Grace of God Old Testament: 2

The Grace of God in the Old Testament: 2

Moses Found Grace

After the days of Abraham and his son Isaac, God’s blessings were passed on to Jacob, whose descendants grew to become the twelve tribes of Israel. In His great mercy, God delivered the children of Israel from their slavery in Egypt. God raised up Moses to lead them to the promised land, and He gave them His commandments and laws so that they might continue to receive His blessings and grace.

Moses himself found grace in the eyes of God, when he pleaded with God on behalf of the children of Israel after their grievous sins of debauchery and idolatry, which they had committed while Moses was receiving the law on Mount Sinai for forty days and nights.

“And Moses said unto the Lord, ‘See, You say unto me, “Bring up this people”….Yet You have said, “I know you by name, and you have also found grace in My sight.” Now therefore, I pray You, if I have found grace in Your sight, show me now Your way, that I may know You, that I may find grace in Your sight: and consider that this nation is Your people....For wherein shall it be known here that I and Your people have found grace in Your sight?’ ” (Ex.33:12-16.)

Moses was pleading with God for grace and for His presence to lead the children of Israel into the Promised Land. “And the Lord said unto Moses, ‘I will do this thing also that you have spoken: for you have found grace in My sight, and I know you by name’ ”(verse 17).

After promising Moses that he would see a glimpse of God’s glory, viewing only His backside, God commanded Moses to hew two more tables of stone, like the first, and come to meet God again on Mount Sinai. “And the Lord descended in the cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the Lord.

“And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, ‘THE LORD, THE LORD GOD, MERCIFUL AND GRACIOUS, LONGSUFFERING, AND ABUNDANT IN GOODNESS AND TRUTH, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin...’ ” (Ex. 34:5-7).

The Lord God of the Old Testament revealed Himself to Moses as a God of MERCY and GRACE—not at all like the stern, wrathful God that theologians through the ages have depicted in their distorted view of the Old Testament. These verses in the Old Testament describe the very nature and character of God, which is eternally the same. “For I am the Lord, I change not” (Mal. 3:6).

God the Father and God the Son, Who were both known as “the LORD” in Old Testament times, have always shared the same loving, merciful divine nature. “Every good act of giving and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation, nor shadow of turning” (James 1:17, AT). “Jesus Christ isthe same yesterday, today and into the ages of eternity” (Heb. 13:8, AT). The Lord of the Old Testament Who revealed Himself to Moses is the same merciful God Who became the Lord of the New Testament!

God’s Love Toward

Israel of Old

In spite of countless passages in the Old Testament which reveal the profound love and magnificent grace of God, most people envision the God of Israel as a hateful, vengeful God of wrath and destruction! For centuries, ministers and teachers have led the Christian-professing world to believe that a stern, implacable God gave Israel harsh, restrictive laws that were a burden and a curse. Your Bible reveals the opposite!

Moses told the children of Israel just before they came into the promised land, “And the Lord commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the Lord our God, FOR OUR GOOD ALWAYS, that He might preserve us alive, as it is at this day. And it shall be our. righteousness, if we observe to do all these commandments before the Lord our God, as He has commanded us” (Deut. 6:24-25).

God revealed Himself as a God of love and mercy in the covenant that He established with Israel and the blessings that He promised for obedience. “The Lord did not set His LOVE upon you, nor choose you, because you were more in number than any people: for you were the fewest of all people: but because the Lord LOVED YOU, and because He would keep the oath which He had sworn unto your fathers....Know therefore that the Lord your God, He is God, the FAITHFUL GOD, which KEEPS COVENANT and MERCY [which comes from His grace] with them that LOVE Him and keep His COMMANDMENTS TO A THOUSAND GENERATIONS....Wherefore it shall come to pass, if you hearken to these judgments, and keep, and do them, that the Lord your God shall keep unto you the COVENANT and the MERCY which He swore unto your fathers; and HE WILL LOVE YOU, AND BLESS YOU, AND MULTIPLY YOU: He will also bless the fruit of your womb, and the fruit of your land, your corn, and your wine, and your oil, the increase of your cattle, and the flocks of your sheep, in the land which He swore unto your fathers to give you. YOU SHALL BE BLESSED ABOVE ALL PEOPLE...” (Deut. 7:7-9, 12-14). These are indeed wonderful promises of God’s blessings! If Israel had kept God’s covenant and obeyed Him, God would have blessed them above all nations.

