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Bonds

Scripture

Verses on Bonds

Direction of Change

Do I eat because I am hungry, or do I eat because the clock flips to twelve o’clock? Am I motivated because of the internal or because of the external? Do I function on body time or by mechanical time?

Russian scientist Ivan Pavlov pioneered experiments testing these psychological motivations, known as classical conditioning. Through repetition he conditioned dogs to associate the sound of a bell with food. When the bell rang, the dogs salivated. After a while the stimulus elicited a reaction whether or not food was delivered. Their minds transformed into formulaic machines: bell=food.

I am just like one of Pavlov’s dogs. I try to reduce a covenant relationship with God to formula. He calls me to love him, and I prefer to obey the rules. When will I understand that behavior modification never works?

Old Covenant/New Covenant

Life is not fair. How often did my mom remind me after I returned home from yet another day of childhood injustice?

“I know,” “I know,” I would say, but inside something craved the fairness I adamantly thought I deserved. It is not fair for everyone, but it should be fair for me, I argued with myself. I want the extra helping, the lucky break and the extra provision. I want things I don’t deserve. And yet simultaneously, I want to deserve them.

I had a simple code: mercy for me, justice for them.

Entailments of a Covenant

I sat in a wooden pew. Candles lit the altar and illuminated the shadows of the ornately cavernous chapel ceiling. Organs and bagpipes sang traditional songs, and a radiant woman dressed in white walked expectantly down the long aisle on the arm of her father, who smiled with both joy and sadness.

Weddings allow us to glimpse the eternal and taste the holy. They reflect with a shimmering truth the promises and prospects to come. We were created to be united, to join in love and in relationship.

But the union comes at a price and is sealed with a promise. Two cannot transform into one without a death. And a covenant that unites entails the cost of a life. In the Old Testament, an animal sacrifice marked the creation of a covenant. The body was divided in half, and blood flowed as a result of the creation through division.

What is a Covenant?

God created a covenant with a human. And we have absolutely no idea what that means. What is a covenant? Why would he create one with us?

Webster defines “covenant” in theological terms as “an agreement that brings about a relationship of commitment between God and his people.” But this description lacks something. A thesaurus offers the synonyms: contract, agreement, undertaking, commitment, guarantee, warrant, pledge, promise. Yet how does this archaic lingo and apparently cryptic contracts impact my world?

History of a Covenant

Raised high, a muscled arm and calloused hand holds a knife, sharp and glinting in the afternoon sun. In one quick, steady motion, the arm thrusts downward, and the blade finds its mark on the spine of the lamb.

The man guides the knife, from the point of entry down the back of the animal. Two halves result. Through this division, small rivers of blood flow freely, mortally marking the event with a sacred solemnity.

The world exists in a similar show of division, contrasting opposites and complementary halves abound; black and white, light and dark, left and right. In the Old Testament, we observe the existence of blessings and curses — the results of the adherence to or deviation from a covenant.