Making A Covenant To Keep The Covenant

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Introduction

Perhaps you’ve heard of the philosophy of the Navy SEALs, an elite branch of the United States Navy.

United States Navy SEAL Philosophy

In times of war or uncertainty there is a special breed of warrior ready to answer our Nation’s call; a common man with uncommon desire to succeed. Forged by adversity, he stands alongside America’s finest special operations forces to serve his country and the American people, and to protect their way of life. I am that man.

My Trident is a symbol of honor and heritage. Bestowed upon me by the heroes who have gone before, it embodies the trust of those whom I have sworn to protect. By wearing the Trident, I accept the responsibility of my chosen profession and way of life. It is a privilege that I must earn every day.

My loyalty to Country and Team is beyond reproach. I humbly serve as a guardian to my fellow Americans, always ready to defend those who are unable to defend themselves. I do not advertise the nature of my work, nor seek recognition for my actions. I voluntarily accept the inherent hazards of my 186profession, placing the welfare and security of others before my own.

I serve with honor on and off the battlefield. The ability to control my emotions and my actions, regardless of circumstance, sets me apart from other men. Uncompromising integrity is my standard. My character and honor are steadfast. My word is my bond.

We expect to lead and be led. In the absence of orders I will take charge, lead my teammates, and accomplish the mission. I lead by example in all situations.

I will never quit. I persevere and thrive on adversity. My Nation expects me to be physically harder and mentally stronger than my enemies. If knocked down, I will get back up, every time. I will draw on every remaining ounce of strength to protect my teammates and to accomplish the mission. I am never out of the fight.

We demand discipline. We expect innovation. The lives of my teammates and the success of the mission depend on me—my technical skill, tactical proficiency, and attention to detail. My training is never complete.

We train for war and fight to win. I stand ready to bring the full spectrum of combat power to bear in order to achieve my mission and the goals established by my country. The execution of my duties will be swift and violent when required, yet guided by the very principles I serve to defend.

Brave men have fought and died building the proud tradition and feared reputation that I am bound to uphold. In the worst of conditions, the legacy of my teammates steadies my resolve and silently guides my every deed. I will not fail. (“Navy SEAL Philosophy”)

That’s what the Navy SEALs say of themselves.

As Christians, as those redeemed by the blood of Christ, our ultimate commitment is not to an earthly government but to the Lord who redeemed us. And just as Navy SEALs commit themselves ultimately to the Constitution and people of the United States, so in Nehemiah 10 the returned exiles commit themselves to the law of Moses and the people of God.

187What they’re going to do in Nehemiah 10 is make a covenant to keep a covenant.13

Need

As God’s people, redeemed by the blood of Christ, we need something for which to live. We don’t live unto ourselves, for ourselves. We need a cause to which we can give everything. We need something that will summon forth from us all that we are and have.

The Lord has given to us the opportunity to serve Him and to love one another.

Israel broke their covenant with God when they were in the land, and God visited the curses of the covenant upon them, exiling them from the land. Now Israel has returned from exile, and the Lord has neither set out the terms of nor done anything to bring about the initiation of the new covenant that Jeremiah predicted (Jer 31:31-34), so in Nehemiah 10 the returnees made a covenant to keep the terms of the old covenant.

Context

What we have seen goes something like this: The story of the first wave of returnees is told in Ezra 1-6. In 539 bc the Persians overcame Babylon, and the Persian King Cyrus issued a decree that those who wished to return could do so. In Ezra 7-10 we read of an internal crisis. The returnees had begun to intermarry with the peoples of the land. We saw that intermarriage was not a racial problem but a holiness problem: they were intermarrying with idolaters. So Ezra addressed the situation, and all who had married unrepentant, idolatrous foreign wives put them away to seek the purity of the returned community.

• Ezra 1-6—Rebuilt Temple
• Ezra 7-10—Rebuilt People

Nearly a hundred years later, around 445 bc, in the first six chapters of Nehemiah we read of how Nehemiah returned to the land to rebuild the wall. As with Ezra, the first six chapters are a building project. In 188Ezra 1-6 they rebuilt the temple; in Nehemiah 1-6 they rebuilt the wall. As with Ezra, where the last chapters are dealing with the renewal and purification of the people, so with Nehemiah: first the wall is rebuilt, then the people are.