God Himself loved the children of Israel and commanded them to love Him. “Hear, O Israel! The Lord our God is one Lord; and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might” (Deut. 6:4-5).

Jesus Christ, Who was the Lord God of Israel before coming in the flesh as the Son of God, taught that all the commandments and laws of God are based upon love. In response to the question as to which was the greatest of the commandments, Jesus answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets” (Mat. 22:37-40, AT).

God has always desired loving obedience from the heart. In Old Testament times, God commanded the children of Israel to demonstrate their love for Him by continually walking in His way of life. “And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you, but to fear [in reverent awe] the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways, and to love Him, and to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, to keep the commandments of the Lord, and His statutes, which I command you this day for your good?

“Behold, the heaven and the heaven of heavens is the Lord’s your God, the earth also, with all that therein is. Only the Lord had a delight in your fathers to love them, and He chose their seed after them, even you above all people, as it is this day.

“Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no more stiffnecked. For the Lord your God is God of gods, and Lord of lords, a great God, a mighty, and a terrible, which regards not persons….You shall fear the Lord your God; Him shall you serve, and to Him shall you cleave, and swear by His name. He is your praise, and He is your God, that has done for you these great and terrible things, which your eyes have seen” (Deut. 10:12-21).

Throughout the Old Testament, as recorded in the Law, the Prophets and the Psalms, God manifested His love and mercy toward the children of Israel. They were in turn to love Him, to keep His commandments and to walk in His ways.

The Two Choices Given to Israel:

Obedience and Life, or Disobedience and Death

Just as with Adam and Eve, God set before the children of Israel two ways of life—and they were required to make a choice. On the one hand, He set before them His way of life and good; and on the other hand, their own ways of death and evil. “See, I have set before you this day life and good, and death and evil; in that I command you this day to love the Lord your God, to walk in His ways, and to keep His commandments and His statutes and His judgments, that you may live and multiply: and the Lord your God shall bless you in the land whither you go to possess it” (Deut. 30:15-16).

It is abundantly clear that God loved the children of Israel and desired to bless them, just as He desired that they in turn love, serve and obey Him. But God also made it clear that they had to respond to God by loving Him and choosing to keep His commandments of their own free will.

God warned the children of Israel that if they did not choose to love and obey Him, and instead chose their own ways and served other gods, the result would be death and evil. “But if your heart turn away, so that you will not hear, but shall be drawn away, and worship other gods, and serve them; I denounce unto you this day, that you shall surely perish, and that you shall not prolong your days upon the land, whither you pass over Jordan to go to possess it.

“I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, that both you and your seed may live; that you may love the Lord your God, and that you may obey His voice, and that you may cleave unto Him: for He is your life, and the length of your days: that you may dwell in the land which the Lord swore unto your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them” (Deut. 30:17-20).

God’s Love And Mercy

Does Not Abrogate His Judgment

Because God is love, He is gracious and merciful. But the Bible reveals that God can and does execute judgment and vengeance. As God, Creator and Lawgiver, He alone has the power and prerogative to do so. Therefore when people sin, God must judge!

God specifically warned Israel that He would execute judgment for their sins. This is clearly revealed in the second commandment: “You shall not make you any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the waters beneath the earth; you shall not bow down yourself unto them, nor serve them: for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate Me, and showing mercy [through His grace] unto thousands of them that love Me and keep My commandments” (Deut. 5:8-10).

Foreseeing a time when the sins of the children of Israel would become great, God prophesied, “To Me belongs vengeance, and recompense; their foot shall slide in due time: for the day of their calamity is at hand, and the things that shall come upon them make haste” (Deut. 32:35).

God executes His judgment as a last resort to bring sinners to repentance so that He may forgive them. When properly understood, even the punishment and correction that God administers is, in fact, an ACT OF LOVE AND GRACE. Throughout the course of history, the only ones ever to experience the full fury of God’s wrath have been unrepentant sinners and haters of God!

