God will reign over all the nations of the earth through His covenant people.

This is the thread that runs through the entire Bible. It’s the goal behind creation, the reason for every covenant, the purpose of Israel, the mission of Jesus, and the calling of the Church.

There are three major covenant periods:

1. Unconditional covenants: God tells Abraham He will bless all nations through his offspring. He tells David his throne will last forever. These covenants declare the destination.
2. Conditional covenant: At Sinai, God lays out what it would look like for His people to live under His reign—a holy nation, a priestly people. But faithfulness is required, and sin brings consequences.
3. Fulfilled covenant: In Jesus, God fulfills the entire covenant story. Through His death and resurrection, Jesus established a covenant that cannot be broken—a covenant that empowers people to live under God’s reign by the Spirit.

The early church understood this well. But when the Greeks translated berit—the Hebrew word for covenant, which never meant a will or testament—they used the word diathēkē, which could mean either covenant or will. Then, over time, the Hebrew Scriptures were labeled the “Old Testament.”

But that translation had nothing to do with the actual covenants in the Hebrew Scriptures. Yet now, many people read Old Testament as Old Covenant—and assume the whole thing is obsolete. So we just stick to the New Testament, thanks!

Really all the the scriptures say is that the Mosaic covenant is now obsolete. Like John the Baptist’s ministry, the Mosaic covenant prepared a people for the reign of the King. Israel was called to be a holy nation in the sight of other nations. The old covenant was meant to display God’s rule while pointing forward to something greater. And like John, it had to step aside when the King arrived: “He must increase, I must decrease.”

Jesus fulfilled the covenants with Abraham and David, becoming a blessing to all nations as King of the earth through his church, his body, by His Spirit. This is the new covenant.