Covenant theology as some prefer to call it concerns how God chose to deal with mankind though covenants. Since God created man and upon placing man in the garden set conditions whereby he would be blessed or cursed depending on his obedience to the commandments, I do not think you can find any other way God has ever chosen to deal with man. While we will find many covenants in Scripture, some general and some exclusive, they are contained within the scope of the two listed in this statement of the above. Since this is God’s chosen method of dealing with man, it is proper we should understand what is meant, and how we are to interact with the covenants revealed in Scripture. We could enter into a discussion or definition of covenant or contracts here, but I think the definition from the Children’s Catechism is sufficient for our purposes: "A covenant is an agreement between two or more persons." With the additional note that you do not have to personally sign or assent to a contract (covenant) for it to be binding upon you. For example the Mortgage on your home will be binding upon your heirs though they did not personally sign nor enter into that covenant (contract).

This distinction of only two covenants (which will be shown to be one later on) is important to the Reformed churches. One of the biggest errors in the history of the church is "Dispensationalism" which recognizes all the covenants in the Bible in progressive order, and teach that God dealt differently with His people according to the conditions of each covenant. Not true! God does not change, indeed cannot change and be holy. These facts are clear from Scripture. Thus we will see at the proper place in this series of questions dealing with covenants that the choice of wording is one covenant "administered" differently in two dispensations. The intent and result never change. Thus God’s "progressive" revelation of Himself through the covenants with His chosen people are not changes in the mind of God, but an ever upward movement in revelation, until the complete means of salvation is perfectly or completely revealed in His Son Jesus Christ.

We have a tendency here in our use of the wording "administration" or "dispensation" to try and fit our conception of management of earthly affairs or businesses to the revelation of Scripture. The covenant doesn’t really change and it is not a change of principals involved in the covenant, but more how this covenant is revealed or fulfilled. Thus in the Old Testament we find many ceremonies or practices which we would call sacramental in place. In the New Testament with the complete revelation of Jesus Christ, the Word of God made flesh we see these shadows or types fulfilled and the "administration" change to only two sacraments, baptism and the Lord’s table. Same principals, same covenant as such, but administered differently. The word dispensation here is to be used only in conjunction with and the understanding of the change in administration or of sacrament, not as if another time (dispensation) alone has changed how God deals with His people. In this sense I tend to overlook the so called covenant of works with Adam and say we only have one covenant, though in the beginning this required a more personal and complete obedience to the very letter of the law (God’s commands) as the means of keeping the covenant, and in Christ all of grace is revealed and Christ for us has fulfilled the "covenant" and though we are still in covenant with God, we are not bound to the law in the same way of the old church. In other words the church and her worship of God progresses with the revelation of God of Himself and His plan of redemption to man. Man’s responsibility to obey the superior (God) is not diminished under this new administration, the means of obedience and more particularly worship have changed, or progressed.

Good News

God has chosen us in Christ and what we see is not the end of the story or what we get, to use the WYSIWYG terminology of our modern world of computers. We find the term chosen by the reformers as the means of explaining this is that we stand or have a physical place in salvation. This word (estate) has a breadth and depth that has far more meaning than the ownership of something. It is the place where we live, exist, and have our being and thus we speak of being in the state of grace or of the estate of grace. Though somewhat archaic in this use, I am not sure we have a more modern word that can reveal this same understanding of the completeness of what God has wrought in our salvation than the word estate. An how did we come by this estate, by grace in the "testament" of Jesus Christ. God in the beginning promised an inheritance, with the death of Christ, the adoption into the family and "position" as an heir was completed. The church in the wilderness (Old Testament) looked to that promise in faith as the children of Abraham, we of the New testament live in that estate as joint heirs with the Son.

Having established the truth of the first petal in the preceding statements, the reformers mirror Scripture and reveal the second petal as God’s love and mercy being revealed immediately in the creation story, where God removed man from the garden less he partake of the tree of life and exist forever in sin. Thus at the end of the section on sin and man’s very nature being made sin, and as darkness settles over mankind, we immediately see the light of the second petal to give hope to the heart of mankind. Without elaboration the reformers point to the third petal as they open the concept of a covenant for the benefit of the elect. And as before we then find the fourth petal to be of necessity, for the dead make no decisions, thus the fourth petal is not only revealed here, but when revealed against the very nature of sin revealed in the previous section we can readily see that perhaps the greatest grace shown by God is to "irresistibly" execute the gift of His love and grace shown toward the elect. How different than the darkened heart of man, that God pursues those who have chosen to deny their Creator. We might liken it to the beast that bites the hand which feeds it. The fifth petal then not only resting upon the sovereignty of God as revealed truth, begins to be understood within the logic of the created. As God has revealed His love for man, and His mercy toward man in the election and salvation of some, it is only logical that the God of creation would not begin what He could not complete. Thus having brought man to salvation would prove Himself most weak and unworthy not to be able to hold what is His, and to complete that which He begins.

Within the full revelation of the TULIP we find in this question, surely we can thank and praise God not only for this revelation of Himself and His mercy, but providing the understanding brought by our precious Reformed faith, that we might rest in Him, tossed no more by the doctrines of the whim of the creature. How much more we should be moved to emulate our Creator, and rather than condemn those outside the Reformed camp, lovingly pursue them with the truth of God’s love and mercy, but also His assurance of salvation for our comfort and strength in this veil of tears, as we await the day we see this glorious flower of God in its full radiance before His throne in heaven.