God has always been desirous to bless human beings because He loves them. Although God is not calling many to salvation at this time, He wants life to go well for people in this present age. In fact, God does not delight in the death of the wicked, although He shows they have earned death as the wages of their sins. “For I have no pleasure in the death of him that dies, says the Lord GOD: wherefore turn yourselves [through heartfelt repentance], and live” (Ezk. 18:32).

The Example of King Ahab’s Sin and Repentance

In spite of all the blessings that God had bestowed upon Israel, the hearts of the people soon turned to the worship of other gods. As part of God’s judgment upon Israel, the nation was later split into the kingdoms of Israel and Judah. Many of the kings who ruled these kingdoms led the people even further into sin and idolatry. The most notorious of these evil kings was Ahab, who ruled the kingdom of Israel in the days of Elijah.

The prophet Elijah was sent on a special mission to pronounce God’s judgment of imminent death and destruction against King Ahab and his wicked wife Jezebel, daughter of the priest of Baal, for their grievous sins. “And you shall speak unto him, saying, ‘Thus says the Lord, Have you killed, and also taken possession?’ And you shall speak unto him, saying, ‘Thus says the Lord, In the place where dogs licked the blood of Naboth shall dogs lick your blood, even yours’ ” (I Kings 21:19).

When Elijah went to Ahab and pronounced God’s judgment against him, Ahab said to Elijah, “‘Have you found me, 0 my enemy?’ And he answered, ‘I have found you: because you have sold yourself to work evil in the sight of the Lord. Behold, I will bring evil upon you, and will take away your posterity, and will cut off from Ahab him that pisses against the wall, and him that is shut up and left in Israel, and will make your house like the house of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, and like the house of Baasha the son of Ahijah, for the provocation wherewith you have provoked Me to anger, and made Israel to sin.’

“And of Jezebel also spoke the Lord, saying, ‘The dogs shall eat Jezebel by the wall of Jezreel. Him that dies of Ahab in the city the dogs shall eat; and him that dies in the field shall the fowls of the air eat.’

“But there was none like unto Ahab, which did sell himself to work wickedness in the sight of the Lord, whom Jezebel his wife stirred up. And he did very abominably in following idols, according to all things as did the Amorites, whom the Lord cast out before the children of Israel” (verses 20-26).

While it is true that God’s judgment is always sure and never fails, it is also true that God desires and watches for repentance, that He may bestow mercy rather than judgment and destruction.

Although Ahab was one of the most vile, wicked sinners in all the history of the kings of Israel, he did not take God’s warning lightly. Notice Ahab’s reaction to God’s powerful sentence of condemnation and death by the mouth of Elijah the prophet! “And it came to pass, when Ahab heard those words, that he rent [ripped off his clothes, and put sackcloth upon his flesh, and fasted, and lay in sackcloth, and went softly” (verse 27).

What a repentance! What a change of heart, accompanied by fasting and weeping! Because Ahab humbled himself and repented, God delayed the execution of His judgment. “And the word of the Lord came to Elijah the Tishbite, saying, ‘Do you see how Ahab is humbling himself before Me? Because he is humbling himself before Me, I will not bring the evil in his days; but in his son’s days will I bring the evil upon his house’ ” (verses 28-29).

This scriptural passage is most instructive because it shows that when a person chooses to repent, even one as wicked as Ahab, God will honor that repentance. After the days of Ahab, God also honored the repentance of Manasseh, one of the most wicked kings of Judah, and restored him to his throne (II Chron. 33:1-13). The Old Testament shows that God always honors true repentance from the heart.

The Example of Nineveh

While God dealt particularly with Israel and Judah as His chosen people, the Old Testament shows that God also honored the repentance of Gentiles who humbled themselves before Him. The book of Jonah gives an account of God’s judgment against the Assyrians and of their repentance upon hearing God’s warning through Jonah. Seeing their repentance, God deferred the execution of His judgment. “So the people of Nineveh [the capital of Assyria] believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them. For word came unto the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and he laid his robe from him, and covered him with sackcloth, and sat in ashes.

