Foundations of reformed covenantal baptism - the covenant of grace

note: I originally started this post a few weeks ago, and my introduction can be found here. If you have read that, carry on!

"The Reformed therefore returned to Scripture and in defending infant baptism unitedly took their position in the covenant of grace, which, according to God’s promise, embraces not only believers but also their descendants. Not regeneration, faith, or repentance, much less our assumptions pertaining to them, but only the covenant of grace gave people, both adults and children, the right to baptism. This covenant was the sure, scriptural, objective ground upon which all the Reformed, together and without distinction, based the right to infant baptism. They had no other, deeper, or more solid ground." -(Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics)

God is a God of Covenants.  He always has, and always will relate to people by means of covenant.  A common objection to reformed, covenantal baptism is usually one that says we (paedobaptists) force a covenantal unity on the texts of the old and new testaments that does not exist.  This is usually only referring to the covenantal signs, namely the continuity between circumcision and baptism. This objection unfortunately attempts to start with the fruit of a covenantal framework for baptism, and not the root.  Who receives the covenantal sign is dependent on what the covenant provides.  So I suggest that the continuity that we must first recognize in scripture is not the continuity of the signs of the covenant, (which certainly exists and is significant) but the continuity of the covenant itself, and what is provided in it.  It is only from there that we can rightly understand who the recipients of baptism should be.  

We will begin in Genesis and march through the early days of redemptive history to see God orchestrating his covenantal relationship with mankind in two covenants; the covenant of works and the covenant of grace.  However before we can do that, we must understand the covenant of grace’s relationship to, and dependence on, God’s eternal covenant of redemption.  Louis Berkhof rightly summarizes the covenant of redemption as “an agreement between the Father, as the representative of the Trinity, and the Son, as the representative of His people, in which the latter undertakes to meet the obligations of those whom the Father has given Him, and the former promises the Son all that is necessary for His redemptive work.” (Manual of Christian Doctrine, p. 151).  This inner-trinitarian covenant occurred outside of redemptive history as revealed chronologically in scripture from Genesis to Revelation.  It can then be understood that all of scripture serves to reveal and tell the story of God’s mission to faithfully accomplish what God said he would before the foundation of the world in the covenant of redemption.  As Berkhof goes on to state, if this inner-trinitarian covenant of redemption did not exist, “there could have been no agreement between God and the sinner” and that agreement of course is that which is understood to be the covenant of grace. 

The early chapters of Genesis are the rapid unfolding of God’s covenantal narrative. God creates mankind and makes a covenant of works with the first man, Adam.  The Westminster Confession 7.2 says, “the first covenant made with man was a covenant of works, (Gal. 3:12) wherein life was promised to Adam; and in him to his posterity, (Rom. 10:5, Rom. 5:12–20) upon condition of perfect and personal obedience. (Gen. 2:17, Gal. 3:10)” Well it didn’t take the human representative Adam very long to screw that covenant up, and place the rest of humanity in a position of enmity with God forever.  Seems like a quick end to the story, but of course, we know it goes on.  Instead of leaving Adam stranded in his state of hopelessness after his transgression, God (who was not caught off guard by Adam’s sin) was ready to fix what sin ruined by making a covenant of grace with mankind.  The WCF 7.3 rightly summarizes this event by saying, “the Lord was pleased to make a second, (Gal. 3:21, Rom. 8:3, Rom. 3:20–21, Gen. 3:15, Isa. 42:6) commonly called the covenant of grace; wherein He freely offereth unto sinners life and salvation by Jesus Christ; requiring of them faith in Him, that they may be saved, (Mark 16:15–16, John 3:16, Rom. 10:6–9, Gal. 3:11) and promising to give unto all those that are ordained unto eternal life His Holy Spirit, to make them willing, and able to believe.”  Genesis 3:14-15 reveals for the first time what was established in the eternal covenant of redemption, and set in stone “before the foundation of the world” as Paul notes in Ephesians, which is ultimately, redemption in Christ.  It is for this reason that Genesis 3:15 is commonly referred to as the protoevangelium, or “first gospel” to ever be proclaimed.  It is God’s declaration of his covenantal promise to send forth a son who will crush the head of the serpent and reverse the curse caused by Adam’s sin.  We of course know the promised son is none other than Jesus Christ, who condescended and took on flesh, lived a perfect life, was murdered by the hands of his own creation, and was raised from the dead. 

Immediately following God’s promise to Adam and Eve, the scripture continues to say, “…the Lord God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins and clothed them” Even though they were both naked and ashamed, God took it upon himself to slaughter an animal and make a covering for his creation.  While there is not complete agreement on this point, I would say is the foreshadowing of being clothed in the righteousness of Christ.  After all, bloody animal sacrifices are not foreign to redemptive history, but instead serve as a clear foreshadow of Christ’s bloody and redemptive work on the cross.  The point of this is to see that even though Jesus didn’t complete his substitutionary work until thousands of years after this promise was made in the Garden of Eden, God’s salvific plan is in clear sight, as they looked forward to it’s fulfillment with genuine faith.  Since God had committed to save His people through Christ “before the foundation of the world” it was the future sacrifice of Jesus Christ that gave them a righteous standing before God after their sin against Him.  We must affirm that there never has been, nor will there ever be, a sinner declared righteous before God by anything other than the finished work of Christ, including those who existed prior to the New Covenant. So why does that matter for our understanding of the covenant of grace exactly?  It shows us that the covenant of grace was present with our first father Adam, and continued to be present in the covenantal unfolding as seen in Noah, and especially in Abraham.  God’s mode of redemption has not changed, but has been the same for all of history in the covenant of grace. 

