Shincheonji lesson 67: God’s covenant, Abraham and Revelation

Where SCJ’s reading conflicts with the Bible

This lesson uses Abraham as the model of faith for today. Just as he left without knowing where he was going, “We know that we’re supposed to flee to Mount Zion, but we don’t know exactly where it is or how to do this thing. Let’s be like Abraham.” It says students shouldn’t “demand that the Bible explicitly mentions everything.” It traces God’s covenants to Jeremiah 31’s new covenant, which Jesus set up at the Last Supper, and then says, “This is why I said Jeremiah 31 is about us, actually,” “About the people who will be alive at the time of Revelation.” It says believers will be part of the covenant “if they flee to the mountain,” and that if someone explains Revelation without talking about this, “they really don’t know what they’re talking about.” Abraham’s own story, as the New Testament tells it, points somewhere very different.

1. 1. Abraham was counted righteous by believing

   The lesson’s hope is “To learn from Abraham’s example and believe and have action according to the promise” of our time.

   • “Abram believed the Lord, and the Lord credited it as righteousness to him” (Genesis 15:6).
   • Paul’s whole point about Abraham is that righteousness comes by faith, not by works: “to the one who does not work, but believes in the one who declares the ungodly righteous, his faith is credited as righteousness” (Romans 4:5).
   • And Paul applies it directly to us, “to whom it will be credited, those who believe in the one who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead” (Romans 4:24).

   Abraham’s example is believing God’s promise, now fulfilled in Jesus’ resurrection. It isn’t a model for moving to an unnamed place.

2. 2. Abraham sought a heavenly city

   The lesson uses Hebrews 11:8 (“he went out without understanding where he was going”) to say students should flee to a Mount Zion they can’t yet locate.

   • God called Abraham personally and directly (Genesis 12:1). Hebrews 11:8 describes what Abraham did (Hebrews 11:8), not an instruction for later believers to follow a group to an unknown location.
   • Hebrews says what Abraham was really looking for: “he was looking forward to the city with firm foundations, whose architect and builder is God” (11:10). The patriarchs “aspire to a better land, that is, a heavenly one” (11:16).
   • And Hebrews tells believers where that city is: “you have come to Mount Zion, the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem” (12:22). Abraham’s hope and ours is God’s heavenly city, reached through Jesus. (See Lessons 44 and 63; Lesson 63’s new section isn’t live yet, so that link goes to the lesson page.)

3. 3. Not demanding that the Bible “explicitly mentions everything”

   • This lowers the bar for proof right when the course is about to make its biggest claims.
   • Scripture tells God’s people to test claims: “How can we tell that a message is not from the Lord?” (Deuteronomy 18:21-22). “But examine all things; hold fast to what is good” (1 Thessalonians 5:21). The Bereans checked even an apostle, “examining the scriptures carefully every day to see if these things were so” (Acts 17:11).
   • A claim that salvation depends on fleeing to a particular place should be clearly in Scripture. Being told not to expect that is a reason for more caution, not less.

4. 4. The covenant with Abraham was God’s unconditional promise

   The lesson moves from Abraham through Moses and the law to a new beginning: “Okay, time to start anew.”

   • In Genesis 15, “a smoking firepot with a flaming torch passed between the animal parts,” and “That day the Lord made a covenant with Abram” (15:17-18). It rested on God’s promise, not on Abraham’s performance.
   • Paul: “The law that came 430 years later does not cancel a covenant previously ratified by God, so as to invalidate the promise” (Galatians 3:17). “God graciously gave it to Abraham through the promise” (3:18).
   • “if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s descendants, heirs according to the promise” (Galatians 3:29).

   Abraham’s covenant is fulfilled in Christ and given to everyone who belongs to him. It doesn’t wait for a place to be found. (See Lesson 7.)

5. 5. A kingdom of priests: Already true of believers

   The lesson notes that Exodus 19:5-6 promised “a kingdom of priests,” but only if Israel obeyed (Exodus 19:5-6), and that Israel failed.

   • Peter gives those titles to believers in Christ: “you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation” (1 Peter 2:9).
   • Revelation opens the same way, to its first-century readers: “To the one who loves us and has set us free from our sins at the cost of his own blood and has appointed us as a kingdom, as priests serving his God and Father” (Revelation 1:5-6). It’s past tense. It was already true in John’s day.

