Covenant is a much-revered biblical and theological concept which is at the heart of the Reformed tradition. The first mention of covenant in Scripture is the covenant with Noah. Many covenants follow: such as those with the patriarchs, with Israel at Sinai, with King David, and finally the new covenant, promised by Jeremiah, made by God in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Indeed the Westminster Confession speaks of an overarching covenant of grace, differently administered in the times of the law and of the gospel. It has become confessionally an essential concept for guiding our faith and our lives together.
The biblical covenant of grace, initiated by the Creator and Redeemer God, involves a promise by God to his people that God will be their God and that they will be his people. While the response of faith and obedience is required, its fulfillment is always God’s gift to his people. The covenant rests solely upon the gracious initiative of God.
New life for God’s Presbyterian people will depend upon renewing the ancient covenant that God has made, in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, which represents God’s eternal plan for the redemption, not only for God’s chosen people, but for the whole creation. As the writer of Ephesians puts it:
In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace which he lavished upon us. For he has made known to us in all wisdom and insight the mystery of his will, according to his purpose which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on Earth (Ephesians 1:7-10).
God has made the covenant in the blood of Jesus Christ; the covenant represents “a plan for the fullness of time,” the purpose of which is to unite all things in Jesus Christ. We are in the fullness of time, yea, the “time between the times.”
This promise of God — God’s covenant in Jesus Christ — is the foundation of our faith, the sure promise of our salvation, and the good hope in which we live all the days of our lives.
If we Presbyterians are to live faithfully and courageously — for God and for the neighbor — in our time, then we must lay claim once again to the awesome promises of God and stake our lives on the belief that they are true and that they represent God’s will for us, the Presbyterian Church, the church universal, the whole creation.
In subsequent weeks, the application of the possible corporate renewal of the covenant of grace will be made to various aspects of our life together in the Presbyterian Church, as these relate to God’s rebuilding of God’s own Presbyterian Church, in this “time between the times.”
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