They’ve been adopted as God’s children. God’s glory belongs to them, and so do the covenants. They received the law and they were taught to worship in the temple. They were given the promises,
Remember that you used to be separated from Christ. You weren’t considered to be citizens of Israel, and so you didn’t have a share in what the covenants promised. You were without hope and without God in the world.
The Spirit you received doesn’t make you slaves who live in fear again. Instead, the Spirit you received has made you God’s genuine child by adoption. And the Spirit leads us to call out to God, “Abba, Father.”
They deal only with food and drink and different kinds of ceremonial washings, which are rules about the outside of a person. They had to be followed only until the new covenant came.
“Listen to another story. A certain man owned some land and planted a vineyard on it. He put up a wall around it, dug a pit for a winepress, and built a lookout tower. Then he rented the vineyard out to some farmers and moved to another place.
It’s the same with the promises that God made to Abraham and to his seed. Scripture doesn’t say, “and to your seeds.” That would mean many people. It says, “and to your seed.” That means one person—Christ.
Above the ark, where God showed his glory, there were cherubim made of gold. They spread their wings over the place where sin was paid for. But we can’t discuss these things in detail now.