Source: INTRODUCTION TO THE BIBLICAL COVENANTS; THE NOAHIC COVENANT AND THE PRIESTLY COVENANT — TMS Journal, 1999
Irvin A. Busenitz
Vice President for Academic Administration
Professor of Bible and Old Testament
Let no one underestimate the importance and significance of a correct understanding of the divine covenants. It is much more than an intellectual pursuit. They provide a most foundational theological anchor for understanding God’s working in human history.
Understanding these six covenants will shape a person’s understanding of Scripture. It will reflect a hermeneutical course that will determine the pitch of one’s eschatological sails. Careful attention to these six covenants will bear an overwhelming abundance of fruitfulness.
When God enters into a unilateral covenant guaranteed only by His own faithfulness; when God enters into a covenant void of any human requirements to keep it in force; when God establishes a covenant that will continue as long as there is day and night and summer and winter, then great care must be taken not to erect man-made limitations that would bankrupt the heart and soul of these covenants and annul the glorious full realization of all that He promised through them. Their significance cannot be overestimated.
I wanted to put this into the discussion as an example of the fact that Covenant Theology is believed by premillennarians, postmillennarians, and amillennarians. Of course, they disagree on certain points, but we must all study God’s Word through the lense of His covenants or lose sight of how and why God deals with humanity.
http://www.tms.edu/tmsj/tmsj10m.pdf
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Jason Robertson is a husband and a father and a pastor. He is dedicated to leading and equipping his the Church with God’s word and biblical theology for life ministry, using a combination of pastoral, church planting and evangelism experience. He holds a Master of Divinity from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. He is experienced in church planting, evangelism, missions, and the training of pastors and Bible teachers.
Jason has been preaching the gospel since 1985, serving the first ten years of ministry as a Southern Baptist itinerant evangelist out of Milldale Baptist Church in Zachary, LA which ordained him in 1993. He has preached in hundreds of churches in over 30 States and 4 countries. He planted churches in Siberia, Russia in the summers of 1993 and 1994. He founded Murrieta Valley Church in California, which he planted in cooperation with the SBC NAMB in 2001. He also teaches ministry students at California Baptist University.
You can hear his sermons and read his manuscripts on sermonaudio.com. Just follow the link to "sermons" at the top of this page.
Does anyone know how someone like George Eldon Ladd would fit into this? The guy was a historic pre-mil (but not dispy).
I think an understanding of the Suzerain/Vassal treaty (which the Abrahamic covenant is patterned after)is worth mentioning.
Jason,
Just to clarify, are you citing Irvin A. Busenitz and his article as an example of the cov’t premil position?
Covenant Theology is believed by premillennarians, postmillennarians, and amillennarians
That is as accurate as saying that premil, amil, and postmil all believe in dispensations.
I do believe that Busenitz affirms the Biblical framework and hermeneutic, not that of Covenant Theology proper.
Ill second Dan here. (cause he stole my commment) and Matt i have a hard time thinking that the TMS journal would publish any thing but a premill. dispy. position. But you would know better than i would you did graduate from TMS.
Would it not be more accurate to say that this (i.e. Busenitz’s article) is a theology of “covenant” but not “covenant theology” as you have labled it here?
I would second Matt’s question. Are you familiar with Busenitz’s work on Joel?
Lest any rumors get started, I should say very clearly that Dr. Busenitz categorically rejects covenant theology. My question was designed to figure out if I was misreading Jason. For the record, Dr. Busenitz is the Vice President for Academic Administration at TMS as has taught there as a professor since they opened the doors in 1986.
Another thought:
Busenitz wrote, “Understanding these six covenants will shape a person’s understanding of Scripture. It will reflect a hermeneutical course that will determine the pitch of one’s eschatological sails. Careful attention to these six covenants will bear an overwhelming abundance of fruitfulness..”
Since Busenitz makes no mention of a covenant of “works” or “grace” would you now say that these two covenants are not needed in order to understand God’s work of redemption? If so, this seems to be a major shift in your theology.
I haven’t made any shifts in my theology. This post was, as I stated in red letters at the bottom of the post, to show that though we in the Reformed community may disagree on certain points, we must all study God’s Word through the lense of His covenants or lose sight of how and why God deals with humanity. Yes, it is true that CT’ers believe in dispensations and many Dispy’s believe in covenants. And where these cross is a worthy discussion. Being reformed we have much more in common than not. And this post was to prove how much CT’ers and Dispy’s in agreement. I know that some of my Dispy friends have the same attitude as I — that we praise God that we are Calvinists!
Thanks Jason,
I understood the point you were making. I would still be interested to know if you believe the “covenant of works” and “redemption” are necessary for understanding a theology of covenant and God’s work of redemption.
Paul,
That is a good question and if we were talking in person I would probably ask you to expand your question or clarify it. Because based on what I think you are asking my answer would be YES. I absolutely believe that a lack of understanding of what happen with the first Adam will completely cause you to misunderstand the significance of the Second Adam and the doctrines of imputation and justification. There are some who have trouble calling the Covenant of Works a “covenant”, but all Calvinists know that what happened pre-fall is the foundation of why Christ was needed and what Christ did and etc. Furthermore, all Calvinist believe that redemption was perfectly planned by God prior to Creation. One Calvinist may call it a Covenant of Redemption and another may not. But the substance of those doctrines, ranging from election and predestination to fore-ordination and sovereignty, — those doctrines must be understood in order to understand God’s work of redemption.
We both understand that by grace through faith (Calvinism) we are saved by the works (Covenant of Works) of Christ (Covenant of Redemption). Both Calvinist Dispys and CT’ers agree. The difference is that CT consistently teaches this and Dispensationalism does not. It is that simple.
