Here was a startlingly new view of a supreme monarch on the earth, a king who forgives law-breaking, and trespass, and evil, to anyone who seeks that forgiveness. He will not clear the guilty as long as they remain guilty. But they need not remain guilty before Him, for His law provides a way to His mercy. This means the guilty remain guilty until they are willing to meet God on the grounds of mercy which He institutes for their forgiveness. The Old Covenant and the New Covenant both describe that meeting between God and man. On man’s part confession of his sin with a repentance which includes making his wrongs right as far as it is possible to do so. On God’s part is the offer to forgive the sin of the sinner and to “cover “ him. in the Old Covenant the covering meant that sinner could remain in the congregation of the people of God. In the New Covenant forgiveness of sins is the remission of the sin, and a cleansing of the sinner from the sin itself; so that he may enter into the kingdom of God and dwell within the spiritual congregation of those who are heirs of eternal life.

The Old Covenant was a supreme wonder of the earth, in the world of that time, exactly on that account: MERCY OFFERED TO ALL. There was never any law in any other nation like it, for that very reason: Mercy offered to all. It is not true that there were other laws just as good, and much older, in other nations. For there was not any other nation in whose law was revealed such a LORD and such a GOD.

There were laws in other nations which recorded some things similar to the Law of Moses. Some of the knowledge of Eden-law filtered down through the centuries, in traditions from the flood, by the sons of Noah. But, the similarities which were found between ancient records of laws of other nations and the Law of Moses only increased the vividness of things which are dissimilar. For the laws of the nations were saturated with idolotry. The Law of Moses was a revelation of God Himself. That revelation of the LORD GOD in the Law was a separation between the Israel of God and “The Nations” of the world.

The revelation was limited, to a considerable degree, to the conditions of life of both the people Israel and the instrument Moses. It had to be a revelation which could be received by a people to whom the “new birth” was not yet given, although it was promised. The people were not capable of receivingthe new Covenant revelation of what Divine Love is. Nevertheless whoever entered into FAITH must have tasted that Love, for the simple reason that Faith, itself, is faith in the truth of the love of God.