The Politics of Responsibility

So God heard their groaning; and God remembered His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.  Exodus 2:24  NASB

Covenant – I suppose the first thing we need to address in this verse is the possibility that God forgot about His covenant and it took the groaning of the people to remind Him.  At least, that’s what this translation might suggest.  When we use the word “remember,” we often assume that whatever is remembered must have been forgotten.  But that’s not what the Hebrew verb zākar implies.  Zākar has a wide range of meanings: “think (about), meditate (upon), pay attention (to); remember, recollect; mention, declare, recite, proclaim, invoke, commemorate, accuse, confess.”^[1]  So, we could legitimately render this verse as “God thought about His covenant” or “God paid attention to His covenant,” neither one implying that God ever lost track of His promise.  The NASB choice isn’t very helpful

Now that we’ve settled that issue, let’s look at the more important one.  What does bĕrit (covenant) really mean?

a treaty, alliance of friendship; between individuals: a pledge or agreement; with obligation between a monarch and subjects: a constitution; between God and man: a covenant accompanied by signs, sacrifices, and a solemn oath that sealed the relationship with promises of blessing for keeping the covenant and curses for breaking it^[2]

This definition has some important implications for societal governance:

More than any other type of politics, covenant makes demands on its citizens.  A covenantal society is one in which everyone had responsibilities as well as rights; in which everyone is expected to study and understand the law as well as keep it; in which parents are duty bound to tell the story of freedom to their children; in which we are collectively as well as individually responsible for the common good.[3]

To enter into the covenant God has with Israel is to accept the responsibilities associated with that covenant.  Among other things, this means doing justice, loving ḥesed, and following in God’s ways (Micah 6:8).  What is quite clear is that some elements of this kind of governance are found in Western civilization common law, but it is equally clear that these basic assumptions about the fabric of a society are under attack today.  As Jonathan Sacks wrote: 

“We must earn our freedom if we are to keep it.”[4]  

God designed His kingdom around the idea of covenant.  That means He expects the citizens of this kingdom to act in covenantal ways, and to do that every citizen has a responsibility to fight for biblical freedom.  Egyptomania cannot be incorporated into the Kingdom, as forty years in the wilderness demonstrated.  Today we long for a society that emulates this covenantal arrangement, but I wonder if we are willing to actually fight for it.

Topical Index: covenant, responsibility, Exodus 2:24