13th Sep 26 | 04:00
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Restoring the marriage relationship with God
📖 Acts 13:13-48
115 – Sat, 23 Aug 2025 – *Restoring the marriage relationship with God*- _Acts 13:13-48_ – THE TEACHING AT THE SYNAGOGUE IN ANTIOCH PISIDIA – _Romans 11:11-14_
_Acts 13:40-41 *Beware* therefore, lest what has been spoken in the prophets come upon you: (41) ‘BEHOLD, YOU DESPISERS, MARVEL AND PERISH! FOR I WORK A WORK IN YOUR DAYS, A WORK WHICH YOU WILL BY NO MEANS BELIEVE, THOUGH ONE WERE TO DECLARE IT TO YOU.' "_
The Lord has provided the new covenant relationship for His people, His wife, His church, which consists of both Jews and Gentiles, so that we can be reconciled with Him. We cannot be casual and negligent about the new covenant relationship that God has set in place through the blood of Jesus shed on the cross.
_Hebrews 10:28-31 Anyone who has rejected Moses' law dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. (29) Of how much worse punishment, do you suppose, will he be thought worthy who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, *counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified a common thing*, and insulted the Spirit of grace? (30) For we know Him who said, "VENGEANCE IS MINE, I WILL REPAY," says the Lord. And again, "THE LORD WILL JUDGE HIS PEOPLE." (31) It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God._
The writer to the Hebrews is referring to the overall perspective of the Old Covenant. _Deuteronomy 17:2-7 "If there is found among you, within any of your gates which the LORD your God gives you, a man or a woman who has been *wicked in the sight of the LORD your God, in transgressing His covenant*, (3) who has gone and served other gods and worshiped them, either the sun or moon or any of the host of heaven, which I have not commanded, (4) and it is told you, and you hear of it, then you shall inquire diligently. And if it is indeed true and certain that such an abomination has been committed in Israel, (5) then you shall bring out to your gates that man or woman who has committed that wicked thing, and shall stone to death that man or woman with stones. (6) *Whoever is deserving of death shall be put to death on the testimony of two or three witnesses*; he shall not be put to death on the testimony of one witness. (7) The hands of the witnesses shall be the first against him to put him to death, and afterward the hands of all the people. So you shall put away the evil from among you._
Considering this as the background, the warning pertains to the reception of the new covenant. God’s word is telling us categorically that the Lord will judge His church if we have not been faithful in the new covenant of marriage with Him. God is a God of vengeance.
Let us consider the accusation against Stephen. _Acts 6:13-15 They also set up false witnesses who said, "This man does not cease to speak blasphemous words against this holy place and the law; (14) for we have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy this place and change the customs which Moses delivered to us." (15) And all who sat in the council, looking steadfastly at him, saw his face as the face of an angel._
This accusation was both true as well as inaccurate. The Lord was indeed setting up a new covenant relationship with His church. The old covenant that came through Moses was being put aside. At the same time, the accusation did not consider the fact that the Lord God was restoring the marriage relationship with His people through the new covenant through the blood of Jesus. This is why Stephen was so rested in the Lord, for he was now in a deep, intimate relationship with Christ.
The Lord came to His own people, the Jews. It was to them that the opportunity was first given to be restored in the marriage covenant, but they were rejecting the Messiah. _Matthew 21:42-45 Jesus said to them, "Have you never read in the Scriptures: 'THE STONE WHICH THE BUILDERS REJECTED HAS BECOME THE CHIEF CORNERSTONE. THIS WAS THE LORD'S DOING, AND IT IS MARVELOUS IN OUR EYES'? (43) "Therefore I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to a nation bearing the fruits of it. (44) And whoever falls on this stone will be broken; but on whomever it falls, it will grind him to powder." (45) Now *when the chief priests and Pharisees heard His parables, they perceived that He was speaking of them*.
Paul longs for his people, the Jews, to be restored to God. The Gentiles coming into faith in Christ was to provoke the Jews to come back to God. _Romans 11:11-14 I say then, have they stumbled that they should fall? Certainly not! But through their fall, to provoke them to jealousy, salvation has come to the Gentiles. (12) Now if their fall is riches for the world, and their failure riches for the Gentiles, how much more their fullness! (13) For I speak to you Gentiles; inasmuch as I am an apostle to the Gentiles, I magnify my ministry, (14) if by any means I may provoke to jealousy those who are my flesh and save some of them._
Consider the heart of God that is restoring all of us, both Jews and Gentiles, back into a covenant marriage relationship with Him.
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