The author has been talking about the old covenant versus the new covenant. Under the new covenant we have a relationship with our God like never before, and we are able to obey Him from the heart in a new way.
"For if there had been nothing wrong with that first covenant, no place would have been sought for another." (Hebrews 8:7) As we've said before, it's not that the first covenant was bad; it's that the new covenant is better. As a Gentile, I'm especially thankful for the new covenant, because God did not make the first covenant with Gentiles. He made it with the nation of Israel. If God had not introduced to us a second covenant---one that invites "whosoever will" to come and partake of it---I'd be left out in the cold. For He did not give the commandments, the law, and the prophets to my pagan ancestors. He gave these to the descendants of Abraham. Even so, God always intended to extend an invitation to the Gentiles, for when promising to make a great nation of Abraham's descendants, He also promised that all nations would be blessed through the Seed (Christ) who would come from Abraham's line. (Genesis 22:18)
The first covenant wasn't bad. Nothing God makes is bad. The problem was the inability of the people to abide by the covenant. "But God found fault with the people and said: 'The days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and with the people of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they did not remain faithful to My covenant, and I turned away from them, declares the Lord.'" (Hebrews 8:8-9) This quote is from Jeremiah 31, a chapter in which God makes beautiful promises to His people Israel. We are not to be critical of the nation of Israel, for if God had made the first covenant with Gentiles instead, we too would have broken it. We too would have wandered from God in our hearts. We might have kept going through the rituals of religion, as many in Israel did, but God would have been able to say of us, "These people come near to Me with their mouth and honor Me with their lips, but their hearts are far from Me." (Isaiah 29:13)
But let's take a moment to consider the mercy of God. Though the people failed to remain faithful to God, God remained faithful to His promises to them. Though He allowed them to be conquered and taken captive due to idolatry and hard-heartedness, He never broke His promise that the new covenant was coming. He kept His word that He would make a new covenant in which the people would not simply be going through the motions of religious ritual by checking off a set of rules. The new covenant is one written in the heart, not on tablets of stone. "This is the covenant that I will establish with the people of Israel after that time, declares the Lord. I will put My laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. No longer will they teach their neighbor, or say to one another, 'Know the Lord,' because they will all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest. For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more." (Hebrews 8:10-12) The author is still quoting from Jeremiah 31. Jeremiah prophesied to the people in a time when the nation was about to be conquered and go into captivity. The people in those days must have wondered whether God was going to abandon them forever. It looked like all was lost, but to assure the people that all was not lost, God reminded them of His eternal love for them. He said in that same chapter, "Only if the heavens above can be measured and the foundations of the earth below be searched out will I reject all the descendants of Israel because of all they have done." (Jeremiah 31:37)
The author is telling his readers that they are living in a time when God's promise of a new covenant has been fulfilled. God has kept His word, and they are not to cling to the legalism of the old covenant. They are to embrace the new covenant of grace that Christ made with them through His own blood. "By calling this covenant 'new', He has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and outdated will soon disappear." (Hebrews 8:13) You've heard the expression, "Out with the old, in with the new." This is what the writer is saying to the Jewish Christians. The law was good, but grace is better. Relationship with the Redeemer is better than religion, for religion can become a ritual that we follow with hearts that are far from God. But a relationship is something that grows and evolves. A relationship with our Redeemer keeps our hearts warm and open to His guidance so that we automatically live honorable lives. Though we will never be perfect while we live in the flesh, "we have an advocate with the Father---Jesus Christ, the Righteous One." (1 John 2:1) On the basis of our relationship with Him, we can approach the throne of God with confidence "so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need". (Hebrews 4:16)
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