• Nehemiah 1-6—Rebuilt Wall
• Nehemiah 7-13—Rebuilt People

We can take a closer look and see that they renewed the covenant in chapters 7-12, and then they re-broke the covenant in chapter 13.

• Nehemiah 7-12—Renewing the Covenant
• Nehemiah 13—Re-breaking the Covenant

Let’s review the contents of Nehemiah 7-9 in more detail. Nehemiah 7 was a list of names. The returnees needed to determine who belonged to the people of God. Then in Nehemiah 8 they read the Torah, and in chapter 9 they confessed their sin and praised God for the mercy He had shown to Israel. With that done, having identified the people, heard the law, and responded with confession, the people make a firm commitment to walk in the covenant in Nehemiah 10.

• Nehemiah 7—Reviewing the Returnees
• Nehemiah 8—Reviewing the Torah in the Seventh Month
• Nehemiah 9—Praising God for Mercy and Confessing Israel’s Sin
• Nehemiah 10—Swearing to Keep Covenant Not to Intermarry, to Keep Sabbath and Sabbatical, and to Support Temple Worship
• Nehemiah 11—Repopulating Jerusalem
• Nehemiah 12—Dedicating the Wall
• Nehemiah 13—Breaking the Covenant: Intermarriage, Failure to Support Temple Worship, and Profanation of Sabbath

Preview

What the returnees do in Nehemiah 10 serves as a good example for us today. Who participates in the new covenant? Those who trust in Christ, those who have been redeemed by the blood of the death of the new Passover lamb (1 Cor 5:7). Believers are in the new covenant, and when we sign something like a church covenant, what we are doing is making a covenant with one another to keep the covenant that God has made with us.

189We will see that Nehemiah 10 falls into two parts. The first 27 verses is a list of names. We will make just a few observations about that list of names. These are the people who signed onto the covenant. Then in the second part of the chapter, verses 28-39, these people entered into a curse and an oath to keep the covenant and to do what they had been commanded. They boil down their obligations to three commitments: (1) They will no more intermarry with pagans. (2) They will keep the Sabbath and the sabbatical year. (3) They will support the ministry of the temple.

Those Who Signed Their Names

Nehemiah 10:1-27

The first name you see in verse 1 is Nehemiah’s. Prominently placed, right there at the beginning, Nehemiah signs his name to this covenant that the people are enjoining upon themselves. Then, at the end of verse 8, you see the words, “These were the priests.” In verse 9 we have “The Levites.” Then in verse 10 we have “and their brothers.” So the order is Nehemiah, then priests and Levites, followed by their brothers.

Beginning in verse 14 we get the list of “the leaders of the people.” When we get down to verse 28, it’s “The rest of the people—the priests, Levites, gatekeepers, singers, and temple servants.” We’re not told the names of “the rest of the people,” but that phrase encompasses the unnamed.

It is interesting that in these first 27 verses they took down names. They made a list. The list is obviously not exhaustive, because as we saw in verse 28, they simply summarize “the rest of the people.” That means the list is representative. What this tells us, though, is that they knew who was in and who was out. They had a firm idea about who was part of the people of God and who was not part of the people of God.

This is significant for us because some people argue against the concept of church membership. They point out that church membership is never explicitly addressed in the New Testament. We are looking at a passage from the Old Testament, and I would suggest that it pertains to church membership. I know that Nehemiah is talking about an ethnicity making up a nation, not the non-national, non-ethnic, trans-locational church. Nevertheless, we see an important principle here. The returnees do know and are able to identify who belongs and who doesn’t.

190So as we practice church membership, I would suggest that we are following a precedent that the people of God have set for us. We are in a very different situation from the one in which this old covenant remnant in Nehemiah 10 found itself, yet we can learn from their example. Jesus gave instructions on church discipline in Matthew 18:15-18, and those instructions presuppose the ability to know who belongs to the church and who doesn’t.

