The Covenant Within – Part 2

“For I will take you from among the nations, gather you out of all countries, and bring you into your own land. Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them” (Ezekiel 36:24-27).

Dear God, we hear You speaking to us in our innermost being, calling us to come up higher and dwell in Your holy Presence; and that is where our hearts desire to be! So please give us that new heart of flesh, where You can dwell by Your Holy Spirit, and enable us to walk according to Your law of love! This we pray, in the mighty name of Jesus Christ. Amen!

In our last devotional we introduced the topic of, the Covenant Within. We saw that this was necessary, because, even though the Israelites may have been desirous of keeping their part of the bargain, and had declared their intentions to do all that the Lord required of them, they had done just the opposite.

The purpose for which they were chosen by God, to bring glory to His name, had not been accomplished! To the contrary, His name had been profaned among the nations. But the love of God is such, that He does not abandon His people. He always finds the way to redeem what is lost!

So God began the task of rescuing His people by bringing them out from the other nations. After all, they became His special people after He brought them out of Egypt, and made them His special treasure above all other nations of the world! But their status did not keep them from backsliding!

Then He allowed them to be taken into captivity for seventy years in Babylon. But in the fulness of time, He brought them out just as He promised He would, and brought them back to their own land, the very land that He had promised to their father Abraham.

But before He did, He washed them, and cleansed them from all the uncleanness of the idolatrous practices they had learned from the nations that had held them captive. But a deeper work was necessary in order for them to live in accordance with His perfect will for their lives.

Therefore, He performed a surgery on their hearts. For years, their heart of stone had made it impossible for His people to walk in His statues, and judgments. So He gave them hearts of flesh. Hearts that were soft enough to be molded according to His will and way.

There was no other way. And even today, in the twenty-first century, there is no other way! Why? Because along with the heart of flesh, is the gift of His Holy Spirit, which provides us with the power to yield to His will. More will be said about this in our next devotional.