November 23, 2020 • 47 mins
The story of the Bible is the story of covenants. If we do not have an understanding of how God covenants with humanity, we cannot properly grasp the intent of the biblical authors and the theology they taught. In his book The Mystery of Christ, His Covenant, and His Kingdom, Samuel Renihan provides an overview of all the covenants in the Bible, including some with which you may be less familiar. We discuss how they work together and what it means for our Christian worship and practice. Also in this episode: Things get Funkadelic and we learn what Sam wants for Christmas.
Links related to today's guest:
- Book page
- Petty France Blog
- From Shadow to Substance: The Federal Theology of the English Particular Baptists (1642-1704)
Further reading related to today's episode:
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Jon Guerra (00:07):
(MUSIC PLAYING) I have a heart full of questions
quieting all my suggestions.
What is the meaning of Christianin this American life?
I'm feeling awfully foolishspending my life on a message.
I look around and I wonder everif I heard it right.
(MUSIC STOPS)
Amy Mantravadi (00:28):
Welcome to the (A)Millennial podcast, where we
have theological conversationsfor today's world.
I'm your host, Amy Mantravadi,coming to you live from Dayton,
Ohio, home of the Funk MusicHall of Fame and Exhibition
Center, or at least a will bewhen they find a new exhibition
space.
What's that you say?
You didn't know there was a FunkMusic Hall of Fame and
Exhibition Center, and you wouldnever have associated funk music
(00:52):
with Dayton?Well, that showswhat you know! This was the land
of the funk in the 70s and 80s.
Funkadelic, my friends! Movingon to our main topic for today,
I'm going to be speaking withSamuel Renihan about his book,
The Mystery of Christ, HisCovenant and His Kingdom.
We'll be considering that branchof theology popularly known as
(01:12):
covenant theology, which is theconsideration of God's plan of
salvation as it has played outthrough the covenants he has
made with mankind.
If you've had much exposure tothe Bible, you know that God
makes covenants, most especiallythe Old and New Covenants.
ut often in our study ofscripture, we tend to focus in
on various details withoutmaking some of the big
(01:33):
connections that God intended usto draw from this covenantal
framework.
So the aim of today's podcast isto help us become better readers
of all of scripture by zoomingout and looking at the big
picture.
To begin today's episode, I'dlike to read to you from the
book of the Bible that providesone of the best examinations of
covenant theology, the Epistleto the Hebrews, beginning with
(01:54):
the first verse of chapter 10.
"For the law, since it is only ashadow of the good things to
come and not the very form ofthings, can never by the same
sacrifices which they offercontinually year by year, make
perfect those who draw near.
Otherwise, would they not haveceased to be offered?
Because the worshipers havingonce been cleansed would no
(02:15):
longer have had consciousness ofsins, but in those sacrifices,
there is a reminder of sins yearby year.
For it is impossible for theblood of bulls and goats to take
away sins.
Therefore, when he comes intothe world, he says,'Sacrifice
and offering you have notdesired, but a body you have
prepared for me.
In whole burnt offerings andsacrifices for sin you have
(02:37):
taken no pleasure.' Then I said,'Behold, I have come.
In the scroll of the book it iswritten of me to do your will
God.' After saying above'sacrifices and offerings and
whole burnt offerings andsacrifices for sin you have not
desired.
Nor have you taken pleasure inthem, which are offered
according to the law,' then hesaid,'Behold, I have come to do
(02:58):
your will.' He takes away thefirst in order to establish a
second.
By this will, we have beensanctified through the offering
of the body of Jesus Christ oncefor all.
Every priest stands dailyministering and offering time
after time the same sacrifices,which can never take away sins,
but he having offered onesacrifice for sins for all time,
(03:20):
sat down at the right hand ofGod, waiting from that time
onward until his enemies be madea footstool for his feet.
For by one offering He hasperfected for all time those who
are sanctified.
And the Holy spirit alsotestifies to us, for after
saying,'"This is the covenantthat I will make with them:
After those days," says theLord,"I will put my laws upon
(03:42):
their heart and on their mind Iwill write them."' He then says,
'And their sins and theirlawless deeds I will remember no
more.' Now where there isforgiveness of these things,
there is no longer any offeringfor sin." That was Hebrews
10:1-18 from the New AmericanStandard Bible.
