Better Promises - Hebrews 8:7-13

Scripture

• Hebrews 8:7–13

About this sermon

We said, this morning, that the writer of Hebrews does something very interesting with Jeremiah 31:31-34 which he quotes from the Septuagint. It is the longest quotation in the New Testament. And he does something quite unexpected with it. He doesn’t exposit it. He just leaves it there. Now, he isn’t going to leave it there for long. Just as he has done with Psalm 110:1-4, he is doing to do with this section. He gets the entire section out there before our eyes, and then in the verses that follow he teaches from it. He will amplify the meaning and the implications of this section. But here, in our text, he has one point that he wishes to make. His point is this: As soon as God spoke of a new covenant, the Old Covenant was on the clock. That is what he means in verse 13 when he says that the first was obsolete. When God promised a new covenant he made the first one dated.