It’s good to be with you once more. I’m speaking this week about personal relationships and I’ve started by looking at the cross, the great symbol of the Christian faith and I’ve pointed out that the two beams of the cross, the vertical and the horizontal, symbolize two different directions of relationships. The vertical speaks of relationships with God, the horizontal speaks of relationships with God’s people.

Today I want to go on to speak more specifically about the vertical beam, about personal relationship with God. I’m going to explain the only basis on which God will enter into such a relationship with man. I’m going to start by reading from Psalm 50, the first five verses:

“The Mighty One, God, the Lord, has spoken, And summoned the earth from the rising of the sun to its setting. Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God has shone forth. May our God come [other versions say ‘Our God shall come’] and not keep silence; Fire devours before Him, And it is very tempestuous around Him. He summons the heavens above, And the earth, to judge His people: ‘Gather My godly ones to Me, Those who have made a covenant with Me by sacrifice.’” (NAS)

Clearly this is a preview of the personal return of the Lord Jesus Christ in glory and power at the close of this age. The main purpose that is spoken of here is to gather His people to Himself and He calls out, “Gather My godly ones to Me, those who have made a covenant with Me by sacrifice.” There is a very important definition there. Who are the “godly ones”? Who, indeed, are His people? The answer in Scripture is “those who have made a covenant with God by sacrifice.” More literally, the Hebrew says, “Those who cut My covenant on the basis of sacrifice.” In other words, the godly ones, the people who truly belong to Christ, are those who have entered into relationship with God that’s based on a sacrifice. It’s a covenant relationship. And that is the only basis of relationship which God will accept, a covenant based with a sacrifice. If we look through the history of the Bible we see that every time God wanted to establish an enduring relationship with man, He did it through a covenant that was based on a sacrifice. That’s how He made a covenant with Noah, that’s how He made a covenant with Abraham, that’s how He made a covenant with Israel and that also is how He made His covenant with the church.

The description of the making of the covenant between Jesus and the church is found in Matthew 26:27–28. This is the end of the Last Supper and it says here:

“And He [that is, Jesus] took a cup and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, ‘Drink from it, all of you; for this is My blood of the covenant, which is to be shed on behalf of many for forgiveness of sins.’” (NAS)

We see that the only way into the covenant was by drinking of that blood which was the blood of the covenant. Jesus is very emphatic. He says, “Drink of it, all of you.” In other words, there is no other way you can come into the covenant but through the blood which speaks of the sacrifice. Now the sacrifice of the New Covenant is the death of Jesus. It’s important for us to understand that from this aspect the death of Jesus was a sacrifice. In fact, it was the sacrifice that consummated all other sacrifices recorded in the Bible. This is clearly stated in Hebrews. Chapter 9:26 says of Jesus:

“...but now once at the consummation [of the ages] He has been manifest

Relationship With God

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