“And he caused it to be proclaimed and published through [out] Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, ‘Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste any thing: let them not feed, nor drink water: but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily unto God: yea, let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands.

“ ‘Who can tell if God will turn and repent, and turn away from His fierce anger, that we perish not?’ And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that He had said that He would do unto them, and He did it not” (Jonah 3:5-10).

Yes, the Lord God of the Old Testament, Who later became Jesus Christ of the New Testament, was a God of mercy and lovingkindness. He extended grace and forgiveness to all those who repented, whether Israelite, Jew or Gentile. This account in the book of Jonah is most significant because it shows that God has always required all nations—not only Israel and Judah—to keep His commandments. The character of God NEVER changes!

The Meaning of Grace

in the Old Testament

As we have seen, God extended His grace freely to individuals and nations who humbly sought His favor in Old Testament times. God granted His grace to Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, the children of Israel, the Ninevites, David, and even kings Ahab and Manasseh when they repented of their wickedness. The Scriptures also record God’s grace and blessings to those women who sought His favor, including Abraham’s wife Sarah, (Gen. 21:6-7, Heb. 11:11, Ruth the Moabitess (Ruth 1:16; 2:12), and Hannah, the mother of Samuel (I Sam. 1:10-19).

The entire Old Testament is a demonstration of God’s gracious kindness and mercy. However, the grace and mercy which God granted during Old Testament times was in most cases limited to physical deliverance and material blessings. The Scriptures reveal that only a few in Old Testament times received God’s Holy Spirit and were granted the grace of God unto eternal salvation. Nevertheless, God’s blessing and grace was extended bountifully in the physical realm for those who loved God and kept His commandments. And mercy and forgiveness was extended to all who repented from the heart.

The Old Testament is a history of those who sought God with all their hearts, and received God’s grace and blessing, as opposed to those who rejected God’s grace and blessing, and heaped to themselves punishment and wrath for their grievous sins.

Grace Revealed

in the Book of Proverbs

What does the book of Proverbs reveal about the grace of God? The book of Proverbs is designed to show us how to receive the blessings and grace of God in our daily lives. When we learn to live God’s way, we receive His grace and favor in all that we set our hands to do.

The book of Proverbs gives us understanding of God’s grace under the Old Covenant as well as insight into the grace that He offers under the New Covenant:

“The proverbs of Solomon the son of David, king of Israel; to know wisdom and instruction; to perceive the words of understanding....A wise man will hear, and will increase learning; and a man of understanding shall attain unto wise counsels....The fear [loving, reverent awe] of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge: but fools [who reject the love and blessings of God] despise wisdom and instruction. ‘My son, hear the instruction of your father [for Christians, God the Father], and forsake not the law of your mother [Jerusalem in heaven above is the mother of all true Christians]: FOR THEY [all of God’s instructions, commandments, statutes and laws] SHALL BE AN ORNAMENT OF GRACE unto your head, and chains [of God’s blessings] about your neck” (Pro. 1:1-9).

Contrary to the teaching of pseudo-Christian theologians, the laws and commandments of God are not contrary to grace! Rather, they are essential to receiving God’s grace and favor, just as the book of Proverbs reveals.

The book of Proverbs make it clear that God extends His grace to those who demonstrate their faith and love toward Him by wholeheartedly keeping His commandments. “My son, forget not my law; but let your heart keep my commandments; for length of days, and long life, and peace, shall they add to you. Let not mercy and truth forsake you: bind them about your neck: write them upon the table of your heart: so shall you find favor [grace] and good understanding in the sight of God and man. Trust in the Lord with all your heart: and lean not unto your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths” (Pro. 3:1-6).

These verses in the book of Proverbs show that God wants us to respond to Him with loving obedience that is based on faith and complete trust in His grace. Here in the Old Testament is a foreshadow of the New Testament teachings of the grace of God unto eternal salvation through faith in Jesus Christ.

The Proverbs confirm that faith and obedience work together in each believer’s life to keep him or her in continual grace and favor with God. This truth is revealed in the writings of the Old Testament, as well as in the New Testament.