Thanks be to God for his Word.
(04:02):
Let's head to the interview.
Jon Guerra (04:05):
(MUSIC PLAYING)
Amy Mantravadi (04:16):
And I'm here with Samuel Renihan, the author
of The Mystery of Christ, HisCovenant and His Kingdom.
He received his masters ofdivinity at Westminster
Seminary,California and theInstitute of Reformed Baptist
Studies and his PhD from theFree University of Amsterdam.
He regularly conducts researchon the Particular Baptists of
(04:37):
17th century England.
Those would be the predecessorsof most of the Reformed Baptists
today.
And he is a pastor at TrinityReformed Baptist Church in La
Mirada, California, and anoccasional lecture at the
Institute for Reformed Baptiststudies.
He's put out several books,including God Without Passions:
A Primer, From Shadow toSubstance: The Federal Theology
(05:01):
of the English ParticularBaptists, The Petty France
Church (05:04):
Part One, which I think at some point is going to be
followed by part two, and thebook we're going to talk about
today, The Mystery of Christ,His Covenant and His Kingdom,
and you can catch him on Twitter@PettyFrance.
That's P E T T Y underscore F RA N C E.
So Sam, welcome to the program.
Samuel Renihan (05:26):
Thanks Amy.
I'm delighted to join you.
Amy Mantravadi (05:28):
Well, I'm delighted to have you here.
So before we begin, I wanted toask you for a little
clarification because Iunderstand you play something
called a keytar.
Is that correct?
Samuel Renihan (05:42):
Oh, man! I wish that I could play the keytar
because it's pretty much thecoolest instrument ever.
I can only dream.
Actually, I play a low D tinwhistle, which is right here in
my office, and I play theseawesome guitars, which are here
(06:03):
in my office.
But you can see them- podcasterscan't see them.
Amy Mantravadi (06:07):
Yeah, it's too bad we're not releasing the
video.
He's just been pullinginstruments out of every space
in his office.
Samuel Renihan (06:15):
The keytar is- I guess that'll have to be a
Christmas wish for the rest ofus.
Amy Mantravadi (06:24):
Okay.
And am I correct inunderstanding it's a kind of
cross between a guitar and apiano?
Samuel Renihan (06:29):
It's a keyboard that you hold and play like a
guitar, so it has a strap, andso you can play it.
You can move around on stage,but you're really just playing a
keyboard.
So it's a keytar (06:38):
a keyboard guitar.
Amy Mantravadi (06:41):
Well, now that you've put that desire of yours
out there, maybe Santa Clauswill get wind of it and you will
receive it this Christmas.
Samuel Renihan (06:51):
I have to be a really good boy to get a keytar
from Santa.
Amy Mantravadi (06:54):
Well, I'm doing what I can to help you.
So anyways, we're actually hereto talk about the biblical
covenants today, and I guessI'll just start off by
discussing the beginning of yourbook.
You say a couple of things aboutcovenants in the opening pages
that I think are a great way tointroduce the topic.
First you note that,"Studyingthe covenant theology of the
(07:17):
Bible magnifies the majesty ofthe triune God's plan of
redemption." And you expand onthat a little later by writing,
"Covenant theology seeks tounderstand and explain the
united purpose of God in allhistory past, present, and
future." So keeping that inmind, we should probably start
with some basic definitions.
(07:37):
What is a covenant in biblicalterms and how was one
established?
Samuel Renihan (07:42):
I think that the easiest way to define a covenant
is to think of it ascommitments.
Covenants are made out ofcommitments and those
commitments are guaranteed orprotected by threats.
So when I say commitment, thinkof,"I will, you will"
statements.
In a covenant, one party says, Iwill do this and you, the other
(08:04):
party will do that.
And then there are oaths that weswear, and if I don't do this,
then this penalty comes upon me.
Or if you don't do this, thenthis penalty comes upon you." So
they're not just agreements: they're commitments. (08:15):
undefined
And they are commitments thatare guaranteed or protected by
some kind of threat, which issometimes called a sanction.
