ICS Daily Devotions
Act on Your Covenant Rights
1 Samuel 17:26 (NKJV) Then David spoke to the men who stood by him, saying, “What shall be done for the man who kills this Philistine and takes away the reproach from Israel? For who is this uncircumcised Philistine, that he should defy the armies of the living God?”
If we want to be a trailblazer in the walk of faith, we need to know our covenant rights. One of the very things that set David apart from King Saul and the army of Israel is the knowledge of the covenant rights and privileges that Israel had with God. In the Old Testament, only the Jewish nation was in a covenant relationship with God; in the New Testament, all believers of Jesus Christ are in a covenant relationship with God because of the shed blood of Christ which has established a new, better and lasting covenant for us. We can be fearless in the face of a crisis because we know that the God of our covenant, whom we worship, is trustworthy and dependable.
The entire outcome of the encounter with Goliath changed because one man among the whole crowd knew his rights. David acted on his rights with his covenant partner and invoked God to act on their behalf.
Genesis 17:9-11(NKJV) And God said to Abraham: “As for you, you shall keep My covenant, you and your descendants after you throughout their generations. This is My covenant which you shall keep, between Me and you and your descendants after you: Every male child among you shall be circumcised; and you shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between Me and you.”
Why did David differentiate between the circumcised and the uncircumcised people in the verse from 1 Samuel 17:26 above? For the Jewish people in the Old Testament, physical circumcision was the sign that they were in a covenant relationship with God and that they were in compliance with His instruction to Abraham in Genesis Chapter 17. This is why David referred to Goliath as the “uncircumcised Philistine” who had no covenant with God, yet dared to take on the army of Israel which had a covenant with God.
In the Old Testament, the Jews were God’s chosen people and set apart as a nation that had a covenant with God. Praise to the Lord that in the New Testament, all of us have been set apart to live out sanctified and consecrated lives unto the Lord when we accepted Jesus Christ. As part of His finished work through the cross, He has established a new and everlasting covenant with all believers which involves a circumcision of the heart instead of a circumcision of our physical bodies.
Romans 2:29 (NKJV) But he is a Jew, which is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the Spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not from men, but from God.
Sermon Series: Trailblazer
