to be in in this passage, which is Jeremiah 31. Would you turn there? And as I said, we'll land there. We'll land, I won't ask you to go back to Hebrews. Jeremiah chapter 31. We'll look there in a couple of minutes. I'll let you be seated this time. Thank you for standing. Let's pray together. Let's take a brief moment and we can all pray silently. Would you pray even now on your own? Lord, you are great. Thank you for Pastor Ben leading us in prayer already and pointing us again to the helpful song. Thank you for our, even for our hymn book that we can sing these rich songs. May our boast be in you. Lord, may you get glory for yourself this morning. Help, help us to serve whether be in preaching or in nursery or in sound or being every member of ministry, help us to serve with the strength that you supply so that in all things you will be praised through Jesus Christ. Lord, we pray the first petition, the Lord's prayer that your name would be hallowed. Lord, find us faithful, we pray. Find us faithful. Help us with the text. It is your word. Help us through the Holy Spirit. We do pray for the Wooten family. As I know family members are gathered with Mrs. Wooten, comfort them through the true gospel, even as we pray also for Springs of Life Church and for the Sassers and other needs among us this morning. We pray in Jesus' name, amen. The point in what we are saying is this. This is another quick little snippet from Hebrews 8. You don't have to be there. The point in what we are saying is this. We have such a high priest, one who is seated at the right hand of the throne of the majesty in heaven, a minister in the holy places, in the true tent that the Lord set up, Not man. Hopefully you are in Jeremiah chapter 31. We'll look there in just a moment. Let me share something with you as I was going back to a book called Fault Lines by Vody Baucom. Let me just share just a brief snippet from that book with you. If this sounds jarring, then I have a reason from the text for bringing it up. Explain it more as we go. In the book Fault Lines, Vody Baucom says this, as we saw earlier, the term anti-racist is loaded. It has a very specific meaning, part of which includes the idea of works-based righteousness. Simply one thing that he's talking about is that there's many competing religions today, and they offer a false gospel. So for example, white people are not called to look to God for forgiveness. They are not told that Christ's blood is sufficient. No, they are told that they must do the unending work of anti-racism. And this work must be done regardless of their own actions, since the issue at hand is a matter of communal generational guilt based on ethnicity. The whole reason I bring this up is because Votie Bauckham references our text today, he references our text in showing the great, full, and final promise that God gives of complete forgiveness through Jesus Christ, through the blood of Jesus Christ. So he goes on to say this, he says, this flies in the face of the clear teaching of Scripture. The Bible makes it clear that God forgives sin. Consider the following passages. No longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, Know the Lord, for they shall all know Me from the least of them to the greatest. I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more." And there he quotes from Hebrews 8 and Jeremiah 31. Again, let me come back to that, or it may be like, what's that all about? The first thing that I want us to see this morning, and just start out with some basic observations as we look at Jeremiah chapter 31. The first thing that I want you to see, if you're taking notes on paper or in your head, is that we see the new covenant in Jeremiah 31, 31 through 34. In Jeremiah 31, 31, really 31 through 34, we see the new covenants. Now this is important. Friends, this is foundational to all true Christianity. This is a classic passage, Jeremiah 31, 31 through 34. It's one that, just honestly, you should know this passage. It's foundational to true Christianity. You see there, I'm not going to read the whole thing right this minute, Jeremiah 31, 31-34, but let me just point out, in the middle of verse 31, just notice the middle of verse 31, I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. This idea of the New Covenant, and this is simply what we're doing this morning. Our text is Jeremiah 31. Our theme or title is the New Covenant. The New Covenant, Jeremiah 31. In the Old Testament, this idea of the New Covenant is talked about really frequently. you find the idea of the new covenant in multiple places, beautifully, I'm not just gonna say explained, but extolled. Because the new covenant is explained in many places in the Old Testament, but it's not just, let me give you a dry definition, it's let's celebrate, let's praise, Let's rejoice in the glories of this thing called the New Covenant. Now, that being said, this is the only place in the Old Testament where we find explicitly new covenants. And I said again, this is a famous passage. It's one that you should know. It's foundational to true Christianity. Jeremiah, it's even helpful for you to remember, Jeremiah 31, 31. It's the only place where explicitly the New Covenant is mentioned as long as we don't make the mistake to think that it's the only place where it's talked about in the Old Testament. No. Isaiah, Ezekiel. And so that's the first thing. These are just very basic things, okay? Very basic things. Jeremiah 31, 31-34, the New Covenant. Number two. Number two, let me say this by first of all asking a question. Very basic, where are we? Where are we? Well, we went first of all from Hebrews, right? To see that this is what the author of Hebrews is talking about. Then we went to Jeremiah, which positions us. If we're in the book of Jeremiah, then