And so you'll see biblicallanguage- A lot of"you will, I
will, and you will." And you'llalso see language of.
"May the Lord do so to me andmore also if I do not," and then
(08:37):
they state their commitment.
So they're sort of threateningthemselves as they make oaths.
So covenants are commitmentsguaranteed by threats.
Amy Mantravadi (08:46):
Okay, thanks.
I think that's a good basicdefinition.
Reading through your book, youmentioned two covenants with
which some Christians may not beas familiar.
I think most people havecertainly heard of the Old
Covenant and the New Covenant ifthey've had any exposure to the
Bible, and they probably evenheard about the covenants with
(09:07):
Abraham and David and Noah, butyou also mentioned the Covenant
of Works and the Covenant ofRedemption, which maybe not
everyone has heard of.
And in the framework youdescribe in your book, these
covenants set the stage foreverything that comes after
them.
So could you give a briefdefinition of each of those and
(09:29):
explain where we see them inscripture?
Samuel Renihan (09:32):
Sure.
The Covenant of Works comes fromlooking at the way in which God
related to Adam or the ways inwhich God dealt with Adam in the
garden and paying attention tohow later scriptures interpret
and develop what happened inGenesis 1-3.
And so when we look at Genesis1-3 and we look at God's
dealings with Adam in the garden, we find that God gave him a
(09:55):
command not to eat of the treeof the knowledge of good and
evil and that God threatenedAdam with death if he disobeyed
God.
And we also find in thescriptures that God promised
eternal life to Adam, which issymbolized in the tree of life.
And so here we have a covenant: God is saying,"You will obey me (10:10):
undefined
and h eed my voice.
You will do what I havecommanded or else." And God is
saying,"I will give you eternallife," which is not explicitly
stated in Genesis 2, but it isdeveloped through other
scriptures later on.
And even in Genesis 3, the angelwith the flaming sword is set
(10:32):
there that they may not eat ofthe tree of life and live
forever.
So there's an understanding ofeternal life being promised to
Adam.
So when we see these commitmentswith threats, when we see this
promise of eternal life, we say,"God made a covenant with Adam,"
and we call that a Covenant ofWorks because it is A dam's
obedience or disobedience thatdetermines whether or not he
(10:54):
enjoys the reward.
And obviously Adam sinned, hedisobeyed God, he ate of the
forbidden fruit.
And so he all his- Adam andmankind in him fell into that
curse of sin and death.
And so the Covenant of Works isthat covenant that God made with
Adam and mankind i n him.
Now, m an being fallen, we findthat God had an eternal purpose
(11:16):
to save fallen mankind.
And so if you read i n 2 Timothy1, or in Titus 1, Paul says that
God's purpose to save- he saysit was before the ages began.
And so the Covenant of Works and man's fallen state is- God
already had a purpose to savethem from that darkness and sin
(11:37):
in which men had fallen.
But how do the scripturesdescribe that eternal purpose of
salvation or that eternalpurpose of redemption?
Well, if we look at passageslike what are called the Servant
songs i n Isaiah like Isaiah 49,50, 53 and others in those
passages, we see commitments.
We see that the Father commitsthe Son to a certain work.
(12:00):
He must go and obey and sufferin the place of a people.
The Son i s now committed to awork by the Father and the
Father- well, in the Servantsongs, it's Jehovah and the
servant of Jehovah, but weunderstand this to be the Father
and the Son, because Jesusapplies that language to
himself.
And then we also see that notonly does the Father commit the
(12:20):
Son to do a work of obeying andsuffering, but he also- the
Father or Jehovah- commitshimself to reward the Son, to
reward the Servant.
"When you have poured out yourlife," Isaiah 53 says,"You
will...your days will beprolonged.
You will see your offspring." Sothe Father commits to resurrect
the Son when he offers his lifeup and to glorify and magnify
(12:44):
and exalt the Son after he hasfaithfully completed his
mission.
And the Holy Spirit is alsocommitted to enable the Son in
his incarnate nature to fulfillhis mission.
