By John Thiel, First Angel’s Message, study 13, mp3

The second person of the Godhead the facility of ‘The Word’ was provided for our salvation.  This enlarged to us that the work of Jesus as our ransom was of such a degree and that he actually had to become the very package of paying us out of our captivity.  He did this by becoming one with us and by dying the death that we have to die.  This beautiful ransom will not be effective for us unless we have entered into the experience of the Old Covenant leading on into the New Covenant.  This is a process whereby we actually need to make an agreement with God that we will promise to keep His law but then fail miserably in our sincere efforts to keep it.  It is only through this experience that we can actually come to understand what the ransom is really all about.  Our failure to keep the Old Covenant provides us with a deeper appreciation of our great need for Christ’s atoning work through the New Covenant and it is the depth of our appreciation of the atonement that determines its effectiveness in our lives.  In the scriptures the New Covenant is also referred to as the everlasting covenant or the everlasting gospel which is the very presentation of the first angel.  As we commence our study we will bring to mind the detail of the covenant as entailed in Jeremiah. Read the rest of this entry →