Part 3 of 7
Covenants are far more important than most Christians realize. It’s one of the most important, yet under-taught theology in Evangelical Christianity. Orienting yourself to living in a covenant relationship with God will change your life, for the better. I’m not kidding and I’m not exaggerating.
God has chosen to implement His redemptive plan through a series of covenants which are given in both testaments. Covenants are key to understanding the redemptive history of the Bible. By looking at the covenants[1] and God’s faithfulness to us, one can conclude that one characteristic of the nature of God is covenantal, grounded in His faithfulness.
A covenant is the voluntary entering into a relationship in which both parties agree to be faithful in fulfilling their responsibilities to the other party—even when the other party is not faithful. While understanding of covenants is not a “hot” topic in most Christian circles, stewardship and covenants are closely connected. So, having a basic understanding of covenants is important.
Rabbi Jonathan Sacks deals directly with the concept of covenants in his commentary on Exodus. He writes:
At the heart of Exodus is a monumental event, the covenant at Sinai, to which the entire story of slavery and liberation has merely been a prologue…God pledges himself to a people and the people pledge themselves to God. [emphasis added] The idea of covenant was not new. It was a standard device in the politics of the ancient Near East. Essentially it was a non-aggression treaty between two powers, tribes, clans or city-states…The Sinai covenant was quite different: …In it an entire nation committed itself to the sovereignty of God…it defined the Israelites as God’s people. He alone was to be their king, lawgiver and protector. Israel would become a people unlike any other. In the words of Torah, it was to become “a kingdom of priests and a holy nation” …[2]
Covenants have two parts to them: promise and administration. The core of a covenant is the promise. The promise can be one-sided in which one party commits to fulfilling obligations to the other party. Or the promise can be two-sided in which both parties agree to fulfill their obligations to the other. The Abrahamic covenant is an example of a one-sided covenant. The Sinai covenant is an example of a two-sided covenant.
Dr. McComisky writes:
The basic idea underlying the concept of a [covenant] is that of a relationship involving obligation…Parties must be involved in the [covenant], but here need not always be a mutual response. Other elements, such as confirmation and explication, may be found in covenants in Scripture, but this definition represents an effort to capture the common element of all the functions of [covenant] in the Old Testament.[3]
Some covenants are administrative in nature. How obedience and disobedience is managed is just as important as the promise, though the administrative aspects are not permanent like the promise:
The covenants that have the distinct function of administering the terms of obedience in redemptive history are the covenant of circumcision, the Mosaic covenant and the new covenant.[4]
The forming of the covenants described in the Bible was not unique to Israel. This would make sense. If one were going to develop a treaty with God or if God were going to develop a treaty with His people at that time, would they not use a common, accepted format so that it would be seen as credible and accepted? The notion that the covenant forms were borrowed from other sources does not diminish their validity or effectiveness when used by God.[5] Covenant forms were commonly known and accepted in the ancient Near East:
Two types of treaties in the ancient Near East are especially noteworthy: (1) the suzerain-vassal treaty and (2) the royal charter or land grant. The first type is a diplomatic treaty between a great king or suzerain and client kings or vassals. The focus of these treaties was to reinforce the interests of the suzerain by arguments from history and oath-bound affirmations of loyalty on the part of the vassal states, backed up by divine sanctions. The second type of treaty involves a grant of property or even a privileged position of a priestly or royal office given as a favor by a god or king. The focus of these treaties is on honor and the interpersonal relationship. Scholars have found it helpful to compare and contrast biblical covenants in form and structure to treaties in the ancient Near East. For example, the book of Deuteronomy is identical in form (but not in content) to the international treaties in the ancient Near East, especially the suzerain-vassal treaties of the Hittites from the late fourteenth century b. C [sic] … Two important points have frequently eluded scholars as they have attempted to use models or patterns of treaties in the ancient Near East to analyze and characterize those in the Old Testament. First, it may be that the biblical treaty in question is an adaptation of a genre or literary model in the ancient Near East and not necessarily a consciously close imitation of the literary structure in all aspects, so that one need not “discover” every feature of the genre or model in the biblical example. Second, although one may distinguish these two types of treaties, they represent different emphases on a continuum rather than polar opposites. Thus, rather than categorizing a treaty as either suzerain-vassal or royal grant, it may be that a covenant in the Old Testament has features of both types, and it would diminish the communication of Scripture to represent the covenant solely in terms of one model.[6]
So, God uses common forms of covenants and treaties to make His covenant with His people. Table 1-21 outlines the major covenants in the Bible. While there are other covenants in the Bible, I’m focused on the major covenants as they relate to God’s redemptive plan.
