Pneumatology: God’s Law Written on Hearts
Christians have often misunderstood God’s promise to write His law on His people’s hearts, in Jer 31.33. Christians have interpreted it as a promise fulfilled by the new relationship we have with the Holy Spirit since Pentecost. This interpretation implies the erroneous idea that before Pentecost God’s people only had the external impetus of the Mosaic law to lead them in the path of righteousness, but since Pentecost we have the indwelling of the Spirit to guide us in our obedience to God. This is a serious distortion of the real history of the Holy Spirit’s ministry to God’s people.To interpret what it really means for God to “put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts,” we first apply the rule of Context (Hermeneutics Principle 11). Remember that the rule of Context doesn’t simply point us to the verses before and after Jer 31.33, but also to the historical and cultural context within which the prophecy was given. Studying our context quickly causes us to recognize that Jeremiah did not address this prophecy to the first believers after Pentecost nor to first-century Christians in general nor to believers during the “church age.” It was addressed to the people of Israel and Judah (Jer 30.03-04; 31.01,02,04,27,31), also referred to as Jacob (Jer 30.10,18), Zion (Jer 30.17), Ephraim (Jer 31.06,09,18,20) Rachel’s children (Jer 31.15), and those with whose forefathers God made a covenant when He took them out of Egypt (Jer 31.32). While the prophecy certainly has application to Christian believers, it is primarily about the spiritual and geographical restoration of national Israel at the time when they will wholeheartedly embrace God and their Messiah whom God will raise up for them (Jer 30.09). And remember that in Jeremiah’s time, Israel/Judah as a nation was far from God. Generally, speaking their religion at best consisted only of external observances, while at worst they engaged in open idolatry. Therefore, the promise of God’s laws being written on people’s hearts is not about a new ministry of the Spirit after Pentecost, but about a revival of love and obedience toward God on the part of national Israel.
Furthermore, we must not think that since God will write His law on the people’s hearts in the future He had never written them on people’s hearts during Jeremiah’s time or before. On the contrary, all true believers throughout time have had God’s laws written on their hearts. We discover this by applying the principle of Internal Consistency (HP 9). We apply this rule when we do something as simple as checking cross references in our Bible’s margins. We look for other passages in Scripture that confirm or negate what we think our passage under scrutiny may mean. If we thought that Jer 31.33 meant that writing God’s laws on people’s hearts was a previously unknown ministry of the Holy Spirit, cross references quickly set us straight. In 1000 BC, David described his own experience of the law written in his heart in Psa 40.08:
“I desire to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart.”David also spoke of this quality of having God’s laws written on one’s heart as characteristic of the righteous man:
Psa 37.30 The mouth of the righteous man utters wisdom, and his tongue speaks what is just. 31 The law of his God is in his heart; his feet do not slip.We may also compare the words of Psalm 119:
Psa. 119.111 Your statutes are my heritage forever; they are the joy of my heart. 112 My heart is set on keeping your decrees to the very end.Now, a proper understanding of man’s fallenness and the natural state of his heart (Jer 17.09), compels us to believe that a good heart that loves God and His laws can only be produced by the Holy Spirit (1Co 06.11; 1Pe 1.02). Therefore, we must conclude that the Holy Spirit has always been writing God’s laws on the hearts of those who manifest a devotion to God. More than that, the Spirit has even been writing God’s laws on the hearts of unbelievers, Jew and Gentile, providing all men with a conscience (Rom 2.15)!
What then does Jeremiah’s prophecy that God will write His laws on the hearts of Israel and Judah mean? Not that Israel had never had His laws written on their hearts before (see Deu 30.14)! To suggest this is to interpret the final part of Jer 31.33 as meaning that God had never been Israel’s God before and they had never been God’s people before. Rather than this absurd interpretation, we must recognize that the promise is to restore Israel and Judah to the ideal relationship with God to which they had once aspired. This restoration or return is a common theme in Jeremiah and it is a matter of the heart:
Jer. 24.7 I will give them a heart to know me, that I am the LORD. They will be my people, and I will be their God, for they will return to me with all their heart.The promise then, is for a full spiritual restoration of Israel, a complete relational healing between them and their God. This revival will differ from others in that every person in the nation will turn to God (Jer 31.34) and the externals of the law, historically so important to Israel, will become superfluous to their essential relationship with YHWH. The new future spiritual state of the nation, essentially a new covenant, will be mediated by Messiah Himself with the expectation that, as a nation, Israel will never again apostatize to hypocritical, external religion. The Holy Spirit will be the architect behind the scenes of this revival and sanctification of the nation as He has been behind every other revival and sanctifying work.
What application does this prophecy have for Christian believers? First, the prophecy serves as an apologetic to demonstrate that the Mosaic covenant as understood by the first century rabbis was inadequate (Heb 08.06-13). Secondly, Jeremiah’s prophecy serves as a reminder to both Jew and Gentile that the only effectual covenant is a covenant of the heart (Mar 07.06; Rom 02.15; 10.9; Heb 10.19-22; 1Pe 3.15; cf. 2Co 3.3; 5.12).
What does all this teach us about the Person and Work of the Holy Spirit? That, consistent with the hermeneutical principle of Already/Not Yet (HP 17), the Holy Spirit was already writing God’s law on Israelite hearts in Jeremiah’s time and before, even as He is writing it on the hearts of Jews who are receiving Messiah today, BUT He is not yet writing God’s law on the hearts of Israelites in the ubiquitous way that He will in the future when Messiah reigns on earth.
posted by Roderick of TMin @ 4:51 PM
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