The Curse And Oath To Keep And Do

Nehemiah 10:28-39

Let me first draw your attention to the mercy that is in verse 28. Do you see the mercy? The first part of the verse lists out “the rest of the people,” and those are all Israelites. The rest of the verse is mercy. The verse continues, “and all who have separated themselves from the peoples of the lands to the Torah of God” (my trans.). These are non-Israelites. This tells us that the returnees are not racists. The returnees are not simply preserving an ethnic distinction. They are saying to anyone who wants to separate themselves from the abominations of the land and devote themselves to the Torah of Yahweh, “You’ve got a place with us. We welcome you in.” And it’s wonderful to see the way the Lord saves not just from the chosen people but from the peoples of the lands. We saw something similar to this back in Ezra 6:21.

Did you notice what those words of verse 28 said? “All who have separated themselves from the peoples of the lands to the Torah of God.” They have separated themselves from something to something. They have separated from certain things: the abominations of the idolaters. And they have separated to the Torah of God. This word “Torah” refers to all that Moses taught in the first five books of the Old Testament.

As we look at this passage, we will see a great focus on the Torahof Moses:

• 10:28—“separated themselves ... to obey the law of God”
• 10:29—“to follow the law of God given through ... Moses”
• 10:29—“to carefully obey all the commands, ordinances, and statutes of Yahweh our Lord”
• 10:34—“as it is written in the law”
• 10:36—“prescribed by the law”

191Some might be inclined to ask whether this might be a little bit legalistic. The answer is that this is not legalistic at all. These people have been mercifully redeemed and brought back from exile. It must be kept in mind that they were already redeemed before the commitment to obey was made at the exodus and before they made a covenant to keep the covenant here at the return to the land. Another thing to keep in mind is that Nehemiah is doing what God has put in his heart to do for God’s people (Neh 2:12; 7:5). I take it that Nehemiah is the author of this book. The book was received in the canon because its author, Nehemiah, was recognized as having been inspired by the Holy Spirit. (If someone else has presented the final form of Nehemiah’s first person memoirs, that person too would have to be recognized as having been inspired by the Spirit for this book to be in the Bible.) That means this Spirit-inspired author is showing God’s people committing themselves to God’s law. God does not teach His people legalism. This commitment is not a legalistic covenant. They are entering into this covenant having been mercifully redeemed and as a sign of their commitment to respond to the mercy that has been shown to them.

It would appear that this covenant is being presented as something the people are voluntarily taking upon themselves. We see that those who joined it in 10:28 were “everyone who is able to understand.” This could possibly imply that those who could not consciously agree, children perhaps, were not regarded as being in this covenant.

The Curse and Oath to Keep and Do (10:28-29)

Nehemiah 10:29 describes for us the terms and consequences of the covenant. We see that the people described in verse 28

The people entering the covenant are detailed in verses 1-28, and then in verse 29 they take a curse upon themselves if, the implication is, they fail to keep the terms of this covenant. In addition to entering into the curse, they make an oath, a promise to obey. Then they state what it is that they intend to obey. Verses 30-39 will lay out some 192particular points of obedience to which the returnees are committing themselves; these are areas of struggle that the covenanters are joining together to address. In general, however, 10:29 states that the terms of this covenant are the same terms Israel received at Sinai. They make an oath “to walk in the Torah of God which was given by the hand of Moses” (my trans.). This commits them to obeying everything set forth in the Pentateuch. Then to make it clear, they use language that is reminiscent of Deuteronomy when they promise “to keep and to do all the commandments of Yahweh our Lord, with His judgments and statutes”(my trans.).

The returnees faced a situation strained by several factors. First, there were strong statements in the Prophets leading up to the exile that the covenant had been broken (e.g., Hos 1-2). The destruction of the temple and the exile from the land was like Israel being killed, with nothing left but a valley of dry bones (Ezek 37; cf. Hos 5:14). Their being brought back to the land was like resurrection from the dead (Ezek 37:10-14; Hos 6:1-3), but what was the status of the covenant? Was the broken covenant renewed? And what about these foreigners who had separated themselves from the peoples of the lands?

