The One Covenant of God
Our God is a covenant God. Before the foundation of the world, God covenanted with Himself: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Because God is eternal, His covenant is eternal. Because the eternal covenant is contained within the Trinitarian Godhead, it is unbreakable (Ps 89:34).
The eternal, unbreakable covenant can only be one covenant because God is one. God does not change, therefore, what is contained in God’s covenant does not change. The contents of God’s covenant are promises.
The promises of God are true, for God cannot lie (Rom 3:4). What God promises, He will do. Moreover, what God promises, He is able to do. The will and power of God are sure to fulfill all that God has eternally decreed with oath and covenant.
The eternal covenant includes the promise to save an elect people in time (Eph 1:4,5). The covenant formula reads, “I will be their God and they will be My people (Gen 17:7). God’s chosen people are not covenant partners, but they are covenant beneficiaries. They are made partakers of the covenant, hence, the covenant promises, guaranteed by God’s binding Word to do as He says He will.
The Word of promise is the sure Word of salvation for those God predestined, in His predetermined plan. This promise was to save some, but not all people. The promise was given to Abraham and Christ Jesus, the singular seed, who would cut the covenant, so that His precious blood would be the blood of the covenant, shed for the remission of sins. This was prefigured in the rite of circumcision.
Those who belong to Christ, the people of God’s own possession, come under the sprinkled blood of their substitute, who has redeemed them. They enter the covenant by His grace, alone. For this reason, God’s covenant with Himself, extended to elect saints, is called, “A covenant of grace.” The elect receive the unmerited favor of God.
This covenant of grace demonstrates that the covenant beneficiaries, heirs of God in Christ, perform no works in order to partake in the blessing of the covenant. Christ has done all that is required, and those who trust in Him, come to Him to enter His rest. To be, “in Christ,” means one is in the covenant. Grace means that being in Christ, in the covenant, is entirely a work of God alone.
Christians bear witness, “He saved us,” and He did so by an eternal covenant, whereby He made promises. He also did all the work to fulfill His promises, to the people He chose to be in an eternal relationship with Himself. God gave a sign to remind His people, and their children, that God is a faithful covenant keeper.
Circumcision was the removal of the veil, which revealed: the coming King; the seed of Abraham; sole keeper of the Law of God given to Moses; the first-born from the dead; and the head of His church, the Israel of God (Gal 6:16).
These people from every nation, tribe, and tongue (Rev 5:9) were chosen, redeemed, and regenerated, that is, given new life in Christ, by the Spirit. These are the people in relationship with God through union with Christ, who is Himself the covenant.
The death of Christ on the Cross is the true circumcision that has fulfilled the sign of circumcision. This revelation has caused a shift in understanding. Christ anticipated in the Old Testament has come, and has become the covenant partner with God that we could never be because of sin. No more blood sacrifices means no more circumcision.
With the old becoming new (greater revelation), the sign of the same covenant of grace is water baptism, issued to the infant children of believers, as circumcision was from Abraham to Christ. Thus, the eternal covenant of grace continues, and the Holy Spirit continues to gather the elect in every generation to be children under the covenant of salvation, the one covenant of God unto eternal life.
David Norczyk
Spokane Valley, Washington
October 12, 2021
