The holiday season can feel more stressful than restful. How can we live with a well soul in the middle of all the chaos of checklists and our regular responsibilities? This season, I am offering you a gift to help you live with a well soul. So click the link in the show notes to sign up for the Advent Reflections where every day in the month of December will be a reflection and time for you to pause so that you can live with a well soul from December 1st to December 25th.
Click the link in the show notes to join for free.
Welcome to the WellSoul Podcast, where we pause to drink in scripture, reflect, and pray. I am your host, Shauna Scott, and sometimes life leaves our souls feeling parched. So come to the well of living water that never runs dry.
In today's episode, we will focus our meditation time on the new covenant, the new promise God gave Jeremiah and is fulfilled in Jesus Christ. It is my hope as we enter the holiday season, we can see that God keeps his promises. And we can have confident faith in who he is. For anything we face, God is faithful.
In our time through the story of the gospel, we have seen some major promises God made. Beginning in Genesis 3, when God announced the consequences to Adam and Eve and the serpent. He also announced a promise. One day a man would come through the woman who would crush the serpent's head right here He also declared a
promise to Abraham, which started to fulfill his promise in Genesis. Three, that God would give Abraham a land, many descendants, and a blessing that would bless the whole world. So land, seed, and blessing in the unconditional covenant with Abraham. We meditated on the conditional covenant with Moses. God gave the Israelites the law to show them how to be in relationship with God and how to be in relationships with one another.
And God told them that if they followed this conditional agreement, this conditional covenant, they would be blessed. If not, they would be cursed. Hence the story of the Israelites in much of the Old Testament. But then we came to David where God further revealed the fulfillment of his unconditional promise in the garden through the promise to Abraham.
And God told David that God was going to build him a house. And through his seed, a king would come who would reign on David's throne forever, in a forever kingdom. This gave clarity to God's promise to Abraham in how, how would all the world be blessed through Abraham. It was through the blessing of Abraham's descendant.
David through the King to come who would reign forever. And we know the story of the Israelites. They did not fulfill their part of the agreement at the Mosaic law, so they were exiled from the land through the Assyrian. and Babylonians. While in exile, God told the prophet who still lived in the promised land, Jeremiah, about another promise.
The promise that would fulfill all the unconditional promises, also called covenants, and would also make a way for the forgiveness of sin. better than that of bulls and goats in the temple sacrifices. This is what we have gone through and seen in the story of scripture. We need a savior. This my friend is where we're going to step into the hope we celebrate this Christmas and Thanksgiving season.
And this is where we will pause to drink scripture today.
I'm going to read Three passages for us today with a few seconds of pausing in between each so we can hear both the Old Testament promise being proclaimed and the New Testament witness of Jesus, because this is our hope this holiday season, Jeremiah 31, 31 to 33, the days are coming declares the Lord when I will make a new Covenant with the people of Israel and the people of Judah.
It will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors. When I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them, declares the Lord. This is the covenant I will make with the people of Israel after that time, declares the Lord. I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts.
I will be their God and they will be my people. Dwell on this for a moment.
Matthew 26, 27 to 28. This is Jesus speaking. Then he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them, saying, Drink from it, all of you. This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness Of sins. Dwell on this for a moment.
Hebrews nine 14 to 15. How much more than will the blood of Christ who through the eternal spirit, offered himself unblemished to God? Cleanse our consciousnesses from acts that lead to death so that we may serve the living God for this reason. Christ is the mediator of a new covenant, that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance.
Now that he has died as a ransom to set them free from the sins committed under the first covenant. Dwell on this for a moment.
Take another moment to dwell on God's faithfulness all the way from Genesis through the story of the Bible. To do what he said he would do. And how do you need this kind of faithfulness in your life right now? Dwell and pray on this for a moment.
Friend, Jesus Christ is the one to come who will crush the serpent's head when he returns and destroys the enemy forever in the second death as promised by Genesis 3. And He is the one who came first, whose blood sacrifice paved the way for us to have a relationship with God and the forgiveness of sins.
As promised to Abraham, as demonstrated in the sacrificial law of Moses, and promised to David, and then proclaimed through Jeremiah the prophet. He is the Savior. who takes away our sin forever. This is our hope this holiday season. Not in the laughter around a perfectly made table with crisp turkey, or not in receiving the one gift your family thinks to get you.
Jesus is our greatest gift this Thanksgiving, Christmas season, and always.
Let's pray. Father, Son, Holy Spirit, one and only true God. Thank you. Thank you that by reading your word from Genesis all the way through to the end of the Old Testament and into the new, we can see that you are a promise keeping and promise making God. Help us to rest in your character instead of our frenzy this holiday season.
Lead us by your spirit. In Jesus name. Amen. Amen. Thank you for joining me today on the WellSoul podcast for our story of the gospel journey. I invite you to subscribe to the WellSoul Advent emails, link is in the show notes, and every day you will receive an email with an encouragement to live with a well soul all through the month of December leading up to Christmas.
It is my gift to you for being a faithful listener on the WellSoul podcast. See the links and then show notes to join us for free in closing. I remember my late friend, Brian Vasquez, who made this podcast possible. God bless you. And I pray that you have a well soul.