Because God's promises were to Abraham and his progeny, we can see a continuation of God's favor of and involvement with Abraham's son, Isaac, and his son, Jacob, later named Israel. God likewise visited Israel's children, and after delivering them from captivity in Egypt, He made a covenant with them.

A covenant is a contract, an agreement, between two parties. When God is one of those parties, it is a very serious pact, a sacred agreement. In fact, to God, the Old Covenant was a "marriage" contract between Himself and Israel, telling her through the prophet Jeremiah, "I am married to you" (Jeremiah 3:14). He considered Israel to be His wife! Almost a millennium after the covenant's ratification, Jeremiah quotes God as He remembers the events of Mount Sinai: "the kindness of your youth, the love of your betrothal, when you went after Me in the wilderness" (Jeremiah 2:2). Ezekiel 16:8 similarly connects the Old Covenant with marriage.

The promises that God made to the patriarchs, as recorded in Genesis, bear a great deal of similarity to those He made to the children of Israel in Exodus (see Exodus 19:3-6; 23:25-31). In both groups of promises, God pledges to give the blessings of land, population, and prosperity. There is, however, a fundamental difference between the two sets of promises. To see that difference, it helps to compare just one promise from Genesis and one from Exodus.

Notice Exodus 19:5, which summarizes the Old Covenant: "Now therefore, if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be a special treasure to Me above all people; for all the earth is Mine." Reminding Israel that He owns the land and therefore has the power to make good His promises, God demands Israel's loyalty—her commitment to obey His voice. He expects her to be faithful to the terms of the covenant. With the words "My voice," God refers to the Ten Commandments, which He "spoke" (Exodus 20:1) from Mount Sinai, as well as to the commanded statutes and judgments recorded elsewhere in the Pentateuch.

God reiterates His requirement for obedience in Exodus 23:21-23. He then commands Israel to display its loyalty to Him by shunning the false gods and religious practices of the people of Canaan (Exodus 23:24). In short, in the promises of the Old Covenant, God pledges to Israel protection, land, population, and prosperity in return for her loyalty to His commandments, statutes, and judgments.

Note, however, the presence of "the biggest little word in the English language" in both the Exodus 19 and the Exodus 23 passage: if. God will fulfill the promise if. The fulfillment depends on some action (or combination of actions) on the part of the people of Israel. These, then, are conditional promises; their fulfillment is conditional upon Israel's performing its side of the deal.

The books of Leviticus and Deuteronomy are full of conditional promises. For example, the promises of prosperity, plenty, and power outlined in Leviticus 26:4-12 are conditional: The children of Israel would enjoy them only "if you walk in My statutes and keep My commandments, and perform them" (verse 3). Conversely, God promises poverty, disease, famine, war, and even national destruction, "if you do not obey Me, and do not observe all these commandments, and if you despise my statutes, or if your soul abhors My judgments" (verses 14-15). To do this is to "break My covenant" (verse 15). God reiterates these same conditions of obedience in the later rehearsal of His covenant in Deuteronomy 30:9-10.

A comparison of these scriptures from Exodus, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy with Genesis 22:16-18 shows that God did not condition fulfilling this promise on any expected behavior on Abraham's part. Abraham did not have to do anything in the future to receive it. This promise, unlike the promises later in the Pentateuch, is an unconditional promise. Consider, as a second example of an unconditional promise, Genesis 12:7: "Then the LORD appeared to Abram and said, ‘To your descendants I will give this land.'" That is all there is to the promise. God attaches no ifs, ands, or buts to it at all. He simply says, in effect, "I will do it. Period."

The same could be said of any of the promises to the patriarchs found in Genesis 12:1-3, 7; 13:15-16; 15:18-21; 17:6-8; and 35:11-12. In every single instance, the fulfillment of the promise does not depend on any future action or behavior God expected on the part of Abraham, Isaac, or Israel (Jacob).All of these scripturesrecord unconditional promises.

The bottom line is that God's promises to the children of Israel were conditioned upon their obedience to Him. Conversely, His promises to the patriarchs were not conditioned by their subsequent obedience. This difference has significant implications:

• First, because God made unconditional promises to the patriarchs, we can be sure that He willfulfill them. Though He always responds to individuals' faith—or lack thereof—He will not allow people's actions to frustrate His purposes. He is resolute in His commitment to keeping His promises to the patriarchs. As a result, we can be certain that the search criteria we identified previously are solid. God will not change His mind about fulfilling them.
• Second, God's unconditional promises to the patriarchs do not preclude Him from punishing disobedience or faithlessness in their descendants. God has not put Himself into a straightjacket; He still has the latitude to punish sin. Individuals, everywhere and at all times, still reap what they sow (Galatians 6:7).

God's unconditional promises to the patriarchs meet His conditional ones to the children of Israel at this nexus: He never said that all of Abraham's descendants would receive the promises. Someof Abraham's descendants—the obedient ones—will see God's promises fulfilled, while others—the disobedient ones—will not. Whether we speak of Abraham or of the least of his descendants living today, the promises have the same audience: The promises are for the faithful. Only the faithful will inherit them.

The history of the Israelites illustrates this principle clearly: Had they been obedient, they would have inherited the land under Moses, but "because of unbelief," as Hebrews 3:16-19 points out, they did not. "So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief" (verse 19). God was even willing to destroy an entire people—the children of Israel—and raise up another people through Moses, and thereby honor His promises to the patriarchs (see Numbers 14:12-20).

This is a vitally important concept. Without violating His promises to the patriarchs, God can—and did—defer their fulfillment. He even tells us how long He will defer the promises' fulfillment. Later, we will see that this timing factor, in itself, becomes a crucial search criterion for isolating modern-day Israel. Next time, however, we will look at the promises God made to King David, which will provide us with more search criteria to point us to modern-day Israel.