For I have given my word to the Lord, and I cannot go back on it.
A covenant is a contract. Like any contract, when broken it incurs a penalty. In the olden days, covenants were ratified by a vow or oath (spoken promises), and sometimes sealed by blood. Interestingly, God does not handle covenants with levity.
To demonstrate this very important characteristics of God, lets look at two case studies where people have seemingly made oaths or vows by trickery or error, and see God’s perspective on these matters.
Amidst a very tense battle, Jephthah made a vow;
And Jephthah made a vow to the Lord, and said, “If You will indeed deliver the people of Ammon into my hands, then it will be that whatever comes out of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return in peace from the people of Ammon, shall surely be the Lord’s, and I will offer it up as a burnt offering.”
On his return, his daughter was the one who came to meet him. An only child, a loving daughter. In despair he said;
For I have given my word to the Lord, and I cannot go back on it.
Little wonder why his name was mentioned among the greats in Paul’s list of God’s Generals.
The most fascinating account has to be that of the Gibeonites. When they heard the fame of the children of Israel, they hatched a plan to lure them into a covenant. You really have to commend their ingenuity! They pretended to be from a far country, securing a covenant of peace through flattery. Hundreds of years later, King Saul broke this covenant in his misguided zeal for his subjects. This however led to a famine for three years, years after his demise. And seven of his descendants had to given-up as atonement for his error.
Friends, like Rizpah (Saul’s concubine) who watched over the bodies of the seven innocent people as they hung on the mountain, God almighty watches every word he has spoken to perform!
Vows, oaths and covenants are not to be handled with levity – no excuses… Our God is a covenant keeping God.
~ Sabali
Healingsprings fellowship 