This strained situation seems to have led Ezra and Nehemiah, along with the people, to the conclusion that they needed to assert, “we are cutting [a covenant] of faith in writing” (Neh 9:38, my trans.). The terms of the covenant in verse 29 remain the terms of the old covenant made with Moses at Sinai, so this is a kind of covenant renewal. The returnees are covenanting together to keep the Sinai covenant. There seems to have been a precedent for this, as we read of earlier generations who entered into the Sinai covenant for themselves (e.g., Deut 29:1, 10-14).

We see the first thing that they commit themselves to do in Nehemiah 10:30.

No Intermarriage (10:30)

The returnees state, “We will not give our daughters in marriage to the surrounding peoples and will not take their daughters as wives for our sons.” This commitment addresses the problem of intermarriage. The problem with intermarriage with those of other people groups does not arise from something on the surface. The problem is intermarriage with people who have not separated themselves from the abominations of the peoples of the lands, separating themselves to the Torah of Yahweh. 193The Israelites who entered into this covenant meant to separate themselves from those who had not devoted themselves to Yahweh. They committed not to intermarry with idolaters.

We saw this problem in Ezra 7-10, and we will see it again in Nehemiah 13, when the returnees break this aspect of the covenant they are making here in chapter 10. Malachi was probably ministering around this time, and he too seems to address the problem of mixed marriages with idolaters (Mal 2:11, 14-16).

This commitment not to marry one who doesn’t worship Yahweh pertains to every familial household obligation. By boiling down their commitments to these three sets of obligations, the covenanters identified overarching concerns. These obligations committed them on all other matters of obedience to the law. If both parents were followers of God, they would obey Deuteronomy 6 and train their children in the Torah. This would lead to the keeping of the Ten Commandments, as the Torah was taught and lived in the home.

We can also ask this question: How could marriage be what God intended it to be if the man and wife were not united on this most fundamental question? In Genesis 2:24 the man shall cleave to his wife and they shall become one flesh. This one-flesh-ness speaks to a union of all they are. Such one-flesh union is impossible without agreement on who God is and what it means to know and worship Him.

Paul taught in Ephesians 5 that marriage is about Christ and the church (Eph 5:21-33). (See further Hamilton, “The Mystery of Marriage.”) Paul learned this from the Old Testament, where the relationship between Yahweh and Israel, the covenant, is treated as a marriage (e.g., Jer 31:32; Hosea). If a man and his wife were not united in the worship of God, how could their marriage reflect the relationship between God and His people?

This commitment not to intermarry with idolaters was not a harsh requirement that was imposed on the people of God. Rather, the people of God devoted themselves to the Lord by committing themselves to living such that coming generations would know the Lord (for discussion, see Hamilton, “That the Coming Generation Might Praise the Lord”). They sought that by devoting themselves to marrying only those who worshiped Yahweh.

The New Testament calls Christians to the same marital standard. In 1 Corinthians 7:39 Paul says that a widow is free to remarry “only in the 194Lord,” meaning that she is only free to marry a believer. The teaching that believers should not marry unbelievers can thus be found in the Old and New Testaments.

This requirement is not merely a box we want to check, as though a believing spouse settles the matter. We want to pursue what this points to: the relationship between God and Israel under the old covenant and Christ and the church under the new. That’s what our marriages are about. We want to cultivate wonderful marriages so that our marriages will display Christ’s love for the church and the church’s submissionto Christ.

So if you’re a married person, let me invite you to renew your commitment to the accurate display of the love between Christ and the church in your marriage. If you’re not married, I call you to commit yourself to marrying only someone who is united with you in the worship of the one true and living God by faith in Christ. Prepare yourself for that by relating to other single people in ways that will lay a foundation for a marriage that displays the gospel.

Sabbath and Sabbatical Year Observance (10:31)

The second obligation they commit themselves to is where they say,

There are several parts of this one commitment: the weekly Sabbath, the sabbatical year, and the consequent obligation to cancel debts. Let’s think first about the Sabbath.

Notice how they come at the observance of the Sabbath. They don’t just reiterate the commandment to honor the Sabbath and keep it holy; they address the loophole. It appears that the reason they needed to word the commitment this way was that some Israelites claimed that they were not working on the Sabbath; it was the idolaters who did the work. So they themselves weren’t exactly breaking the Sabbath by engaging in trade with those surrounding peoples who were doing work. That loophole was closed by these words.

