Will You Marry Me?

In the ancient world when two kings from distant lands came together and wanted to form a covenant, such as a covenant of peace or a covenant of trade, they would write the terms of the covenant on two copies of stone tablets, which were essentially their "rules of engagement". Each side of the tablets would contain writing. So, for example, tablet #1 would have rules 1-5 written on the front, and rules 6-10 written on the back. Then, an identical copy of this was made on another tablet.

Each king would take their copy of the covenant and place it in a wooden box, which was referred to as an "ark". This was their "Ark of the Covenant".

Now, each king would typically have their own god who they worshiped. So, king #1 would take his ark back to the temple of his god, and king #2 would take his ark back to the temple of his god. So, there was a copy of the covenant in each of their temples. The idea was that their respective gods would punish them if they violated the rules of the covenant. King #1 would essentially say, "If I violate any of the rules of our covenant, my god will punish me", and King #2 would do the same.

In the case of the ancient Israelites, the Lord first offered them a direct relationship with no rules, asking them to be "a kingdom of priests" (Ex. 19:6). This was God's "Plan A". However, because they were afraid of direct relationship they asked for a rule-based covenant like the Egyptians and all the other pagan people around them (Deut. 5:27), after all, they had just spent 400 years in Egyptian slavery and it was all they knew. Because of their fear they asked to be servants instead of children - they asked for religion instead of relationship. "We don't want to be that close to you. Just tell us what to do." This was the "Plan B" chosen by the people.

This put the Lord in a very uncomfortable position.

Now, because Love must honor the human will, He was forced to be both their covenant partner AND the God who would punish them if they broke any of the covenant rules. So, God wrote two copies of His ten commandments, which were the terms of the covenant. Because the Lord doesn't have a "god" over Him, both copies were given to the people and placed in their Ark of the Covenant and then into the Jewish temple. These were easy commandments which could be summarized as "love the Lord with all your heart and love your neighbor as yourself". It was the bare minimum, God made it easy, for He did not want to be forced to punish them. Nevertheless, by the time Moses descended the mountain the people were already worshiping a false god.

As their covenant partner, the Lord was very grieved. As their God, He was forced to punish them as their God. This roller coaster of blessing and punishment continued for about 1500 years. It was terrible. Both God and the people looked forward to the day when they might get the opportunity to get back to "Plan A" - when they could be a "kingdom of priests" with direct relationship with the Lord.

There was only one way back to Plan A.

See, covenants are only in force as long as both parties are alive. "For where a covenant is, there must of necessity be the death of the one who made it" (Heb. 9:16). So, for this rule based covenant of death to be abolished, one of the covenant partners had to die - similar to what we see in a marriage covenant today, "Till death do us part". It was either going to be the people or God. So, God had a choice to make. Who was going to die?

God took on flesh and became a human being in order to die and put an end to the old covenant and establish a new covenant of life. Jesus said, "I came that they might have LIFE." We often say that Jesus died for our sins which is true in a sense, but what He really died for was what sin was doing to us. "The wages of sin is death." Sin was killing us. It's not about punishment, it's about restoration. God doesn't punish the record of our wrongdoing, He cancels it (Col. 2:14).

Jesus didn't die to appease the "wrath" of an angry Father, He died to appease the "wrath" of sin. Jesus died to "set us free from the law of sin and death" (Rom. 8:2). He died to abolish the old covenant and create a new one.

Back to "Plan A".

God's no longer interested in you not keeping the rules, because that covenant is abolished. God died, the covenant ended. It is now completely "obsolete" (Heb. 8:13). We are now free to re-marry Him all over again, under far better terms. Marriage only has one law. LOVE. "Love each other as I have loved you" (John 15:12).

And someone is proposing right now.

The New Covenant is a unique covenant, in that it is between God and God (the Father and Jesus). We have nothing to do with it. Thankfully, it's not based on our performance. We can "rest" in the finished work of Jesus Christ - our new groom.

The only question remaining is, Will you marry into the family or not? If you do, everything that is His is yours, and everything that is yours is His.

"Will you marry me"? is the question He is asking the world.

What is your answer?