Table 1-1 : Major Covenants of God’s Redemptive Plan[7]
| Covenant | Scripture Text |
| Covenant with Abraham | Genesis 12, 15, 17, 22 |
| Covenant at Sinai | Exodus 19-24 |
| Covenant with David | 2 Samuel 7; Psalm 89 |
| New Covenant | Jeremiah 31-34; Isaiah 54; Ezekiel 33-39; Luke 22 |
As we proceed through this book, the concept of covenant will form the context for Christian stewardship which will have at its core the expectation of faithfulness. Faithfulness, in turn, will have the expectation of perseverance while also depending on presence to connect us to the heart of God.
Covenants are not contracts. Our modern-day contracts are different and distinct in flavor and personality than how covenants are presented in the Bible.
In essence, covenants emphasize relational obligations whereas contracts emphasize rights. Covenant societies emphasize our responsibilities to each other. Contract societies emphasize the private rights we each hold.[8] In Covenant societies, the exercise of power is expressed through faithfulness to others. In Contract societies, the exercise of power is expressed through asserting individual rights, even at the expense of another person. In Covenant societies, fulfilling responsibilities as an expression of worship to God is sacred. In Contract societies, preservation of individual rights as limiting the power of government is sacred. Covenants make us “other” focused. Contracts make us “self” focused. Covenants internalize responsibilities. Contracts externalize duties. Covenants are relational. Contracts are transactional.
The contract/transactional nature of our American society has colored how we do church in America. If we are honest with ourselves, we’ll need to admit we are much more transactional than covenantal in our church polity.
In our society which emphasizes personal rights, we evaluate the effectiveness of our church based on our own individual preferences and when our standards are not met, we scamper down the road to the next church to see if they will “meet my needs.” This approach to church elevates our own needs. It also demonstrates transactional thinking.
This unstated—but well-understood—transactional aspect of modern-day laity leads pastors to develop sermon series, ministries, and impressive physical plants which cater to a transactional mindset that evaluates the quality of the sermon, the impressiveness of the building, and/or a cost-benefits analysis of one’s overall satisfaction experience.[9] I’ve heard pastors say (more than once): “If we don’t do this or that, the young people will leave and go somewhere else,” as if having their mere presence inside our four walls is the goal. The unstated unwritten transactional contract is in full force: we either meet the expectations of a demanding generation or we lose them to another church.
We hire professionals to do the core work inside our church, so we sit and evaluate the performance of our pastors and staff while rebuffing any of their attempts to hold us accountable. We conduct our church polity through a western civilization belief in democracy, even though nowhere in Scripture is the church presented as a democracy. We take a rights-based approach to our attendance and interactions in our local churches. This is inherently pagan and transactional, not covenantal.
We sometimes carry our rights-based approach to life into our relationship with God. After making some small sacrifice for Him, we’re arrogant enough to tell God we deserve to get what we want. After all, we made this sacrifice for You. Yet there is no place in Scripture where God says we deserve anything or are worthy to receive anything. Transactional Christianity leads us to think we deserve something from God. Covenantal Christianity doesn’t care what we might think we deserve.[10]
We emphasize a tithe of 10%, which can turn giving into a transaction—a duty to fulfill—a checkbox to check off the list. What we should be emphasizing is generosity, not some slavish devotion to a percent. When we emphasize a number, we’re doing transactional Christianity.
We sometimes define holiness as the absence of sin—in our minds we become more holy when we become less bad. This is a transactional view of sanctification and turns drawing closer to Jesus into a performance obligation. This transactional view of holiness might be unwittingly promoted in some pulpits when we speak of drawing closer to God as praying more or sinning less. It’s not that sinning less or praying more is bad, it’s that if it is grown in the soil of duty, we miss the incredible experience of having God change our hearts.
