The church still knows...Covenant

We live in an age that has stopped believing promises mean anything.

And honestly, we come by that cynicism honestly. Institutions have failed us. Leaders have disappointed us. Relationships we thought were permanent turned out to have conditions buried in the fine print. We have been let down enough times that somewhere along the way, many of us quietly stopped expecting anything different. 

The world runs on contracts. Perform and you're in. Stop performing and the deal is off. Loyalty, belonging, commitment, all of it conditional. All of it fragile. All of it subject to revision. 

But the Church still knows...Covenant.

A covenant is not a contract. A contract says I will if you will. A covenant says, "I will" period. It is not held together by our faithfulness. It is held together by God's faithfulness. Hebrew has a word for that quality in God, "hesed." Steadfast faithfulness. The stubborn, unbreakable commitment woven into every promise God has ever made. It isn't easily translated into English, so different translations each take a run at it, lovingkindness, mercy, steadfast love, faithful love, and none of them quite gets all the way there. The word is simply bigger than English allows.

You can trace that covenant thread through the whole of Scripture. God made a covenant with Abraham, not because Abraham had earned it, but because God is faithful. God met Israel in the wilderness again and again, not because the deserved it, but because the covenant held. The psalmists cried out from their lowest moments and found the same thing every time. 

"Give thanks to the Lord, for God is good; for God's steadfast love endures forever." (Psalm 136:1)

And then the cross. Not a contract being settled, but a covenant being fulfilled. God entering the full brokenness of the world, defeating death itself, and refusing to let anything, not even the grave, have the final word. 

The same God. The same covenant. The same faithfulness. All the way through. 

In a cynical world that has been burned by broken promises, the Church still believes some promises don't break. Not because people are reliable. We aren't. But because God is. The covenant God made is not conditional on your performance. It does not have fine print. It does not expire. It has held every failure, every doubt, every wandering, every silence. 

This is what we carry into the world. Not a contract to perform. A covenant to rest in. 

Rest in assurance that God's steadfast love for you endures forever. 

The Church still knows...covenant. 

Peace, 
Travis Segar
Pastor for Care and Community

Image: Dramatic view of the Cliffs of Moher under an overcast sky. Pexels