By Liaf
No. I am NOT late for Valentine's Day in spite of the fact I made the background color pinkish because of the subject. However, we are in time for what is traditionally called "Easter". Readers of this site know I prefer "Firstfruits", a name given to the Hebrew feast day that foreshadowed Christ's resurrection.
However, we may be familiar with the famous Biblical passage of Ezekiel 11:17-20:
Therefore say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; I will even gather you from the people, and assemble you out of the countries where ye have been scattered, and I will give you the land of Israel. And they shall come thither, and they shall take away all the detestable things thereof and all the abominations thereof from thence. And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them an heart of flesh: That they may walk in my statutes, and keep mine ordinances, and do them: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God.
There's another similar passage in Ezekiel 36 regarding Israel's end-time return to the land of Israel and the replacement of the old stony heart with a new heart. I'm sure many people perceive the stony heart as one of coldness and indifference. Nobody wants to say they have a stony heart. On the other hand, a "heart of flesh" oftentimes is seen as a tender, loving heart. After all, isn't that how the Israelites ought to become when their eyes are finally opened to Christ? This is all very touching and sentimental, I'm sure. However, laying the sentimentality aside, the stony heart represents the covenant of the Law written on stone. The heart of flesh is Christ Himself who came in the flesh. The new heart of flesh (Christ) will be manifested in the hearts of the Israelites when they no longer follow the letter of the Law which kills as Paul said, but follow after the righteousness of Christ in their hearts.
II Corinthians 3:6: Who also hath made us able ministers of the new testament; not of the letter, but of the spirit: for the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life.
Indeed, this is how the Israelites will be empowered to follow God's statues and ordinances--- for the heart of stone was unable and too weak to follow the letter that killeth, but the heart of flesh, that is Christ, gives life.
How can we be sure of that interpretation? The Bible interprets itself. There is another famous passage in Jeremiah 31:31-34 (also quoted in the NT) that states:
Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah: Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith the LORD: But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people. And they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the LORD: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the LORD; for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.
The theme is unmistakably the same--- the idea of an old covenant they broke (the stony heart) and the new covenant they would receive (the fleshy heart) by which they would become empowered to know the Lord. And if I may add a quick side note here, notice the passage only mentions the house of Israel and not Judah in the latter part. This suggests to me that there will be a forerunner of this new covenant first with the house of Israel (the "age of grace" or "church age"). This is in agreement with what the NT taught. Later, ALL ISRAEL will become benefactors of this covenant.
This is my message for now! That's it! During the upcoming "Easter" season where we speak of new life in Christ by His resurrection, I just wanted us to all be aware what the "stony heart" v.s. the "heart of flesh" meant. I want us to lay aside our tear-jerking sentiments and understand Scripture. This is one of countless examples of duality in the Scripture, and in this case the duality is the stony heart/fleshy heart, the Old Covenant/New Covenant, and Law/Grace.