Because God wants an intimate relationship with His people, He forms the basis of His redemptive plan on covenants. God is not interested in transactions. Hence, His covenant with Abraham, David, and us is a call to a deep, lasting relationship of obligations, mutual love, and faithfulness. God will be faithful to us—He will never leave us or forsake us. Our response is one of faithfulness to Him.
So, after God divides the nations, He immediately starts to form His own people through Abraham and starts that process by making a covenant with him. The rebellious people are given over to other gods and now the incomparable[11] God commences with His plan. The first redemptive covenant comes to Abraham in Genesis 12:
Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.[12]
The terms that relate to Abraham are that:
- He will become a great nation
- He will be blessed
- He will have a great name
Elements which extend beyond Abraham include:
- He will be a blessing to others
- Those who show favor to him will receive favor from God
- Those who show disfavor to him will receive disfavor from God
- All the nations will be blessed through him
McComisky writes:
This last element does not teach a universalistic concept – that all mankind are [sic] included in the saving benefits of the promise. The fact that God blesses some and curses others precludes that possibility, and faith is clearly the prerequisite for receiving the benefits of the promise. Rather, those benefits extend beyond the Jewish people to include Gentiles as well.[13]
The promise in this covenant is eternal in nature (Genesis 13.15; 17.7-8, 13, 19; 48.4), just like the covenant God made with Noah. This covenant will be administered forever,[14] extending its blessing to all the people of faith throughout the ages.[15]
The covenant God made with David in 2 Samuel 7 is like the covenant with Abraham:
Now, therefore, thus you shall say to my servant David, ‘Thus says the Lord of hosts, I took you from the pasture, from following the sheep, that you should be prince over my people Israel. And I have been with you wherever you went and have cut off all your enemies from before you. And I will make for you a great name, like the name of the great ones of the earth. And I will appoint a place for my people Israel and will plant them, so that they may dwell in their own place and be disturbed no more. And violent men shall afflict them no more, as formerly, from the time that I appointed judges over my people Israel. And I will give you rest from all your enemies. Moreover, the Lord declares to you that the Lord will make you a house. When your days are fulfilled and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring after you, who shall come from your body, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be to him a father, and he shall be to me a son. When he commits iniquity, I will discipline him with the rod of men, with the stripes of the sons of men, but my steadfast love will not depart from him, as I took it from Saul, whom I put away from before you. And your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me. Your throne shall be established forever.’ ”[16]
David is promised:
- His name would be great
- His offspring succeed him to the throne
- Kings will descend from him
- The nation is promised the security of its own land
The importance of this covenant is difficult to overstate. Isaiah thought this covenant important enough to write about the “unfailing kindnesses promised to David” (Isaiah 55.3). In addition, Amos talked about the restoration of David’s house, which he described as a fallen hut (Amos 9.11). McComiskey writes:
This restatement of the promise in 2 Samuel 7 affirmed that God was continuing to operate on the basis of his promise long years after the time of Abraham. The numerous references to the everlasting nature of the promise attest to God’s continuing resolve to honor his pledged word.[17]
The prophet Jeremiah saw the fulfillment of the covenant God made with David in a “righteous branch” raised up by the Lord Himself:
Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. In his days Judah will be saved, and Israel will dwell securely. And this is the name by which he will be called: ‘The Lord is our righteousness’[18]
and…
Thus says the Lord: “If you can break my covenant with the day and my covenant with the night, so that day and night will not come at their appointed time, then also my covenant with David my servant may be broken, so that he shall not have a son to reign on his throne, and my covenant with the Levitical priests my ministers. As the host of heaven cannot be numbered and the sands of the sea cannot be measured, so I will multiply the offspring of David my servant, and the Levitical priests who minister to me.”[19]
Jeremiah affirms the enduring nature of David’s line. The Abrahamic covenant has not changed—it is an eternal covenant. The Davidic covenant gives some definition as to how God will fulfill His covenant: He will always have a King on David’s throne that will be established forever. Jeremiah talks of a righteous Branch which will find its fulfillment in Jesus Christ.