There is not much that needs to be said about the covenant of grace from the time of Adam, through Noah, to Abraham. It is important to recognize that what God established with Abraham was building on the promise revealed earlier in redemptive history with Adam, and in no way nullified it.  The subsequent periods of time between Abraham and Christ, and now the New Testament era, likewise build upon those promises and do not nullify them.  So we turn to God’s covenantal establishments with Abraham in Genesis 12, 15 and 17.

God comes to Abraham (at that point Abram) in Genesis 12:2,3 and promises to make a great nation out of him so that all the families of the earth shall be blessed in him.  In Genesis 15:4,5 God promises Abram a son, and that through him he will have more descendants than the stars in the sky.  Verse 6 then tells us that Abram “believed the LORD, and he counted it to him as righteousness.”  Paul writes the most important commentary on this verse in Romans 4, when he expounds on the faith of Abraham as true and living faith.  Paul also says that “no unbelief made him waiver concerning the promise of God” (v. 20) and that the crediting of righteousness by faith is a promise not only for Abraham, but a promise for us in the present time as well.  What Paul is doing is identifying the means of justification provided to God’s covenant people in the New Testament with the means by which Abraham was justified, which was faith in Christ.  Finally, in Genesis 17, God reaffirms his promise and makes clear the covenant of grace when he says to Abram, “Behold, my covenant is with you, and you shall be the father of a multitude of nations” (v.4) he then gives him the new name of Abraham, and expands on those included in the covenant, “And I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring after you” (v. 7). 

So Abraham was justified by faith in the promises of God, just like we are today.  It is here we see that God’s everlasting covenant with Abraham is an everlasting covenant because it is a part of the larger plan of redemption found only in the covenant of grace.  Why does this matter?  It matters because we must understand that God administers his salvation through one covenant, and that is the one covenant of grace.  Since there is only once covenant of grace, there is only one mode of salvation, which is found and accomplished only in the promise of Jesus Christ. Since there is only one mode of salvation for all of history, there is only one people of God for all of history.   The covenant as revealed to Abraham clearly includes the children of Abraham, and not just Abraham as the believer who has been credited with righteousness by faith. The establishment of the covenant of grace is the establishment of the people of God, as all of scripture would testify.  Because of the covenant of grace, Yahweh is the God of Abraham, and all his offspring, and that covenantal promise remains the same for us today. 

The signs of the covenant directly relate to the time in which they were administered or practiced in redemptive history.  The Westminster Confession rightly states, “There are not therefore two covenants of grace, differing in substance, but one and the same, under various dispensations.” (Gal. 3:14, 16, Acts 15:11, Rom. 3:21–23, 30, Ps. 32:1, Rom. 4:3, 6, 16–17, 23–24, Heb. 13:8).  The difference in substance is that all of God’s elect in the old dispensation (I prefer to say economy) looked forward with eager anticipation for their promised redemption that was marked by “promises, prophecies, sacrifices, circumcision, the paschal lamb, and other types and ordinances.”  As discussed earlier, the sacrificial system and feasts of the Old economy pointed forward to Christ, which were brought to completion in his own bloody sacrifice.  Therefore, instead of looking forward for redemption that is to come, God’s covenant people now look back on Christ, as the fulfillment of God’s promise to redeem his people. The Westminster divines rightly teach that the preaching of the word, and sacraments of the Lord’s Supper and baptism have now taken the place of what were foreshadows of Christ in the Old Testament economy, because they continually point us back to him.  

So we see that God’s one body of covenant people, living in different times in redemptive history, have participated in various signs and sacraments instituted by God to point us to the same reality, which is God’s promise of redemption in Christ. When we see the continuity of God’s sovereign plan of redemption for one people across both economies, and the covenant signs that are commanded for them as one people, we must examine who the receiving parties of those signs are, and if they are now somehow different in the New Covenant.  The children were rightful members of God’s covenant community in the Old Covenant, and were given the sign of circumcision because of it.  Nobody would dare argue otherwise.  The scriptures of the New covenant nowhere puts the children of believers out of that people group, but instead continues to regard them as a part of it.  It is for this reason we should rightfully give the sign of the new covenant to believers and their children, just like it was done under the same covenant of grace in the old covenant economy.  Here, is where the burden of proof falls on those who deny the children of believers their rightful place in the covenant community of God, and the accompanying sign.  But it is here, my friends, that we will pick up next time.

Bavinck, Herman, John Bolt, and John Vriend. Reformed Dogmatics: Holy Spirit, Church, and New Creation (Vol. 4, p. 535). Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2008. Print.

Berkhof, L. (1933). Manual of Christian Doctrine (p. 151). Grand Rapids, MI: WM. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company.

The Westminster confession of faith. (1996). Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.