we are in the Old Testament. And so what I want to say is just, I'm not saying this is somehow amazingly profound, but just think about this. Think about, this is the Old Testament, right? The first mention of the new covenant is in the old covenants. So here's a little phrase. The new is in the old foretold. The new is in the old foretold. The reason that this is so important, the reason that I said you should know this passage and that it's classic and foundational for true Christianity is because it is from this passage, specifically Jeremiah 31, 31, that we even get the name for the second half of your Bible. It's from this passage where the name New Testament comes. Now maybe you knew that, and again, I'm not trying to act like that's some huge deal, but the new is in the old foretold. We don't first learn about the New Covenant from the New Testament. In fact, the better name for the New Testament is just New Covenant, or the Scriptures of the New Covenant. Do you see? And so this is actually where the name, and that's Part of what I want to impress upon you is just the glory of the New Testament. You know that we teach that the whole thing is the Word of God. The whole thing is perfect and is for Christians today. But through Jesus Christ and the incarnation, when God becomes man, there's a uniqueness to what we call, and it's perfectly fine to call it the New Testament. But that is what it's speaking of here. It's speaking about the New Testament, the new exodus that Jesus brings, and then all of the scriptures that go with that. By the way, dear friends, that's why there's something very special for the Christian about Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Very special. As special as the Old Testament books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy, the first five were for those people. Those were the core documents. Matthew, Mark, Luke and John for us. Why? Because of Jesus Christ. Because of Jesus Christ, who he is. and what he has done. Well, those are, those are some preliminaries. I'm doing this a bit more than normal this morning. Bear with me. Those are some preliminaries. Let's get down to it now, which means the text. Here we go. I want you to see this in the text. The days are coming. Start with me in verse 38. Jeremiah 31, 38. Jeremiah 31, 38. This is the point. The days are coming. Notice what it says there. Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when the city shall be rebuilt for the Lord from the tower of Hananel to the corner gate, and the measuring line shall go out farther, straight to the hill Gereb, and shall then turn to Goa. The whole valley of the dead bodies and the ashes and all the fields as far as the Brook Kidron to the corner of the horse gate toward the east shall be sacred to the Lord. It shall not be plucked up or overthrown any more. By the way, Jeremiah chapters 30 through 33 is often called, just for what it's worth, is often called the book of consolation or the book of hope. And there's so much doom and gloom, and then he gives them this bright spot, this book of hope, this book of consolation. He's telling them in their context, listen to me, in their context, there is hope beyond exile. There's hope beyond you being kicked out of your land. You will be restored. There's a brighter day coming. So what's this first point after the two preliminary points I gave you? What is this first point? The days are coming. Just notice it there in verse 38 again. If you expand it, what does it say? Behold, The days are coming, declares the Lord. And then you go back to verse 27. Did you do that? You go back to verse 27. Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord. That's why this first point, the days are coming. Friends, we're talking about the new covenant this morning. My position is not that it is a renewed covenant, but that it is a new covenant. It's the New Testament. It's Jesus Christ. Do you know him? He says again here in verse 27, I know we're working backwards, but it's to work us to a point, you may have figured out, it's to work us to the center. Verse 27, Jeremiah 31, 27, the days are coming when I will sow the house of Israel and the house of Judah with the seed of man and the seed of beast. And it shall come to pass that as I have watched over them to pluck up and break down, to overthrow, destroy, and bring harm, so I will watch over them to build and to plant, declares the Lord. In those days they shall no longer say, now boys and girls, get this picture in your mind, the fathers have eaten sour grapes and the children's teeth are set on edge. But everyone shall die for his own iniquity. Each man who eats sour grapes, his teeth shall be set on edge." So verse 38, the days are coming. Verse 27, the days are coming. Glance again at verses 29 through 30. That's interesting, right? Verse 29, it was a very famous proverb back then. find it not just here but in other places. It was apparently a very famous proverb. The fathers have eaten sour grapes and the children's teeth are set on edge. I guess one way you could think about that is that dad or grandpa's over here and the family's over there and dad or grandpa takes a bite out of a sour grape and it's very clear by his expression that he's eaten a sour grape. because his face reflects, his face turns sour. I won't try to do it myself this morning. But the children, you could look at this this way, perhaps. The children see dad or grandpa eating this sour grape. They see the expression, it's very clear, and then they clench their teeth. Their teeth are on edge. Ooh, that looks bad. What was that all about, about the Vodibalkum and the fault lines? The point was this, listen, he references the New Covenant and the number one issue, the number one promise, and the number