In addition, Jeremiah also wrote about the new covenant, along with Isaiah and Ezekiel. The new covenant differed from the old covenant in several ways conveyed by Jeremiah in chapter 31, verses 31-34:
Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the Lord. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.[20]
Obedience will be facilitated by a change in the nature of those who are included in the covenant.[21] Because the people had failed to receive the law into their hearts—keeping it externalized to their minds and hearts—they did not have the internal fortitude to obey God. This weakness is overcome by the advent of the Holy Spirit coming to live within us (John 14..23). This new heart will give us a responsive attitude to God’s laws:
What is outlined here is the picture of a new man, a man who is able to obey perfectly because of a miraculous change of his nature.[22]
The new covenant is not a replacement for the old, as if we could simply discard it. McComiskey writes:
The Old Testament continues to speak to mankind under the new covenant. If it did not, how else may we explain the numerous references of the New Testament writers to the old covenant? They appeal to it for objective truth, for argumentational support, for comfort, for exhortation. Surely these appeals cannot be explained adequately by the need to accommodate their Jewish readers to whom the Old Testament was the sole repository of God’s word. This does not adequately explain Paul’s use of the example of Abraham’s faith to expound justification. The faith of Abraham was objective fact, derived exegetically from the Old Testament; it was not merely illustrative material that gave a Jewish aura to what was only a Christian concept. The new covenant itself witnesses to the divine authority of the Old Testament and attests to its continuing validity…The followers of Christ share a hope similar to that of the remnant of the Old Testament. We shall one day reign under the aegis of Messiah, as Micah said the remnant would (Micah 4.7). We shall experience the ultimate triumph of Christ (Micah 2.12-13).[23]
The new covenant is given to us using Christ’s words on the night before He was betrayed:
For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”[24]
This leads us to conclude that the new covenant is not a change in the promise nor is it a replacement of the promise given by God to Abraham. Instead, a new means of faithfulness to these covenants is given to us by the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit. The new covenant is administrative in nature, not promissory.
Let’s not forget that believing obedience to God is at the core of both testaments. Even in the Old Testament law, it was belief and faithfulness to God which was at the core of the law: one obeyed because one already believed in the Messiah who would save His people. Mere obedience to the law was worthless if it was not accompanied by a heart of belief in God. Even in the Old Testament, legalism was a perversion of what the law was intended to accomplish.
So, when Christ spoke about His new covenant on the night before His crucifixion, He was not changing the covenant from one of legalism to one of faith, He was saying that the method of fulfilling our responsibilities in our existing covenant with Him would be through a transformed heart because He would write His law on our hearts—He would give us a new nature and He would come to us and make His home with us.
If the new covenant is in force today, then Christianity is a covenantal religion and obedience is a covenantal obedience. The new covenant is an instrument of grace, but it is still a covenant. Faithfulness is expected by both parties from both parties.
This means that we accept Christ as our Savior and Lord: [25] we don’t enter a transactionally based relationship with Him. We don’t “sign up” for Team Jesus to get a smorgasbord of fire-saving benefits which will complete us and make our lives happier. Instead, we enter a covenantal relationship with God in which both parties have obligations to the other to fulfill.
Hence, when we come to faith in Christ, we are becoming part of the fulfillment of the Abrahamic covenant. We are living out these covenants in real time. And we gladly and willingly accept our obligations to God knowing that He is completely trustworthy.[26]
[1] I do not purport to do an in-depth study of covenants in this section.
[2] Sacks, Jonathan. Exodus: The Book of Redemption (Covenant & Conversation 2) (pp. 10-12). Kindle Edition.
[3] The Covenants of Promise, Thomas E. McComiskey, p. 63
[4] McComiskey, page 144.
[5] See the Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible, on page 617 in the section The Case for Mosaic Authorship. Walter Elwell, General Editor. Baker Book House (1988).
[6] Gentry, P. J., & Wellum, S. J. (2015). God’s Kingdom through God’s Covenants: A Concise Biblical Theology (pp. 49–50). Wheaton, IL: Crossway. For a good review of an outline of covenant structures, see Lanier, G. R. (2016). Davidic Covenant. In The Lexham Bible Dictionary. John Barry, Editor. Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press.