6. 6. “Jeremiah 31 is about us, actually”

   The notes agree Jesus set up the new covenant at the Last Supper (Luke 22:14-20), but then say Jeremiah 31 is “About the people who will be alive at the time of Revelation. It was pointing to us.”

   • Hebrews quotes Jeremiah 31 and says it’s already in force: “now Jesus has obtained a superior ministry, since the covenant that he mediates is also better” (Hebrews 8:6). “When he speaks of a new covenant, he makes the first obsolete” (8:13).
   • Hebrews 10:15-18 quotes it again and concludes, “Now where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer any offering for sin” (Hebrews 10:18).
   • SCJ’s own The Creation of Heaven and Earth (p. 453) says, “The new work that God promised was accomplished when Jesus gave anyone who believed in him the right to become God’s son.” (See Lessons 7 and 58; Lesson 58’s new section isn’t live yet, so that link goes to the lesson page.)

   Jeremiah 31 is about everyone in the new covenant through Jesus’ blood, Christians today included. It isn’t a covenant still waiting for the time of Revelation.

7. 7. Jeremiah 31:22 and 31:27

   • The lesson reads Jeremiah 31:22’s “a woman will surround a man” as pregnancy, pointing to Mary and Jesus. The NET reads “something as unique as a woman protecting a man!” (Jeremiah 31:22). It’s a difficult verse. Some Christians have read it as pointing to Mary, and that’s a possible reading, but the context is God calling his people home from exile: “Return, my dear children of Israel” (31:21). It can’t carry much weight either way.
   • Jeremiah 31:27’s “people and animals” are a promise to repopulate the land: “I will cause people and animals to sprout up in the lands of Israel and Judah,” and “now I will see to it that they are built up and firmly planted” (31:27-28). They aren’t two kinds of seed from God and the devil. (See Lessons 15 and 61; Lesson 61’s new section isn’t live yet, so that link goes to the lesson page.)

8. 8. Revelation 1:1-3 says nothing about a place to gather

   The lesson reads Revelation 1:1-3 as God, Jesus and the angel appointing someone to testify “the place where they need to gather,” and warns, “If someone claims to have an explanation of Revelation but doesn’t talk about this, they really don’t know what they’re talking about.”

   • Revelation 1:1: God gave the revelation to Jesus “to show his servants what must happen very soon. He made it clear by sending his angel to his servant John” (Revelation 1:1).
   • 1:3: “Blessed is the one who reads the words of this prophecy aloud, and blessed are those who hear and obey the things written in it, because the time is near!” (1:3).
   • There’s no place to gather in these verses. Dismissing every other explanation of Revelation for not mentioning one rules out comparison before it starts.

9. 9. Part of the covenant “if they flee to the mountain”

   The notes say “everyone who believes in Christ and is waiting patiently will also be a part of it too if they flee to the mountain.”

   • That adds a condition to the covenant. “if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved” (Romans 10:9).
   • Paul condemned adding conditions to faith in Christ (Galatians 3:1-3; 5:2-4). (See Lesson 66; its new section isn’t live yet, so the link goes to the lesson page.)
   • Jesus said true worship isn’t tied to a mountain (John 4:21-23), and the flight to the mountains in Matthew 24 was escape from Jerusalem’s siege: “when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies … those who are in Judea must flee to the mountains” (Luke 21:20-21). (See Lesson 44.)

10. 10. Small factual slips

    The notes also say Solomon’s kingdom split eleven tribes to one, but it was ten: “I will give 10 tribes to you” (1 Kings 11:31). They once place the golden calf in Genesis 32, but it’s in Exodus 32. And they once apply Romans 4:20-21 to Moses, but it’s about Abraham (Romans 4:20-21). These are minor, but in a course that tells students not to use commentaries or study Bibles, errors like these go uncorrected. (See Lesson 55; its new section isn’t live yet, so the link goes to the lesson page.)

11. 11. No breaks, and “It’s go time”

    The time is near, the lesson says, so “Now is the time, no breaks. It’s go time.”

    • Urgency to act on a claim the student can’t yet locate in Scripture is a reason to slow down. “A naive person will believe anything, but the shrewd person discerns his steps” (Proverbs 14:15). (See Lesson 33.)