The Three Testaments

“Then the LORD said to Moses, ‘Write down these words…And he wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant…When Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the two tablets of the Testimony…he was not aware that his face was radiant because he had spoken with the LORD” Exodus 34:27, 29.

By the time Moses received the Ten Commandments which would later be included in the Old Testament he was close to 80 years old.  He had spent most of life without the recognized fellowship with God that he now experienced.  After the burning bush experience he followed God completely and faithfully and the yield was just as much for us as it was for Moses and the people.  It is written that once Moses wrote the tablets of the Testimony the radiance of God was upon him that everyone witnessed. 

This got me thinking this morning about my own life.  When the direction of my life changed from me-focused to God-focused I began considering what God was doing in my daily attitudes and behaviors.  He was writing a new testament in my life and on my heart.  With each command to discontinue ‘this’ and take time for ‘that’ I felt freedom in places that had enslaved me and life in the graveyards of my heart. 

A testament is something that serves as tangible proof or evidence.  We only have to look as far as the radiance of the Lord on the face of Moses for our evidence.  God gave us the Old Testament through our ancestors and the New Testament as proof for the life of Christ Jesus.  But what about the third testament that is in the process of being written?  It is the living testament that is being written on your heart and on mine.  We are told to hold on tightly to the things that God reveals to us, and to tuck them securely in our hearts.  It is written that what God writes upon our hearts will be lifted to our minds through the Holy Spirit.  When this process happens we will reflect the beauty of Christ just as Moses did with God.  Our living testament will illuminate the radiance of God as we live out the commands written on our hearts. “Keep my commands and you will live; guard my teachings …write them on the tablet of your heart.” Proverbs 7:3

I am so grateful for the finished work of both the Old and New Testaments, and pray that each of us today will walk as living testaments giving proof to the power of God.