New Covenant Promises

January 23rd, 2026
by Lance Waldie

Hebrews 8:10-13 “For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws into their minds, and I will write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they shall be My people. 11 And they shall not teach everyone his fellow citizen, and everyone his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for all will know Me, from the least to the greatest of them. 12 For I will be merciful to their iniquities, and I will remember their sins no more.” 13 When He said, “A new covenant,” He has made the first obsolete. But whatever is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to disappear.

Having shown in Hebrews 8:8-9 that the old covenant blessings had been abrogated through Israel’s defiance, the author of Hebrews goes on to show how the new covenant (NC) is superior to the old. The inferiority of the old covenant was that it was written on stone tablets and given to Moses who placed them in the ark of the covenant. The Jews memorized the words, and many of them tied little boxes with verses inside of them to their hands and foreheads, called phylacteries. They also posted the Law on the doorposts of their homes and on their gates (Deut. 6:8-9). But none of this worked, for the Law never made it to their hearts. Their religion was purely outward.

The superiority of the NC is that, contrary to the outward religion of the old covenant, it is an internal relationship with God. The old covenant was entirely external, motivated by fear of God’s discipline and losing His blessing. But the NC, for Israel, will be characterized by hearts that overflow with worship toward Him, as the Church enjoys it today. True Christians have had heart transplants, as it were, receiving regenerated (born again) lives that worship Christ for His grace and mercy. They recognize what Israel rejected. So, today Gentiles benefit from the NC given to Israel. But the NC was primarily for Israel, a future generation who will one day acknowledge Jesus as their Messiah, or Christ. When they do receive Him, like the Church, the Abrahamic covenant will be fulfilled: the land, the seed, and the blessing.

In v. 10, God promises to put His Law on the hearts and minds of His people. This is irresistible grace! God forges His Law onto the hearts of those whom He chooses for salvation. Israel was a chosen nation, but they were not all chosen to have God’s Law on their hearts. Only the elect are chosen for such. Then God promises to be their God. There is no invitation to “accept” God here; He just comes into the lives of His chosen ones and becomes their God; they become His people. Because of this, at that time, no one will need to tell their neighbor about God, for they will all know Him according to v. 11. The Great Commission (Matt. 28:19-20) will be no more! This in itself proves that the NC has been merely inaugurated. It has yet to be fulfilled entirely since all Christians have been commissioned to tell the world about Christ.

Verse 12 is the high point of the NC. All of God’s promises through time are ultimately fulfilled in the NC. Under the old order, sins were not forgiven, only covered through the blood of animals. But in Christ all sins are eternally forgiven. Since God is He who does everything, then it is by His grace alone. Jesus mediates the NC, and no sinner can become a part of it without faith in Him. The Law says, “It is through obeying the law that a person has life” (Gal. 3:12; NLT). But grace says, Your works are complete in Christ. Trust in Him for salvation.

Food For Thought
Gentiles are born again when they place their faith in the promised Seed of Abraham, thus becoming his spiritual offspring (Gal. 3:7-8, 29). Once the fullness of the Gentiles comes to Christ, God will fulfill the NC promise, and all true Israel will be saved (Rom. 11:26). Only then will Israel be grafted back into God’s eternal covenant of salvation (Rom 11:17-24). This is why we cannot be anti-Semitic, or anti-Israel. Why set yourself against what and who God is for?