[7] Gentry, P. J., p. 51
[8] George Mendenhall, The Tenth Generation: The Origins of Biblical Tradition, pagespp. 16-31
[9] Take time to read through Skye Jethani’s book, The Divine Commodity: Discovering a Faith Beyond Consumer Christianity.
[10] Our entitlement culture even carries over into the ministry where the Celebrity Pastor is Every Church’s Struggle. Christianity Today. https://www.christianitytoday.com/pastors/2020/december-web-exclusives/celebrity-pastor-entitlement-church-culture-humility.html
[11] While God is an elohim, He is also incomparable – far above – any other elohim: Exodus 15.11, Deuteronomy 3.24, 1 Kings 8.23, Psalm 97.9. Heiser: “Biblical writers also assign unique qualities to Yahweh. Yahweh is all-powerful (Jeremiah 32. 17, 27; Psalm 72. 18; 115. 3), the sovereign king over the other elohim (Psalm 95. 3; Dan 4. 35; 1 Kgs 22. 19), the creator of the other members of his host-council (Psalm 148. 1– 5; Nehemiah 9. 6; cf. Job 38. 7; Deut 4. 19– 20; 17. 3; 29. 25– 26; 32. 17; Jas 1. 17) .5) and the lone elohim who deserves worship from the other elohim (Psalm 29.1). In fact, Nehemiah 9.6 explicitly declares that Yahweh is unique— there is only one Yahweh (“You alone are Yahweh”). The biblical use of elohim is not hard to understand once we know that it isn’t about attributes. What all the figures on the list have in common is that they are inhabitants of the spiritual world. In that realm there is hierarchy. For example, Yahweh possesses superior attributes with respect to all elohim. But God’s attributes aren’t what makes him an elohim, since inferior beings are members of that same group. The Old Testament writers understood that Yahweh was an elohim— but no other elohim was Yahweh. He was species-unique among all residents of the spiritual world.” The Unseen Realm: Recovering the Supernatural Worldview of the Bible. Page 31.
Heiser, Michael S.. The Unseen Realm: Recovering the Supernatural Worldview of the Bible pp. 31-32. Lexham Press. Kindle Edition.
[13] The Covenants of the Promise, Thomas McComiskey, Wipf and Stock Publishers, page 16.
[14] Reformed views of the covenant are different than what I’m presenting here. McKenzie writes: “The characteristics of the New Covenant are not like the Old—the law of God becomes internal (written on our hearts) not external (written on stone tablets), all the people in this covenant will know the Lord, and sins will be forgiven and remembered no more. Although the Old Covenant is broken and the blessings are taken away, the nation still functions under the Mosaic Law and is to do so until the New Covenant is given. The New Covenant replaces the Old making it obsolete. That does not mean that the Old Covenant had been for nothing.” [emphasis added]. McKenzie, Robert. Identifying the Seed: An Examination and Evaluation of the Differences between Dispensationalism and Covenant Theology (p. 72). Kindle Edition. Also, John Brown writes: “[The Abrahamic Covenant] had done two things: it had served its purpose as a figure, and as a schoolmaster; and it had also clearly shown that it could not serve the grand purpose of a saving economy: and therefore it was removed out of the way—an honorable end was put to it, in all its requisitions having been fulfilled in Christ.” John Brown, Geneva Series of Commentaries: Hebrews, page 374. See also the Baker New Testament Commentary: 1 Corinthians, Simon Kistemaker. See his comments on 11.25. I disagree with this notion that the promise of the Abrahamic covenant is not still in force today. Yes, it is fulfilled in Christ, but the promise is still in force today and will be forever.
[15] McComiskey. page 17.
[17] McComisky, page 25
[21] McComiskey, page 84.
[22] Gerhard von Rad, Old Testament Theology, vol 2, pp 213-14.
[23] McComiskey, pp. 226-229
[24] ESV 1 Corinthians 11.23–25
[25] Casting salvation in covenant terms means, to my way of thinking, that salvation must be a “Lordship” based salvation. I don’t see how one can come to Christ for salvation from his sins and not intend to make Christ Lord of his life. Salvation isn’t merely a transactional event: It is committing to a covenant relationship with Him.
[26] Jensen, P. (2002). The Revelation of God. (G. Bray, Ed.) (p. 82). Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
