Baptist Covenant Theologians

First let’s note what Covenant Theology is not:

• It is not a response to dispensationalism — for dispensationalism, in fact, did not even exist until the nineteenth century.
• It does not teach paedobaptism, covenant successionism, paedocommunionism, or baptismal regenerationism.
• It does not teach any kind of philosophy of education such as homeschooling or Christian schools.
• It is not sectarian, but has roots from the early church to all the branches of the Reformed church.
• It is not anti-Semitic nor “replacement theology”, but CT teaches the fulfillment of the promises to Israel in the person and the work of the Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth, who established the church in organic continuity with Israel, not a separate replacement entity.

Covenant theology is a system of theology that explains the entire Bible in one systematized story organized around three great covenants  (Redemption, Works, Grace). CT is a hermeneutic, an approach to understanding Scripture, biblically explaining the unity of biblical revelation.

• When Jesus wanted to explain the significance of His death to His disciples, He went to the doctrine of the covenants (see Matthew 26, Mark 14, Luke 22, 1 Corinthians 11).
• When God wanted to assure Abraham of the certainty of His word of promise, He went to the covenant (Genesis 12, 15, and 17).
• When Luke wanted to show early Christians that Jesus’ life and ministry were the fulfillment of God’s ancient purposes for His chosen people, he went to the covenants and quoted Zacharias’ prophecy which shows that believers in the very earliest days of ‘the Jesus movement’ understood Jesus and His messianic work as a fulfillment (not a ‘Plan B’) of God’s covenant with Abraham (Luke 1:72-73).
• When the Psalmist and the author of Hebrews want to show how God’s redemptive plan is ordered and on what basis it unfolds in history, they went to the covenants (see Psalm 78, 89, Hebrews 6-10).

C. H. Spurgeon, a Baptist preacher, said, “The doctrine of the covenant lies at the root of all true theology. It has been said that he who well understands the distinction between the covenant of works and the covenant of grace, is a master of divinity. I am persuaded that most of the mistakes which men make concerning the doctrines of Scripture, are based upon fundamental errors with regard to the covenant of law and of grace. May God grant us now the power to instruct, and you the grace to receive instruction on this vital subject.”

1. The Covenant of Redemption.

• It is an inter-Trinitarian covenant, a covenant between the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit before the foundation of the world concerning the redemption of man.
• It took place in eternity and is the plan by which election would be elective.
• Berkhof defines it this way, “the Covenant of Redemption is the agreement between the Father giving the Son as head and redeemer of all the elect and the Son voluntarily taking the place of those whom the Father has given Him.”
• And so the Father, foreseeing the fall which he ordained, in His grace effects a covenant with the Son in which He gives all the elect to the Son and the Son says I will take their place. (just a few places to read about this covenant is Psalm 2:7-9; 40:7-9; 89:3; John 5:36; Hebrews 10:5-7)
• Some theologians don’t call this a covenant but a decree. Covenant Theologians simply say, “You really can’t understand that decree, especially as it regards to our redemption, until you understand the covenant aspect of it.” It is that eternal covenant–that covenant which is prior to time, in which the Son undertakes to be our surety and our mediator and the Father undertakes to give to the Son all the elect because of the Son’s perfect obedience. Christ gives His word prior to Creation to purchase His bride with His own blood.
• So the Covenant of Redemption is the agreement beyond time and within the Godhead that the Father would appoint the Son Jesus Christ to live a perfectly acceptable substitutionary life and die an undeserved death on behalf of, and as a covenantal representative for, those who would sin but would trust in Christ as their covenantal substitutionary representative.

The next two covenants flow from the Covenant of Redemption.