one beauty for us is the full and complete forgiveness of sins through Jesus Christ and through His blood shed on the cross. You see, there are other competing, if I could say, there are other competing ideologies, there's other competing worldviews going around today. And as I looked at this passage, it makes me think about one of those, which is this idea of generational guilt, right? Ancestor guilt. You're guilty for what your ancestors did. Are you with me? I look at this passage, Jeremiah 31, 29-30, and what it seems to clearly say is what? There's a day coming, verse 30, there's a day coming when you won't be held responsible for grandpa's sin, for your dad's sin. Also, just on the other end of it, you're not going to be going to heaven because your grandpa was Billy Graham or Jonathan Edwards. You could call it individual responsibility. Look at it again in verse 29. In those days they shall no longer say, the fathers have eaten sour grapes and the children's teeth are set on edge, but everyone shall die for his own iniquity. And so the true gospel of Jesus Christ says, today, listen to me, you can be forgiven of your sins. That's the first step. Do you know yourself to be a sinner? You can be forgiven of your sins because finally, finally and fully, blood has been shed, a covenant has been made. There's never ever been a God-made covenant without the shedding of blood. And without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins. This is a new covenant. It had to be ratified through the shedding of blood like the old covenant was. But the key difference, the key difference is that in this covenant, there is actually, there is actually the forgiveness of sins. And you say, listen, if you're thinking at all, you say, well, in the Old Testament, wasn't there the forgiveness of sins? And I say, well, yes. And in the Old Testament, wasn't there this idea of knowing the Lord? Yes. Not like in the New Covenant. The blood of bulls and goats will not help you. It is the blood of the Lamb of God, Jesus Christ, that alone makes atonement for sin. No, as we think about this common notion today, this common notion of ancestral sin, you're guilty, even if you didn't do it, you're guilty because of grandpa's sin or because of your dad's sin. Again, I just look at this passage and I say, well, in one sense, yeah, that's right. Friends, we are guilty because of our ancestors, namely Adam. We are guilty because of our ancestors, Adam and Eve. Adam, if you deny that, you have no hope. We all sin in Adam. We're not guilty the way that Bode Bauckham was speaking against. We're not guilty in that way. We do have ancestral guilt. We have plenty of guilt on our own to send all of us individually to hell under the wrath of God for all of eternity. If you look at this proverb in 29 and 30 in context, it seems that the people of Israel, are you looking at it, 31, 29 through 30? It seems that the original context is that they were moaning and complaining. God, it's not fair. It's not fair, God. You're holding us responsible. You're punishing us. You're sending us into exile away from our land because of something that our ancestors did. And it's as though the Lord is saying, you have plenty of sin on your own. You have plenty of sin to condemn you on your own. Everyone shall die for his own iniquity, but then in verses 31 and 34, at last, we come to the new covenants. In verses 31 through 34, we come to it. We come to the new covenant. Jeremiah 31, 31 through 34. Verse 38. Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord. Verse 27, Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord. Verse 31, Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand. to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the Lord. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord. I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, Know the Lord. For they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will remember their iniquity, I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more. What is all of this new covenant, old covenant? Well, in one sense, I've tried to, it's a big topic, tried to make it as simple as I can. In one sense, it's actually what we call the New Testament and the Old Testament. The New Testament, the most important events are Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. It's the true and better Exodus. It's when Jesus leads His people not out of Egypt through the Red Sea, but it's when Jesus leads His people finally and forever out of our bondage to sin and sets us free through His blood shed on the cross. And then the book of Acts through Revelation is very important, but it's like commentary on the first four books of the New Testament. And the old covenant is really the important acts, the events in Genesis through Deuteronomy, and then Joshua through Malachi, which is a bunch of books, very important. Also, commentary on what happened in the first five books, specifically the Exodus, right? What is this whole covenant thing? What is this? If we lived in more faithful times in America right now, we would maybe not have such a hard time with covenant. You know that I often like to, if I speak about the word covenant, I think the easiest way to think about this word covenant is that if we did live in more faithful times in America, we would all understand, yeah, marriage is a covenant. Marriage is not a contract. It's not a contract like you do with a business that you sign that can be broken. Marriage is a covenant. We, of course, say it's a lifelong covenant between one man and one woman for life to be broken by death. Marriage is a covenant. It's not a contract. Isn't that what it says here in verses 31 through 34? Look at verse 32. Not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hands to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the Lord. How is the new covenant different than the old covenant? This covenant will not be broken. The old covenant was meant all along to be temporary. It was meant to be a preparatory to lead us to Jesus Christ. By the way, can I just say this? You've heard the drumbeat that I've been trying to give over and over and over again. Verse 38, verse 27, verse 31. What is the drumbeat? The days are coming. The days are coming. The days are coming. Or you expand it. Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord. Can I just say, the days have come. The days have come because Jesus the Savior has come. This is the glory of the New Testament. This is why you should just eat the Bible. You should eat the Bible and read the Bible. Right now, I'm in Genesis 40, I think. I'm in the story of Joseph. And all of it's Christian scripture, but there's something unique about the New Testament because it centers on Jesus Christ. The whole Bible actually centers on Jesus Christ. But this new covenant is really new, friends. It's really new. And in it and the gospel alone do we find actual forgiveness of sins. You see, in the old covenant, God brought his people out of Egypt in what we call the Exodus. And what did he do? He gave them his law. And where did he write it? Don't answer out loud, but I hope you're answering in your heart. I hope you're answering in your heart of hearts this morning. Where did He write the law for them? When He brought them out of Egypt, He saved them. He saved them, although most of them did not know the Lord. The majority of Israel did not know the Lord. There was only a remnant. But He gave the whole people His law. And of course, He inscribed His law on the tablets of stone. But in the New Covenant, He inscribes His law not on tablets of stone, not external. Internal internal. He writes his law. What does it say in our hearts? There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did. Sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh so that the requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the spirit. That's one key difference between the Old Covenant and the New Covenant. The law written on tablets of stone now written on our hearts. Also in the Old Covenant, people went around the remnant. The remnant might have gone around saying, you need to know the Lord. You need to know the Lord. Well, I belong to the people of Israel. Doesn't matter. The majority did not know the Lord. Not the case in the New Covenant. Not the case in the New Covenant. They will all know me. Verse 34. They shall all know me from the least of them to the greatest declares the Lord. Or I will forgive their iniquity and I will remember their sin no more. How many sunrises do you think you've seen if you're 10 years old? You didn't see many when you were six months older or a year and six months old, but just bear with me. How many sunrises do you think you've seen if you're 10 years old? 3,650. How many sunrises have you seen if you're 20 years old? 7,300. 30. Where's my math people? How many sunrises if you're 30? 10,950. Anybody thinking, I wonder if the sun's gonna come up tomorrow? I just don't know based on my experience. By the age of 80, a person has experienced 29,200 sunrises. And as it has been said, listen, the promises of God are as sure as the sunrise. Look at the text. Verse 35, thus says the Lord, who gives the sun for light by day and the fixed order of the moon and the stars for light by night, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar. The Lord of hosts is his name. If this fixed order departs from before me, declares the Lord, then shall the offspring of Israel cease from being a nation before me forever. Thus says the Lord, if the heavens above can be measured and the foundations of the earth below can be explored, then I will cast off all the offspring of Israel for all that they have done, declares the Lord. What's the point? The point is, it ain't gonna happen, buddy. It ain't gonna happen, because He's God. And because, I don't know if you caught this, but in verses 31 through 34, He makes the new covenants. Behold, would you just notice this with me, 31, 31, behold, the days are coming when I will make a new covenants. Not like the covenant, verse 32, that I made with their fathers. What, God, did you make a faulty covenant? Nope. The problem was with them. Verse 33, for this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel. I will put my law within them. Can I say something to you this morning? If you're here this morning and you're not a Christian, we're glad that you're here. This is the truth about you if you're not in Christ this morning, is that you only have an experience with the law of God as though it is written on tablets of stone. It's all external for you. Here's what I mean. If you're here and you're not a Christian and you're visiting, or maybe you've been sitting here for four years, I don't know. Your only experience of the law of God is to look at the external on tablets of stone. For example, thou shalt not covet. And what it actually does in your life is it flames it up and it makes you want to sin all the more. But in the Christian who has been bought by the blood of Jesus Christ, who has repented of his or her sin and turned to Jesus Christ who is the only way of salvation, the Christian continues to sin. The new covenant is not fully inaugurated, if I could say it that way. It is here. It is here. But it's not fully yet. The Christian continues to sin. But the Christian in his heart of hearts, you know we say that in Christianity, If you'll pray this prayer with me in your heart of hearts and really mean it. We don't say that here. But the Christian in his heart of hearts has a