He Is Faithful, When We Are Faithless
The whole account of God’s relation to humanity begins with God’s creation of man and woman for perfect union and relationship with Him. There is to be this perfect friendship between humanity and God. He walks in the cool of evening with them and they talk and visit together face to face, man is in the very presence of God. How amazing this must have been, and yet it was not to last. For man sinned and rebelled against God. Adam and Eve deserved to be wiped from the face of the earth in that very instant. God could have and would have been justified in simply starting over at that moment. Instead, however, we see a God who commits himself to humanity and he begins to provide a way for their relationship to be perfectly restored. We know it as the proto-evangelion (the first gospel). God says to the serpent who deceived Adam and Eve, “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.” Jesus would come and crush the head of the serpent and provide a means of restoring humanity to God. The story continues on this way, that even when man is unfaithful and rebellious God remains faithful to them. A clear support for this is found in the Covenants of God.
The first mention of the word “covenant” is the pre-diluvian world where God spares the life of Noah and his family just before wiping out the rest of the world. Why does God choose to spare Noah? The text tells us that Noah is a righteous man, a man who walks with God. So the Lord spares his life, and makes a covenant with him. But the man does not remain “righteous,”[1] for we find him, after the flood drunk, passed out, and flashing everyone in the camp.[2] So does God wash Noah from the face of the earth too? No, instead he reaffirms the covenant with him and with his children.
Next, the Covenant with Abraham begins with a clear indication that God alone initiates this contract in which He binds himself in a promise to the sinful man.[3] God is the one who walks through the divided parts of the sacrifice, not Abraham, who is in fact asleep. Walking through a divided sacrificial animal was a common covenantal practice in the ancient Eastern world. It implied, if I do not live up to my end of this contract may what happened to this animal happen to me. In this example God walks through the divided parts to say to Abraham, “If I do not fulfill to you the promises that I have made then may I be divided in two.” It is a bold commitment for God to make, especially when we consider that He already knows Abraham will be unfaithful. Abraham doesn’t trust God to provide him a son, so he sleeps with his maidservant, Hagar, in order to secure the promises of God by illegitimate means. God again would have been justified in starting over. He could have rightly broken off his contract with Abraham and picked a new forefather for His future people. But God, again in mercy, remained faithful even when Abraham was unfaithful.
The covenant continued after Abraham with his children who were equally unfaithful and ridiculous. Abraham’s son and grandson both follow in their forefather’s steps and at various stages in their lives fail to trust God. Isaac fears for his life and so lies about his wife. Jacob steals his brother’s birth right and runs away to hide. These are not exactly honorable men, and yet with each of them God renews the covenant. By the time Israel goes into captivity in Egypt the key players in this story of redemption are cowardly, lying, cheating, despicable men. Joseph’s brothers sell him into slavery because of their own jealousy, and Joseph probably deserved it because he was a spoiled brat…and yet through it all God remains ever faithful to His promise. What an amazingly gracious God.
[1] It should be said that I don’t think Moses is here contending that Noah was actually a perfectly moral/righteous person. Rather he is stating in common language that Noah was a man who loved and served God, in this sense was he righteous. But we see, even in the following chapter, that Noah was still a sinner who needed salvation.
[2] The Hebrew niphal verb in this text is reflexive and thereby implies that Noah exposed himself. I am persuaded that this means he was flashing everyone. Nonetheless it may be contended simply that he lay “uncovered.”
[3] See Genesis 15:1-20. Pay special attention to the language which states that “on that day God made a covenant with Abram.”
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