2. The Covenant of Works

• The Covenant of Works refers to a pre-fall covenant relationship with Adam.
• It is a binding and blessed relationship initiated by God, in which God enters into fellowship with Adam, prior to the fall.
• This Covenant is asymmetrical in the sense that there are not two equal parties entering into a relationship. This is God, out of His goodness, entering into fellowship with Adam, promising certain blessings and requiring certain responsibilities. God sovereignly imposes those conditions on Adam. Adam was not given the option to say, “Well Lord, I really like that procreation ordinance, but the labor ordinance, I am really going to have to think about that one.”
• Adam is not a private individual according to Romans 5. He is a public person, acting as covenant head-representative for the entire human race.
• The requirement upon Adam was perfection, holiness and personal obedience. It promised life for obedience and death for disobedience.
• Berkhof notes: “Paul tells us explicitly in Rom. 7:10 that the commandment, that is the law, was unto life.” In commenting on this verse Hodge says: “The law was designed and adapted to secure life, but became in fact the cause of death.” This is also clearly indicated in such passages as Rom. 10:5; Gal. 3:13. (Berkhof, 214)
• Since Adam’s fall the Covenant of Works no longer continues in its ability to bless, but its curse is upon us all. God still demands of us all holiness and obedience. But we all fall short of it; by our nature and our actions we are morally incapable of obeying the laws of God’s Covenant with Mankind in Eden.
• How do we know that it is still binding? Because Jesus came and lived it as our substitute thus fulfilling the Covenant of Works for us, and died as our substitute to pay for our covenant breaking sinfulness.

3. The Covenant of Grace

• The Covenant of Grace is the overflowing of the Covenant of Redemption in time after the fall.
• Now, the Covenant of Grace is that covenant between God and the elect as they are in Christ.
• It is inaugurated in Genesis 3 with Adam, and especially in the word of curse against the serpent in Genesis 3:15, and the revelation of it progressively continues in the covenants with Noah, Abraham, Moses, and David. It is prophesied of in its fullest form in Jeremiah in the New Covenant and, it comes to realization in the New Covenant itself inaugurated by Jesus Christ.
• In Genesis 3 God reaffirmed all the covenantal aspects of the Covenant of Works (procreation, marriage, labor, government) and placed them within the Covenant of Grace with one new aspect = Christ the Savior!
• Jesus practiced economic subordination (Philippians 2) to the Father with voluntary willingness taking on the form of a servant, to be the covenant mediator.
• Jesus placed Himself under the law, that He might redeem them that were under the law, that is the Covenant of Works.
• Jesus came to do what Adam failed to do, and did it because of His covenental agreement with the Father (Covenant of Redemption). That is why He often said that He had come to do His Father’s will.
• So the Covenant of Grace is simply the Christ carrying out the Covenant of Works on behalf of the elect.
• The Covenant Grace thus promised eternal blessing for all people for trusting in the successive promises of God and ultimately for accepting Christ as a substitutionary covenantal representative.
• Since Christ me t the condition of the Covenant of Works, the redeemed can now reap the fruit of the original agreement by faith in Jesus Christ.
• And for those who do not get saved, the curse of breaking the Covenant of Works remains upon them — Death. Although man has broken the covenant, the covenants remain eternal because they are God’s covenants.
• No covenant of God has ever ceased or been nullified, but must all be interpreted in light of the Covenant of Redemption.
  

Here are a few of the many Baptist Covenant Theologians:

Tom Ascol
John Bunyan
Isaac Backus
Richard Barcellos
Rolfe Barnard
Alistair Begg
Richard Belcher, Sr.
Abraham Booth
James P. Boyce
W. T. Brantley
John A. Broadus
B. B. Caldwell
William Carey
Walter Chantry
David Charles
Nehemiah Coxe
John L. Dagg
Mark Dever
Richard Fuller
John Gill
Robert Haldane
James Haldane
Robert Hall, Sr.
Robert Hall, Jr.
Michael A. G. Haykin
R. B. C. Howell
Erroll Hulse
William B. Johnson
E. W. Jones
Benjamin Keach – (2nd London Baptist Confession, 1689)
Elias Keach – (The Philadelphia Confession of 1742)
William Kiffin
Hanserd Knollys
Henry Mahan
Fred Malone
Basil Manly, Sr.
Basil Many, Jr.
Albert Martin
Peter Masters
Patrick H. Mell
Al Mohler
Russell Moore
Tom Nettles
Roger Nicole
Robert W. Oliver
John Piper
Ernie Reisinger
James M. Renihan
Michael T. Renihan
Jason E. Robertson
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Tedd Tripp
Samuel E. Waldron
James White
William H. Whitsitt
Roger Williams