Keeping the Sabbath is evidence of faith. This commitment to keep the Sabbath is not about legalism. It is a declaration of trust in Yahweh. An old covenant Israelite could only keep the Sabbath by trusting the 195Lord. A man could not keep the Sabbath apart from faith because there would always be something he would like to be doing. There would always be another way to be productive. The only way to keep the Sabbath was to trust that resting would be better for him than being productive would be. The man who kept the Sabbath trusted that the best stewardship of the time he had was to rest, not work.

Just as the commitment not to intermarry ensured that familial obligations would be kept, promising to keep the Sabbath functioned as an umbrella concept for all other seasonal duties. Everything else Israel was called to do in terms of festivals in Jerusalem and other holy days, all of those would fall in line if the Sabbath was kept.

Similar things can be said about the Sabbatical year. Keeping the Sabbatical year also gave evidence of faith. One who did not have faith would not do this. Imagine the absurdity of the Sabbatical year: year seven rolls around, and a man is not to work his land. He was not to till, plant, sow, or harvest. He was to let his fields lie fallow. He was to do nothing in the way of farming.

That doesn’t look like good farming practice, and it doesn’t seem like economic wisdom. Proverbs 3:5-6 comes into play: a man had to trust the Lord not his own understanding. He had to know Him in all His ways.

Perhaps the most difficult thing to do would be to release the debts in the seventh year. When the seventh year rolled around, the money a man was owed wasn’t owed anymore. The only way he would let that debt go was by faith.

Forgiving debts required the Israelites to believe that God provides; God makes rich. Resting the land required them to believe God’s promise to cause the sixth year to produce enough for three years (Lev 25:21-22). A man would not allow the land to lie fallow if he didn’t trust God to do as He had promised and cause the land to give him three years worth of food—food for the year before the Sabbatical year, food for the year the land was to lie fallow, and food for the next year when he began to work the land again. If he didn’t trust God, he wouldn’t give the land its Sabbath in the seventh year.

If an Israelite didn’t trust God, he wouldn’t keep the Sabbath, wouldn’t release debts in the seventh year, and wouldn’t let the land lie fallow.

What about us today? The commitment in Nehemiah 10:30 applies to us. We are not to intermarry with unbelievers. What about the commitment in196 10:31? Are we obligated to keep the Sabbath now? If there was a place in the New Testament where a New Testament author had an opportunity to affirm that Christians must keep the Sabbath, the place for it would be Romans 14:5-6. Paul says, “One person considers one day to be above another day. Someone else considers every day to be the same. Each one must be fully convinced in his own mind.” The esteeming of one day likely refers to the Jews honoring the Sabbath and keeping it holy. The esteeming of all days alike probably refers to Gentiles who did not keep the Sabbath. All Paul would have had to do to establish Sabbath observance for Christians would have been to quote the commandment: “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.” That’s not what he did. He made it a matter of Christian conscience when he said, “Each one must be fully convinced in his own mind.”

If you feel that you should honor the Sabbath and keep it holy, do so. If you are convinced in your own mind that the Sabbath is not something you’re obligated to because Christ has fulfilled the Mosaic law and brought it to its appointed consummation, and if by faith you look to what the Sabbath pointed to, which is rest in Christ, then be convinced in your own mind. Similarly, the author of Hebrews says, “we who have believed enter the rest” (Heb 4:3). The Sabbath points to eschatological rest in Christ. Trust Christ and fulfill the Sabbath. Paul warns in Colossians 2:16 that no one should be taken captive in regard to a Sabbath day, which I think means that we’re not to allow others to impose their convictions on us in this matter.

The issue with the Sabbath is not the fulfillment of legalistic duties or the avoidance of certain activities. That’s not the point. The point is to be those who trust Christ, those who rest in Him.

Support for the Temple Ministry (10:32-39)

We come to the third obligation they took upon themselves: supporting the worship of God at the temple. Look at all the references to the temple in this passage:

• 10:32—“for the service of the house of our God”
• 10:33—“for all the work of the house of our God”
• 10:34—“to our God’s house”
• 10:35—“to the Lord’s house”
• 10:36—“to the house of our God”
• 10:36—“who serve in our God’s house”
• 19710:37—“at the storerooms of the house of our God”
• 10:38—“in the house of our God”
• 10:39—“We will not neglect the house of our God.”