The Psalms Illustrate the Repentance

Required to Receive God’s Grace

Throughout the Scriptures, it is clear that God extends His grace only to those who manifest a humble and contrite ATTITUDE OF HEART AND MIND toward Him. God inspired the prophet Isaiah to reveal the repentant and yielded spirit that He always requires of a person before He extends His grace and lovingkindness: “...To this man will I look, even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembles at My word” (Isa. 66:2).

This principle is amplified throughout the book of Psalms. The Psalms are filled with wonderful descriptions of God’s love, mercy and grace, and God’s acceptance of those who truly repent and humble themselves before Him.

One of the most heartfelt expressions of repentance is found in Psalm 51,where David confesses his sins to God and pleads for His forgiveness. When King David repented of killing Uriah the Hittite, and of his adulterous affair with Uriah’s wife Bathsheba, David repented with his whole heart. He prayed, “Have mercy upon me, O God, according to Your lovingkindness; according to the multitude of Your tender mercies blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. For I acknowledge my transgressions; and my sin is ever before me.

“Against You, You only, have I sinned, and done this evil in Your sight; that You might be justified when You speak, and be clear when You judge....Behold, You desire truth in the inward parts; and in the hidden part You shall make me to know wisdom. Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow....Hide Your face from my sins, and blot out all my iniquities.”

“Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from Your presence; and take not Your Holy Spirit from me” (Psa. 51:1-11). Because of David’s repentance, God in His merciful grace heard and answered David’s prayer, and David’s sins were forgiven.

Psalm 86 is another prayer of David which illustrates God’s bountiful grace and forgiveness toward those who repent of their sins: “Bow down Your ear [bowing down to listen, to forgive and bless, is an act of grace], O Lord, hear me: for I am poor and needy. Preserve my soul; for I am holy [sanctified by God]: O You my God, save Your servant who trusts in You [saving grace]. Be merciful unto me, O Lord: for I cry unto You daily. Rejoice the soul of Your servant: for unto You, O Lord, do I lift up my soul. For You, Lord, are good, and READY TO FORGIVE; AND PLENTEOUS IN MERCY UNTO ALL THEM THAT CALL UPON YOU. Give ear, O Lord, unto my prayer, and attend to the voice of my supplications. In the day of my trouble I will call upon You: for You will answer me. ..For You are great, and do wondrous things: You are God alone. Teach me Your way, O Lord; I will walk in Your truth; unite my heart to fear Your name. I will praise You, O Lord my God, with all my heart: and I will glorify Your name forevermore. For great is Your mercy toward me....But You, O Lord, are a God FULL OF COMPASSION, AND GRACIOUS, LONGSUFFERING, AND PLENTEOUS IN MERCY AND TRUTH. O turn unto me, and have mercy upon me...” (Psa. 86:1-7,10-13,15-16).

The same attitude of love and repentance toward God is expressed in David’s words in Psalm 103: “Bless the Lord, O my soul: and ALL that is within me, bless His holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all His benefits: Who FORGIVES all your INIQUITIES; Who heals all your diseases: Who redeems your life from destruction: Who crowns you with lovingkindness and tender mercies... The Lord is MERCIFUL AND GRACIOUS, slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy... .He has not dealt with us after our sins; nor rewarded us according to our iniquities. For as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is His mercy toward them that fear Him [in reverent awe]. As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us. Like as a father pities his children, so the Lord pities them that fear Him. For He knows our frame; He remembers that we are dust....But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting upon them that fear Him, and His righteousness unto children’s children: to such as keep His covenant, and to those that remember His commandments to do them” (Psa. 103:1-4, 8, 10-14, 17-18).

Many of the Psalms recount the abundant blessings, lovingkindness and mercies that God bestowed upon the children of Israel, as well as His just punishment when they forsook their covenant with Him and broke His commandments. Some of these Psalms offer prayers of repentance and pleas for renewed mercy toward Israel. Other Psalms are filled entirely with words of praise and gratitude--extolling God for His bountiful mercy and His gracious lovingkindness not only toward the children of Israel but toward every individual who humbly sought His forgiveness, mercy, lovingkindness and favor.

