Blessed Generation (Second Edition): Understanding Covenant and Inheritance. Kenny Mokoena

not put a condition on himself but he put a condition on God. In the first part of his statement from verse 20 to verse 21, he was not even talking to God but to himself. It even looks more like he was thinking than talking. It was only in verse 22 that he spoke directly to God when he said, “… and of all that You give me I will surely give a tenth to You.” In verse 22 Jacob tells God that he will only tithe out of what God would give him. Jacob challenged God to perform and made his tithe to be a response. This is where Jacob got it right. He did not try to manipulate the blessing by his action, his vow was to respond to what God was going to do. Look at the last part of verse 22 “…and of all that You give me I will surely give a tenth to You.”

      Dear reader, let God be first in your life. To tithe and then expect God to do something for you is equal to placing yourself before God and at a level higher than Him. When we try to perform for God, we reject His covenant of grace and make the cross of Christ to be of no effect in our lives.

      There is nothing that God requires from us except worship, that’s why you cannot find a scripture in the New Testament where God instructs us to tithe. God wants the tithe to originate from the heart and not from the law. Tithing is not worship if it is based on obedience to a law. Many teachings in our Churches today focus on tithing as an act of obedience and as a pre-requisite for the blessing. This is the reason why our people are not consistent in tithing. They tithe for two months and then take a break for three months. When things go bad then they start tithing again thinking that the bad things are happening because they did not tithe. They see bad things as evidence of the curse in their lives. If you are born-again, you are redeemed from the curse of disobedience (Galatians 3:13).

      There is more to the tithe than tithing to avoid a curse. Jacob’s vow to tithe was not a vow to obey because God never told him to tithe. It was a vow to worship because God promised to be generous to him. An alter in the New Testament is not a place of sacrifice, but a place of worship because the ultimate sacrifice, Jesus Christ, has already been laid on it. If you tithe, do so from a willing heart and from a heart of gratitude. You must only tithe because you see and appreciate the grace of God upon your life, that’s worship. Those who understand biblical covenant relate with God this way.

      When you see God as He depicts Himself in Genesis 28:13-15, there will be an urge for you to worship Him. Material things, when offered willingly to God, are received as worship. Your money is a very important symbol of worship to God, not because God wants your money but because it represents your heart (Matthew 6:21). In Matthew 15:8 Jesus said, “These people draw near to Me with their mouth, and honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me.” When Abraham offered his son Isaac to God, he was offering his heart and God received the offering as worship. Tithing transcends mere lip service as worship.

      Understanding New Testament Inheritance

      The bible is about the interpretation of a Testament. A testament is a Will. Without understanding the Law of Succession, it is impossible to fully understand the interpretation of the New Testament. For you to fully comprehend your role as an heir or beneficiary in the Kingdom of God and to be able to take possession of your inheritance, you must have a revelation of the New Testament. If you don’t, you will continue to live as a slave when you are actually the owner of the estate. The big brother of the prodigal son lived as a slave when he was a joint heir in his father’s estate (Luke 15:28-31).

      A testament is the wishes of the Testator which he records while he is still alive but to be implemented only after his death. The content of the Testament cannot be in force as long as the person who wrote it is still alive. A testament comes into force when the Testator dies. There are three very important and crucial role players in a Testament. The first is the Testator (the one who writes the Testament), then the Executor (the one vested with the authority to explain and implement it) and finally the Heir or Beneficiary (the one who inherits the estate).

      The Testator appoints the Executor before his death and informs the beneficiary about who the Executor is. Jesus is the Testator of the New Testament, the Holy Spirit is the Executor and the Church is the beneficiary. If one of the three role players is missing, the testament cannot be implemented. This book is about the interpretation of the New Testament so that the beneficiary, the Church, can take possession of the inheritance.

      In John 16:12-15 Jesus informed the Church about who the Executor of the New Testament is.

      John 16:12-15 | AMPC

      “I have still many things to say to you, but you are not able to bear them or to take them upon you or to grasp them now. But when He, the Spirit of Truth (the Truth-giving Spirit) comes, He will guide you into all the Truth (the whole, full Truth). For He will not speak His own message [on His own authority]; but He will tell whatever He hears [from the Father; He will give the message that has been given to Him], and He will announce and declare to you the things that are to come [that will happen in the future]. He will honor and glorify Me, because He will take of (receive, draw upon) what is Mine and will reveal (declare, disclose, transmit) it to you. Everything that the Father has is Mine. That is what I meant when I said that He [the Spirit] will take the things that are Mine and will reveal (declare, disclose, transmit) it to you.”

      I like the part where Jesus says “He will honour and glorify Me, because He will take (receive, draw upon) what is Mine and will reveal (declare, disclose, transmit) it to you. Everything that the Father has is Mine.” Jesus appointed the Holy Spirit as the one who will execute the Testament on His behalf. The Testament is executed when the Holy Spirit takes what belongs to the Lord and reveals or declares it to us. This means that without the Holy Spirit, we cannot receive what the Lord intended for us to have. Jesus further said that He will be honoured and glorified when the Holy Spirit has taken what is His and transmit it to us. The book of 1 Corinthians 2:12 says that “we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God that we might know the things that are freely given to us by God.” This is an inheritance statement and it makes it clear that we can only know what is freely given to us through revelation by the Spirit of God. The Holy Spirit is the Executor of the Estate.

      The most important part of the New Testament is set out by the writer of the book of Hebrews is chapter 8:10-13, the main clause being “For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more” recorded in verse 12.

      Hebrews 8:10-13

      “For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws in their mind and write them on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. None of them shall teach his neighbor, and none his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them. For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more.” In that He says, “A new covenant,” He has made the first obsolete. Now what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.”

      I like the part where God says, “and I will be their God, and they shall be my people”. Look at the order, God is not saying “they shall be my people, and I shall be their God” This is very crucial because God is establishing Himself as our source. He is placing Himself first and place us second. He is the one who performs, not us. Our part is only to receive. I want you to also notice something very important in this new covenant, there are no conditions attached to it and where there is no condition, only faith is required. All we need to do to partake in the covenant is to believe. What makes the promise sure is our faith and what guarantees the promise is the Holy Spirit. In this covenant, it’s all about God dispensing His goodness to His people. Verse 13 says, “In that He says, ‘A new covenant,’ He has made the first obsolete.” The dictionary defines the word “obsolete” as “no longer produced or used; out of date”.

      The time has come for the body of Christ to take advantage of the new covenant. We need to know its power and significance. We must believe that God is merciful to our unrighteousness, and that our sins and our lawless deeds are