Advent 2025: Christ in the Covenants

Scripture Texts: Luke 1:67-79; I Corinthians 1:20

I went to the eye doctor last week to get a new prescription for my glasses.  It has been ten years and since I have nearsightedness, distant objects are getting a bit blurry.

God doesn’t suffer from nearsightedness.  In fact, God is supernaturally farsighted.  He is like the father in the parable of the prodigal son who saw his son coming while he was still a long way off (Luke 15:20).

God could see the coming of His Son while He was still far off.  God saw the incarnation of Jesus, while it was still 4000 years off, from the Garden of Eden to all the way to Bethlehem.  Not only that but He could also see and read all the fine print in between, all the littlest details written into history.

This advent we have looked at some of those details in history, called covenants, and looking through them we could see what God was seeing from Eden to Bethlehem.  This morning we arrive at the fulfillment of all God’s promises in His covenants.

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Scripture Texts: II Samuel 7:8-16

We have been looking at the covenants in the OT.  One way of thinking about them is they are God’s job description.  They tell us who He is, what He is like, what He is doing, and why He is doing it.  They tell us what His priorities are and what He is taking responsibility for.  They tell us why He gets up in the morning, except of course that He has been up all night doing His job, the very thing He said He would do.

They can be summed up in the simplest words, “I will be your God, and you will be my people, and I will do good for all who love me and call on me and wait for me.  I will cause all things to work for your good, your blessing, your benefit.”

Around 4000 years before Christ, in the garden of Eden God made a covenant with Adam, God promised to redeem His broken, fallen, sinful people, saying the seed of the woman would crush the head of the serpent.

2000 years later God made a covenant with Abraham, God promised to give him a great name, give him a place and make him a blessing to all the families of the earth, making all who believe children of Abraham.

500 years later God made a covenant with Moses, God promised to make His people a kingdom of priests, a holy nation with their own place.  He gave them the sacrifices to make them righteous, and He gave them the Law to show how a righteous and holy people should live in grateful response to God.

This morning we come to the final OT covenant, God’s covenant with David, 500 years later.

Scripture Texts: Exodus 19:3-9; Exodus 34:27-28

Advent is the time of year when we revisit and retell the greatest story every told, how God invaded human history and came down as a baby to save us from our sin.  Advent is about how God’s ways are not our ways and God ways are higher than our ways, and way better.

This advent season we are exploring how advent was not the beginning of God’s plan, exploring how the incarnation was not the beginning of the Gospel of our redemption.  What we tend to think of as the Gospel, the four Gospels or the NT, is not the beginning of the Gospel.

As the Heidelberg Catechism says: “God himself began to reveal the gospel already in Paradise; later, he proclaimed it by the holy patriarchs and prophets, and portrayed it by the sacrifices and other ceremonies of the law; finally, he fulfilled it through his own dear Son.”

Ever since the fall God has had one thought on His mind, and everything He has done since then has been with that thought, that one goal in mind.  Everything is preparation for Christ’s advent.

This path of salvation history from the beginning has been guided by covenants God makes with mankind.  God announces His plans and purposes ahead of time and accomplishes all that He sets out to do.

Scripture Texts: Genesis 12:1-3; 22:17-18

Think for a moment about events that changed the course of human history, inventions, discoveries, assassinations, wars, natural disasters, and plagues.

Today is Peral Harbor day, 84 years ago on a Sunday morning our world was changed.

The printing press (1454)

Protestant Reformation (1517)

American Revolution (1765-1783): The Declaration of Independence.

Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand (1914) triggered the start of World War I.

Stock market crash of 1929: the beginning of the Great Depression.

Nuclear bomb on Hiroshima (1945)

Moon landing (1969)

Fall of the Berlin Wall (1989): The end of the Cold War and the reunification of Europe.

Birth of the Internet and the digital revolution (1990s)

9/11 Attacks (2001): a major shift in global security and foreign policy.

COVID-19 Pandemic (2020): A global health crisis that disrupted daily life, economies, and international relations.

In the book of Genesis several of the absolutely most world changing events happen in just the first twelve chapters.  In Genesis 3 after the tragedy of the garden the world is cursed; in Genesis 6-9 the total wickedness of men’s hearts led to it being destroyed by a flood.  In Genesis 11 after the great pride of trying to assert themselves at Babel judgment falls again and the world is scattered to the winds.

Three times God’s divine displeasure resulted in His great wrath and judgment on the world.  That’s three strikes, mankind should be out.  Then Genesis 12 begins with the Word of the Lord came to Abram.

This is an unexplainable verse in the Bible.  So let me explain why it is unexplainable.

Why in the world does God insist on blessing a world that mocks, defies, and rejects Him?

Scripture Texts: Genesis 3:15; Isaiah 46:9-10

The Covenant Highway: The Road from Eden to Bethlehem.

If you set out to build a road one of the most important details you must consider is the destination, where you are building to.  The destination is going to determine where you buy land for right-a-ways, where you cut trees, what equipment you will need to deal with mountains, valleys, rivers and other obstacles.

Everything you do at the beginning of your project will be determined by the goal, the destination.  The end determines the beginning.

God is the God of all history and God has a goal in all of history.  History is going somewhere and it has always been going somewhere from day one.  6,000 years ago God had an end in mind to build a road from Eden to Bethlehem.

God is the state highway commissioner, the chief engineer and the head foreman.  He is the planner, the overseer and the builder.  When history started God already had the end in mind.

Isaiah 46:9-10 I am God and there is no other; I am God and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done, saying, “My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose.”

Christ in the Covenants.

Our advent series will be a journey on the grand redemptive road from Eden to Bethlehem.  We will look at four major mile markers or vista points as we look at Christ in God’s covenants with Adam, Abraham, Moses, and David and how they prepared the way for Christ and how Christ fulfills all the covenant promises of God.  Everything in the OT is building toward the NT.

As we look at the continuity of God’s covenant faithfulness from creation to Christ, I hope you will marvel at God’s wisdom and strategic planning and engineering expertise.  I hope you will be strengthened in your faith, hope and love toward God and encouraged in your own journey on your path of redemption, that you will see all of your history is beautifully designed by a sovereign and good God.

One word about covenants.  A covenant is more than a contract or an agreement.  It is a binding, permanent relationship between two parties.  Covenants are characterized by solemn commitments, promises, and obligations.

God is a covenant-making and covenant-keeping God.  He intentionally enters into formal, oath-bound, binding relationships with His people.  Again and again we will hear Him say, “I will be your God and you will be my people.”