The Prophets Describe God’s

Grace Toward Repentant Sinners

Although only a few were called to receive eternal salvation in Old Testament times, the truth of Scripture is that God did deal graciously with all those who sought Him with their whole hearts and beings! As for those who rejected Him and refused to keep His commandments, upon them came God’s wrath and just judgment! But even then, God’s hand was always held out in mercy, whenever sinners would repent and turn to Him.

The prophet Ezekiel recorded God’s plea to Israel: “Cast away from you all your transgressions, whereby you have transgressed; and make you a new heart and a new spirit; for why will you die, O house of Israel? For I have no pleasure in the death of him that dies, says the Lord God: wherefore turn yourselves [to God in heartfelt repentance], and live” (Ezk. 18:31-32).

God again spoke His plea to Israel, this time affirming His words by His own life: “...As I live, says the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live! TURN YOU, TURN YOU FROM YOUR EVIL WAYS: for why will you die, O house of Israel?” (Ezk. 33:11.)

God declares through the prophet Joel that even in the coming day of the Lord, God will plead with the wicked to repent: “...For the day of the Lord is great and very terrible; and who can abide it? Therefore also now, says the Lord, ‘Turn you even unto Me with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning, and rend your heart, and not your garments, and turn unto the Lord your God: for He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repents Him of the evil’ ”(Joel 2:11-13).

Throughout the Old Testament, as well as the New Testament, God reveals that what He really desires from mankind is repentance and loving obedience! “Seek the Lord while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near; LET THE WICKED FORSAKE HIS WAY, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him RETURN UNTO THE LORD [through repentance], and He will have MERCY upon him; and to our God, for HE WILL ABUNDANTLY PARDON” (Isa. 55:6-7). This prophecy in the book of Isaiah was undoubtedly used in New Testament times when the apostles preached repentance, grace and eternal salvation.

Although God extended the opportunity for eternal salvation to only a few before the coming of Jesus Christ, God has always desired love, mercy and grace, as the Old Testament prophets proclaimed. Their records of the very words of God clearly show that all accusations that the Lord of the Old Testament was a God of wrath and vengeance are utterly false!

The New Testament reveals that although the prophets of old prophesied of the coming grace, they did not fully understand it. The apostle Peter wrote, “...Concerning which salvation [through grace], the prophets who have prophesied of THE GRACE which should come to you, have diligently searched out and intently inquired, searching into what way, and what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them was indicating, and testifying beforehand of the sufferings of Christ, and those glories which would follow; to whom it was revealed, that not for themselves, but to us, they were ministering these things, which now have been announced to you by those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit, sent from heaven, into which things the angels are desiring to look” (I Pet. 1:10-12, AT).

From Genesis to the book of Revelation, the message of Scripture to sinners is to SEEK GOD and to REPENT OF SIN, and the gracious mercy of God will be poured out upon each one! God will reach out with His goodness, blessing and mercy to each repentant man and woman.

This message was preached with power when the New Testament church began. When those who were assembled for the Feast of Pentecost at Jerusalem realized that their own personal sins had killed Jesus Christ, they were deeply moved in heart and mind and asked the apostles what they should do. “Then Peter said unto them, ‘REPENT, AND BE BAPTIZED every one of you IN THE NAME OF JESUS CHRIST for the remission of sins, AND YOU SHALL RECEIVE THE GIFT OF THE HOLY SPIRIT ’” (Acts 2:38).

This scripture and many other verses in the New Testament make it clear that under the New Covenant, the Holy Spirit as a begettal from God the Father has been made available to all who truly believe on Jesus Christ. Everyone whom God the Father calls, and who believes, repents and accepts Jesus Christ as personal Savior, and is then baptized by full immersion in water—into the death of Jesus Christ—is granted the begettal of the Holy Spirit as the earnest of God’s promise of eternal life. Under the New Covenant, the grace of God is truly poured out upon the believer in a most profound way! Through this spiritual begettal with the Holy Spirit of God, the true believer enters into a personal relationship with God the Father and his or her personal Savior Jesus Christ.

In part two, The Grace of God in the New Testament, we will discuss in much greater detail the gracious gift of God the Father and Jesus Christ through the New Covenant—the all encompassing, awe-inspiring grace of God unto eternal life!

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