I think saying it’s “that simple” may be a stretch but thanks for your honest answer. I would agree with Richard Mayhue, when writing specifically about the “covenant of grace” that “the biblical fact of God’s predetermined plan of election to salvation in eternity past (Eph 1:4-5) does not need the theory of ‘covenantalism’ to account for it” (TMSJ,vol.7:2, pg.,255, fn.23).
What does Mayhue call it? An agreement, a decree, a plan? And how does Mayhue explain Jesus’ explanations like in John 5, 10, or 17 (just for starters). Jesus made it clear that he came to do a work that the Father had commissioned him to do (and we Calvinist believe it was agreed upon prior to Creation as opposed to Arminianism or Open Theism).
CT calls that a Covenant of Redemption — but you can call it whatever you like I guess. But if you are Calvinists we define it essentially the same, do we not?
Furthermore, as a Calvinist you believe that salvation was by grace in every “dispensation”, correct? Of course. Now we may agree and disagree on other specifics within these dispensations (like unity and disunity specifics). But we believe that every covenant made with man since the fall was based on God’s grace, correct? Of course. We may all have fun debating Adam’s federal headship, but all we Calvinists believe in imputation, correct?
Now to quote Dr. Busenitz: Historically, premillennialists have placed five or six covenants in this category—Noahic, Abrahamic, Mosaic, Priestly,42 Davidic, and New. Classic Reformed theology, on the other hand, generally concludes that there is essentially one overarching covenant in Scripture— the “covenant of grace.” I don’t actually agree with that statement. Classic Reformed theology concludes that the one overarching covenant in Scripture is the Covenant of Redemption. Again, do you not agree? Do you not agree that everything in Scripture is directly related to the story of God’s redemption? Of course you do. We may debate the finer points of how they are related, but we would agree that it is all about God bringing Himself glory through redemption of sinners.
But I agree with the Dr. when he says: When God enters into a unilateral covenant guaranteed only by His own faithfulness; when God enters into a covenant void of any human requirements to keep it in force; when God establishes a covenant that will continue as long as there is day and night and summer and winter, then great care must be taken not to erect man-made limitations that would bankrupt the heart and soul of these covenants and annul the glorious full realization of all that He promised through them. Their significance cannot be overestimated.
Finally, I find that while the TMS article states the importance of understanding the significance of covenants in biblical theology, it also points out the hermeneutical differences between CT and DT. Such articles are helpful for scholars to understand where the true differences and similarities are. Such is necessary as we defend the Gospel against heresies. I think neither of us believe that either CT or DT is heresy, so the issue is why do we disagree, what are the conclusions of our theology, and how can we both become more biblical and hermeneutically accurate.
Jason,
Thank you for this post. After your series of posts on CT, and you ongoing discussions with Gene on the subject, pausing to identify the common ground between the 2 systems is very encouraging. A lot of people (like me) are sometimes torn between those we respect on both sides.
BTW, and I may get some who disagree with this, but regarding your statement above: “I think neither of us believe that either CT or DT is heresy”, I would like to mention that there are some extreme versions of DT out there that are indeed heretical. One can only be reminded of how DT plays into Zane Hodges and the no-Lordship controversy. However, as a whole, Covenant Theology is much more sound, again, as a whole. I cannot off the top of my head think of any blatantly heretical CT circles that are heretical because of their CT, even though I’m sure they do exist.
Oh, and I’m dealing with Pre-mill on my blog right now as well. Interestingly enough, I think I heard you say a few weeks back that Pre-mill and CT are somewhat inconsistent, even though many down through history have held to such. Personally, I somewhat agree, and I’d love to hear more on that from you in the future.
SDG
This is some of the best comments we have had in months. I think I feel a tear.
Jason said, “Do you not agree that everything in Scripture is directly related to the story of God’s redemption? Of course you do.”
If you’re asking me…no I don’t agree. I would say that everything in Scripture and outside of Scripture is related to God’s greater glory and there is no greater purpose or theme than the glory of God. Call me crazy but the redemption of man even takes a back seat to this. I would agree with the first question of the Westminster Shorter that “the chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.” Redemption makes this possible but redemption is not our chief end.
Thanks again for the opportunity to clarify the issues.
Nathan,
That’s a common red herring argument that has been dealt with many times over (even recently at Pulpit Magazine Blog). Zane Hodges “free-grace” position is no more a result of dispensationalism than John Gill’s hyper-calvinism was a result of his reformed theology. Both errors are aberrant forms of their own making. Again your argument is a form of guilt by association which MacArthur has dealt with in his materials on Lordship (chiefly his “The Gospel According to Jesus”).
Paul,
I am sure you did not mean to misrepresent what I said… but you did. So let me quote the whole statement that I wrote:
Do you not agree that everything in Scripture is directly related to the story of God’s redemption? Of course you do. We may debate the finer points of how they are related, but we would agree that it is all about God bringing Himself glory through redemption of sinners.
So when you say you don’t agree me, but then fail to quote me accurately is very unhelpful to the discussion.
So lets try again. Do you not agree that the Scriptures are God’s revelation of how He glorifys himself through the redemption of man? Of course you do.
I certainly didn’t mean to misrepresent your perspective. I know I have said this before but I think these discussions would be more helpful if we discussed actual passages of Scripture and not particulars of a system since there is no one uniform system for either dispy or cov theology.
For example, which covenant is the writer of Hebrews referring to in Hebrews 13:20?
That would be the everlasting covenant according to the text. Everlasting — now that is a pregnant word. Watch the Arminians run for cover!
Which covenant is the text referring to? I’ll make it easy, do you think this is the covenant of grace, redemption, both or other? I’m curious if you take the standard covenant position on this passage.
It is a reference to the New Covenant, which did not exist until Christ cut it.