Living Stream Ministry

II. CHRIST AS THE SERVANT OF JEHOVAH
SERVING GOD BY BEING A COVENANT AND A LIGHT
TO GOD’S CHOSEN PEOPLE THAT HE MAY BE
THE FULL SALVATION OF GOD

Christ as the Servant of Jehovah serves God by being a covenant and a light to God’s chosen people that He may be the full salvation of God (Isa. 42:5-7; 49:6, 8b-9a).

A. Christ as the Covenant to Be
the Salvation of God

The concept of many Christians is that Christ serves God by love, by gentleness, by humility, or by kindness. However, Isaiah was different. Isaiah said that this Servant of Jehovah serves God by being a covenant. The Lord Jesus said that He would serve us by giving up His life (Mark 10:45), that is, by His death. Christ served us by dying for us, and that was to serve us by being a covenant. He said that He was the good Shepherd who would lay down His soulish life for the sheep that He might minister the divine life to them (John 10:10-11). Christ died for us that He might be life to us. These are the two things by which He serves God. He serves God by ministering life to us through His death and resurrection.

First, Christ established the new covenant according to God’s righteousness through His redeeming death (Matt. 26:28). Then, Christ is the righteousness of God to us for our justification (Rom. 3:22; Gal 2:16). Christ also has become the bequests, the reality, the surety, the Mediator, and the Executor of this new covenant, the new testament, in His resurrection, for our inheritance of the promise (Heb. 7:22; 9:15-17). In the new testament as a will, there are many promises. All these promises are the bequests of that will. Christ is everything for that will, and He is every item of that will. Eventually, He is the will. We have often said that without Christ the Bible is empty. Christ is the reality of the Bible. This means that Christ is the Bible. Without Christ, the new covenant, the new testament, is empty. Christ is the reality of the new testament; therefore, Christ is the new testament. It is impossible to separate Christ from the new testament. Now we can understand the logic by which God considers Christ to be a covenant given to us. Hence, Christ has become the new covenant as the new testament according to God’s righteousness to be the base of God’s full salvation, through His death and in His resurrection.

(Life-Study of Isaiah, Chapter 47, by Witness Lee)