new heart. And the law is written on his heart. And so he doesn't experience the law of God any longer as though on tablets written on stone, but by the Holy Spirit. And you need to be crystal clear on this. Please be crystal clear. You're not a Christian if all you ever do is succumb to sin. And the good news is, the good news is, is that by the grace of God, you could repent of your sin today, be given a new heart, have the law written on your heart, and you can experience the law of God not on tablets of stone, but it can be your deepest desire to do the will of God. The Christian's deepest desire is to actually do the will of God, even though we do it imperfectly and we continue to sin. No, this new covenant is really new. It's really new. It's not going to abort because of verses 35 through 37. The new covenant. The new covenant. The days are coming. The days are coming. The days are coming. The days have come. That's it, right? People get hung up here, and I totally think they're well-meaning. They get hung up and it says, well, this says with Israel and Judah. I mean, what it says with Israel and Judah. And I just wanna say, read the New Testament. The new covenant is fulfilled in Jesus Christ. It is fulfilled in Jesus. Israel and Judah, yes. Gentiles, yes. The new covenant. You can turn there if you like, you don't have to. Ezekiel chapter 36. It's the next book to the right. Ezekiel chapter 36. A couple of more passages about the new covenants. And that's it, that's it. Ezekiel chapter 36. It's the book right after Jeremiah. Ezekiel 3626 I will give you a new heart and a new spirit I will put within you. I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk. I will. That's the difference. That's the difference in the new covenant. I will cause you What about free will? God can't force my free will. I will cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules. Ezekiel 36, 26-20. I read this story about the surgeon who did the first ever heart transplant. And as I read this story, on a whim, this surgeon who did the first ever heart transplant, he looked at his patients randomly. He said, hey, you want to see your old heart? And the next day, as the story goes, they met that evening at 8 PM, and they went into a room. And the doctor who had performed the heart transplant went into the cabinet, took down a glass jar. He handed it to his patient, who had agreed to see his old heart. And they talked about it for 10 minutes, until finally the man who had received a new heart said, So that's my old heart that caused me so much trouble. And he handed it back. And he went on to live with his new heart. It's a great picture. It's a faint picture compared to the gospel of Jesus Christ. So that's my old heart that gave me so much trouble. Friend, you don't need fixing up. Our sin problem is a real problem. We don't need today to be thinking about the false gospels of ancestral guilt, although that's true in Adam. We have plenty of sin on our own, and there is a fountain filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel's veins, and sinners plunge beneath that flood, lose all their guilty stains. It is the blood of Jesus Christ. I'm keeping you long, but this might be one of the most important topics in all of the Bible. Oliver, if you've got it for me, if not, that's okay. Just look at this. 2 Corinthians 3. You can see it up there. Don't turn there. Verse four, 2 Corinthians 3.4. This is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God. Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything is coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God. Hey Christian, you feel sufficient today? Well, if you don't, good news! He's made us sufficient to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter, but of the spirit for the letter kills, but the spirit gives life. If the ministry of death carved in letters on stone came with such glory that the Israelites could not gaze at Moses's face because of its glory, this old covenant was glorious. God didn't say to them, I'm now creating with you an old covenant. That was the covenant. It was awesome. Will not the ministry of the Spirit have even more glory? The ministry of the Spirit. Feel free to close your Bibles. If you close your ears, the Lord knows. The new covenant, the new covenant. The days are coming, the days are coming, the days have come. The new covenant is Jesus Christ. Listen to this. Isaiah 42 6. I am the Lord. I have called you in righteousness. I will take you by the hand and keep you. I will give you as a covenant for the people, a light for the nations. the new covenants all over the Old Testament. The new is in the old foretold because according to Isaiah 42 6, Jesus Christ is the new covenant inaugurated in his blood shed on the cross. You know the Lord's supper, right? This is my body. This is the blood of the new covenant shed for you. There's no, there's no forgiveness of sins apart from the shedding of blood. Jesus died once and for all, let us look to him. Let's pray together. Lord, we thank you for what we call the New Testament. We thank you for the 27 books of the New Testament. We thank you for the 39 books of the Old Testament, and we thank you for one word, one word centered on Jesus Christ, 66 books that we call the Bible. And we thank you that even in the Old Covenant, we see this New Covenant prophesied, foretold. It's Jesus Christ. Help us as a church. Love the Lord Jesus Christ. Help us to hate sin. Help us not to try to do what we cannot do, but help us through your Holy Spirit. Oh Lord, if we have hearts of stone, then give us new hearts. And if we have new fleshy hearts, then fan into flame. Those true and beautiful desires for you. We pray, giving you great thanks for the new covenant in Jesus name. Amen.