministry in Acts 13:1-21
Thus, if the pillar of cloud was on the tabernacle, Paul was free to do whatever he wanted; but if the pillar was lifted up, it was time for him to move on (Numbers 9:18-23, Acts 16:6-10). God didn’t tell him how to build each house, who to talk to, who to avoid; at least, not most of the time.
Now when Paul resisted God’s hints, such as when he was bound in the spirit to go to Jerusalem in Acts 20:23, Paul was punished; but the holy spirit was careful not to say “go to Jerusalem and I’ll kill you” (Acts 21:11-14). Because that wasn’t the covenant!
God was raising Paul, as a Father raises a son, and sometimes all of us are a bit bullheaded and bound in the spirit and slow to take a hint, and the beauty of Genesis 17 is that’s ok! It’ll cost us… but not our lives.
A few swats, a night without supper, but nothing can remove us from God’s house EXCEPT refusing to do things His way (Romans 8:38-39). And it is this same relationship that every parent has with their children, and every master has with his disciples.
I will never leave you… unless you first leave me (Hebrews 13:5). And I don’t mean “leave me”, by missing the point or being a bullheaded idiot; I mean the same way as Adam and Israel left God, the same way Judas left Jesus, the same way Demas left Paul;
The only way anyone CAN sin against their parents, their elders, their masters, lords, Lord, or Master. By eating the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and emancipating yourself from my house by defying my will.
For a master does not call a disciple in order to one day kill them; but so that they, through him, might be saved (John 3:17). Paul wasn’t lurking around every corner waiting to pounce and punish his disciples in Corinth. He would punish them and yell at them, and often did. But he didn’t give them tasks that would have life-and-death implications for their relationship (2 Corinthians 1:17-20).
He didn’t say “if you don’t do this, we’re done”. His commands to them were “do this and live”; “that wasn’t right, do that better and live”; “not that way, do it this other way, and live”. His words were not “do this and live, but if you do that you’ll die”;
Thus, like Genesis 17, Paul’s words to them were “yea, yea”, not “nay, nay”. Which means while the Corinthians were in a Genesis 15 covenant with Jesus, they were, in a way, in a practice version of the Genesis 17 covenant with Paul.
This is how we learn that covenant, learn how it works and what it means; first with our genetic parents, then one or more sets of spiritual parents as we pass through the houses towards Christ, by whom we must enter into the final covenant with the Father.
For Christ is the grapevine of life who was hung on the bitter almond, who took away the bitterness of death from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and made it the tree of the knowledge of Good; and good alone.
So that we, like Him, can find life in our mutual Father’s house.
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION
When God says “be perfect”, He knows we can’t possibly foresee every detail of what “perfect obedience” means to Him. Israel wasn’t comfortable with that, but Abraham was content to let God worry about what “perfect” means.
Because all Abraham had to do was the one perfect thing at a time He tells you to do that day! (James 4:12-17). God didn’t tell Abraham “learn all perfection so you can obey Me” (which is what Israel thought they heard, and correctly realized they couldn’t do).
No, God simply said to him “obey me… and I’ll tell you what that means as we walk along the path!” Just like every father has told his son… ever. Because through the covenant of Genesis 17, Abraham became HIS son, and would be raised by GOD from then on exactly as every other father-figure had raised Abraham… only BETTER (Deuteronomy 6:7).
This newer, better covenant required only that you never rebel against God’s words; you could ask questions, you could try to change God’s mind (Exodus 32:11-13); you could even call God on perceived mistakes (Genesis 18:22-30, etc.).
But once God decides what to do, when He says “I’ve heard you, now shut up and do it my way”, you had better do so gracefully (Deuteronomy 3:23-26). And throughout all of this, you haven’t sinned! Because you haven’t rebelled against the covenant by rebelling!
Thus, as long as Abraham didn’t do that, and as long as God asked nothing from Abraham he would be unable to do… Abraham literally could not sin. For anyone who submits to that tree is in his Father’s house; and by being a son, by definition, has His seed in him!
Which meant Genesis 17 put Abraham back into a safe space; where he, once again, could not sin (1 John 3:9). Genesis 15 had been a safe space with the Lord where the Lord protected Him. But now, in Genesis 17, Abraham had regained sufficient innocence to enter a safe space with the FATHER.
Where, by simply doing what God said, and by God limiting what He says to things that are in your power to do… you cannot sin. For the houses will have already eliminated those who cannot hear, see, or walk properly (2 Samuel 5:8), and those who remain will never be shaken (Hebrews 12:27).
God will never ask us to do things we can’t do. So as long as we never say “you know what God, I don’t feel like it”, we will be unable to sin. Which doesn’t mean we won’t ever misunderstand God; won’t ever make an iffy judgment; but by the terms of the covenant, these things will not be sin to us.
God will have already assured Himself that whatever choices we make, will be made with the Golden Rule in mind; that our judgments will be guided by the simple question “what does God want?” (John 6:38). Something we will have spent this life proving we know! (Ephesians 5:17).
And no one who does his best to answer that question, even if their decision isn’t what God actually wanted, will ever earn God’s ire. Just like you wouldn’t be angry with your child who did their dead-level best to please you, even if what they did was a mistake, even if it cost you money and time.
This is how beings made of mud will one day dwell with God; how we can survive in His presence, even if we make mistakes in the resurrection! This is how we can break lamps in His house and get our good clothes dirty in the Kingdom without being killed by our Father…
Because our whole covenant will be “walk before me, and be ye perfect”.
Who could mess that up?