Every statement in this section communicates the people’s commitment to support the work of the ministry at the temple. As with the other obligations, wider obligations are implied: the marriage commitment sets a good trajectory for all familial issues; the Sabbath commitment addresses all seasonal observances; and the temple commitment facilitates everything that pertains to the worship of Yahweh.

The whole point of the Mosaic law and the temple was that these things enabled Israel to enjoy the presence of God. These commitments were not about legalistic obligations, nor is the covenant we enter into when we join a local church today legalistic. These commitments and obligations that we take upon ourselves are things we do to enjoy the good pleasure of our God.

God said He would dwell in that temple among His people, but if they wanted to avoid being struck dead by His holiness, they had to offer sacrifices for their cleansing. They were unclean. They were sinful. The sacrifices had to be offered. To enjoy God they had to sustain the ministry of the temple. The temple was about the Lord.

In the new covenant, we are the temple. There is no building in Jerusalem that believers are now obligated to support financially, but there are passages in the New Testament that speak to the way that believers should support the work of the ministry (1 Cor 9:6-23; 16:1-2; 2 Cor 9:6-8; Gal 6:6, 10; 1 Tim 5:17-18; cf. Luke 10:7). So today we want to be committed to the new temple, the body of Christ. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 3:16 (my trans.), “Don’t you know that you yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?” To be committed to the temple today is to be committed to the church. And to support the worship of God financially today is to support the ministry of the gospel at the church. We do this to declare that God is Lord over our money, and we do these things as acts of worship. We trust God, not money.

What is at the heart of these three issues to which the Israelites have committed themselves?

The Lord is the point of marriage: marriage exists to display the way God loves His people.

The Lord is the point of the Sabbath: old covenant Israel rested from their labor to declare that Yahweh was their provider. We rest from 198our works and take on the easy yoke Christ offers to proclaim that He saves us; He gives us rest.

The Lord is the point of temple worship: the point of that temple being beautiful, the point of those priests offering sacrifices, the point of the seasonal trips to Jerusalem to worship the Lord there—all that is about being with God, knowing Him, enjoying His presence.

Conclusion

We don’t live for that to which the Navy SEALs have committed themselves. We live to know God. Our cause is not the way of life of the American people. We have something so much bigger and better than that. We have this good news that sinners can be reconciled to God by faith in Christ because Christ has satisfied the wrath of God, He paid the penalty for sin, and all who trust in Him are right with God.

Maybe you’re not a believer in Jesus and you hear me talking about these obligations that have to do with not intermarrying with unbelievers and keeping the Sabbath and sustaining worship at the house of God. What’s all this about? This is all about knowing God. We who believe want you to know God with us.

What you live for is what gives meaning to everything else in your life. These old covenant Israelites are saying, “We live for the Lord.” That dictates who they marry. That dictates what their calendar looks like. That dictates that they care for the most sacred place in their society.

We live for the Lord.

Reflect and Discuss

1. What are the benefits of joining with other believers in the membership of a local church to pursue the glory of God through the advance of the gospel by the power of the Spirit?
2. If you are a member of a church, does your church have a church covenant? What is the value of a congregation reading their covenant together?
3. If you are single, what actions should you take to reflect your commitment to honor God by marrying only a believer?
4. If you are married to an unbeliever, please read 1 Corinthians 7:12-16and 1 Peter 3:1-7. What areas of your life need to be brought into conformity with what those passages teach?
5. 199If you are married to a believer, how are you pursuing a marriage that displays the glory of the relationship between Christ and the church (Eph 5:22-33)?
6. Describe a marriage that would make others want to emulate it.
7. Does your conscience require you to observe the Sabbath? If so, why? If not, why not?
8. Have you experienced rest in Jesus? How do you feel about His call for all who labor and are heavy laden to go to Him for rest for their souls (Matt 11:28-29)?
9. How does the idea that believers together are the temple of the Holy Spirit affect your attitude toward the church?
10. What are the reasons a Christian should support the work of the ministry financially through a local church?