How can I say grace is made manifest and the mercy of God shown if all mankind is not in the covenant and enabled to freely choose if they want to go to heaven or not? It is of grace because God most freely provides a Mediator and through that Mediator eternal life (salvation). None can access this mediator without faith, which is the gift of God. We cannot then lay to the charge of God man’s inability to take and use what God has offered. Because God must act for the fallen nature of man (who fell of his own will) it isn’t of necessity that God so "impose" His will even as of grace and a gift upon any, but it is most gracious of God to so order things that some will accept the gift of life offered in Christ. Irresistible Grace then is not as if God as a task master drives man like so many cattle until they enter the gates of heaven and the safety of the fold of God. It is more in the nature of God lifting the darkness into which the natural man has clothed himself, so man can see God and self in the proper perspective, whereby man will turn to God. Or in other words, God has made man willing to be willing, of man’s choice, but a choice man cannot make for self unaided by the Holy Spirit in regeneration.

Thus a covenant of grace was established which is actually a continuation of the covenant originally made with man whereby man received eternal life for obedience to God. Please note that in the garden man had free access to this tree of life and could have had eternal life, even after sin entered the picture, for which cause God removed our first parents from the garden in "grace." How is this of grace you ask? If Adam and Eve had partaken of the tree of life there would have been no way to provide for the salvation (eternal life) of any. Man would have been like the fallen angels and no Mediator offered, he would have lived forever separated from God. Thus as the symbol of the coming Mediator, that tree of grace stood in the garden, so stands Christ from eternity as the salvation of mankind. In this sense Christ is the covenant of grace, though we more properly determine that it is with Christ on our behalf, as our representative, our Mediator the covenant has been in place from the beginning. Thus we note a fantastic consistency in the way God has dealt with man from the beginning, not a change of the method as some see between the Testaments. Sin was imputed because our legal representative (Adam) sinned and it was imputed to all his posterity. Likewise as the adopted children of God the lack of sin or in a more positive wording, the righteousness of Christ is imputed to those who are enabled to accept the gift of God in His Son. Sin is imputed or more correctly the guilt thereof, thus we are not guilty because we sin, but because God as the Judge pronounces us guilty, the guilt of the offense is imputed to us. Where there is no law (command) there is no sin (offense). Thus it is by imputation we are declared pardoned, or justified in the sight of God, not because of deed done, but the imputation of the righteousness of Christ which we exercise in faith, the gift of God.

God has always then dealt with mankind of His love and grace alone, and that by faith or belief in the promise. In the garden God promised life for obedience. This obedience has to flow from trust in the one making the promise to be able to deliver what was promised. Adam did not exercise the faith, the ability to believe God, but chose to believe the lie instead, and become like God himself. I keep repeating this theme for we must understand that Adam chose, we are therefore of his posterity and are sinners by nature because the very will of man has been corrupted. All are guilty, all are condemned already. To condemned man was given the promise. Nonetheless it is a promise man will not see nor accept apart from the gift of God, faith. Such gift being bestowed freely of the will of God alone, for His own purpose alone.

For further thought: Next quarter we will deal with what is properly known as Christology, the study of Christ or the doctrine of the Son. Every heresy in church history centers on who and what Christ was and why it had to be just as it is, and no other sequence of events would have brought about salvation for any.

For further study: Same old dead horse so to speak, which of the five classic points do you disagree with? Why? What passages of the Bible support your view? If we are to exist in harmony as I am positive is the best of God’s will for the body of Christ, then we must have boundaries, and points of contact. I believe the TULIP is not only a reformed concept, it is the heart of Reformed theology.

Quarterly Conclusion: The Reformed faith is nothing more than the faith revealed in the Bible. It cannot stand as the so called five classic points of Calvinism, but must be based first upon the sovereignty of God, as revealed in the very Word of God, the Bible. Being able to first accept the Bible as God’s Word and second to properly understand what it says is not an option, nor something we can leave to another. Each of us needs to understand theology simply means the study of God and is important and that doctrine is the beliefs we each have.

The following bibliography is offered for those who would care to further research the "Doctrine of the Bible." The attempt has been to select works that are still widely available and of a nature that most can understand them without a degree in theology.

Berkhof, Louis. Principles of Biblical Interpretation. Grand Rapids, MI:

Boice, James, ed. The Foundation of Biblical Authority. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1978.

Bruce, F.F. The Canon of Scripture. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVaristy Press, 1950.

Carson, D.A., and John Woodbridge, eds. Hermeneutics, Authority and Canon. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1986.

_____. Scripture and Truth. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1983.

Demarest, Bruce A. "Revelation, General." New Dictionary of Theology. S.B. Ferguson, D.F. Wright, J.I. Packer, eds. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVaristy Press, 1988. pp. 944-45.

Fee, Gordon D., and Douglas Stuart. How to Read The Bible For All Its Worth. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1982.

Geisler, Norman L., ed. Inerrancy. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1980.

Henry, Carl F.H. "Revelation, Special." New Dictionary of Theology. S.B. Ferguson, D.F. Wright, J.I. Packer, eds. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVaristy Press, 1988. pp. 945-48.

Packer, J.I. "Scripture." New Dictionary of Theology. S.B. Ferguson, D.F. Wright, J.I. Packer, eds. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVaristy Press, 1988. Pp. 627-31

_____. "Infallibility and Inerrancy of the Bible." New Dictionary of Theology. S.B. Ferguson, D.F. Wright, J.I. Packer, eds. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVaristy Press, 1988.

Ramm, Bernard. Protestant Biblical Interpretation. 3rd ed., Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1970.

Schaeffer, Francis. No Final conflict: The Bible Without Error in All That It Affirms. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1975.

Silva, Moises. Biblical Words and Their Meanings. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1983.

Sproul, R.C. Knowing Scripture. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1977.

Weeks, Noel. The Sufficiency of Scripture. Edinburgh and Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1988.

Young, Edward J., Thy Word is Truth. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1957.

© February 2000 – Dr. Chuck Baynard, 246 Rainbow Circle, Clover, SC 29710