And so we look at these biblicalpassages and we say, we have an
eternal purpose of redemptionthat is portrayed to us or
presented to us as t he Fatherand Son making commitments and
(13:05):
promises to one another.
And so we look at that and wecall that the Covenant of
Redemption, where the Fathersays,"You will and I will." And
the Son says,"Okay, yes, I willand you will." So that's what we
mean by the Covenant ofRedemption, and as you
mentioned, those two covenantsin many ways set the stage for
history.
Man has fallen.
(13:26):
What's going to happen to him?
Will they all die?
W ill they all be left in sin?
But we find that God had aneternal purpose of redemption,
which is that Covenant ofRedemption is worked out in
history.
It's manifested in history byChrist and his actions because
he did what he was sent to do.
Amy Mantravadi (13:43):
Well, thank you.
I appreciate you providing thosedefinitions here at the
beginning, because when we aretalking about covenant theology,
it gets really complicated.
We're dealing with the entiretyof scripture and several
different covenants, all withtheir own stipulations and
members.
So I think it's good to get someof the basics established before
(14:04):
we dig any deeper.
You write a lot in your bookabout the concept of federal
headship in covenants, whichagain is something I think a lot
of people will have some basicconcept of, but not everyone
will have heard it developedquite as in-depth.
So I'll read a quote here fromyour book.
You say,"Covenantal membershiptherefore is determined and
(14:27):
defined exclusively by federalheadship.
To determine one's membership ina given covenant.
the question that one must askis,'Do I belong to the federal
head?
Did the federal head covenant onmy behalf?'" Could you explain
for our listeners, what exactlydoes it mean to be a federal
head of a covenant and who arethe federal heads of some of the
(14:51):
various biblical covenants thatwe've been discussing?
Samuel Renihan (14:55):
We often talk about our government as the
federal government, and that'sbecause we have a government
based on representation.
We have representatives who acton behalf of a certain people in
a geographic region who haveelected them.
And so a federal head is arepresentative.
It's one person with whom Godcovenants on behalf of a group
(15:17):
of people.
So the federal- meaningcovenantal- head, one person
who's the head of a group ofpeople in a covenant.
And we see this in thescriptures in a variety of
places.
So I'll run through some ofthose examples as you asked.
First off, think about theCovenant of Works and Adam.
In Romans 5, we're told that oneman sinned, and the many are
(15:39):
regarded as transgressors.
They're regarded as sinners.
So one person acts and it countsfor- it represents an entire
group of people.
And so Adam's the federal headof the Covenant of Works.
God covenanted with Noah and Goduses the language of,"With you
and with all your generationsafter you throughout all their
(15:59):
generations forever." So youknow that Noah and all people in
him are included in the NoahicCovenant or the covenant that
God made with Noah.
So Noah is a federal head.
God made a covenant withAbraham:"With you and with your
offspring after you, throughouttheir generations." And
throughout the scriptures, wesee that the children of Abraham
(16:20):
are self-consciously aware- it'sa little bit redundant, but they
are aware of their own identity.
"We are the children of Abraham,and so therefore we are entitled
to the promises that God made toAbraham.
The land belongs to us.
Canaan belongs to us because weare the offspring of Abraham."
And so Abraham is the federalhead of the Abrahamic Covenant.
The Davidic Covenant (16:42):
David is the head.
And oftentimes the name of thecovenant bears the name of the
head of the covenant.
Why is it that David's sons havea right to this dynastic
succession?
Why is it that they have a rightto the throne of Israel?
Well, it's because God made acovenant with David that he and
his sons would sit on thethrone.
and so it's descent from David.
(17:02):
There's no alternate kingshipthat can rule the tribe of Judah
and can establish itself inJerusalem.
David is the only rightful heir,and only his offspring.
So David's the federal head.
Their right to those thingsderives from him and the
promises God made to him.
The Mosaic Covenant doesn't havea federal head initially, but
(17:22):
the Davidic Kings become thefederal heads of the Mosaic
Covenant, where God says,"Youmust obey to remain in the
land." And eventually it's theking's obedience and leadership
and obedience that determineswhether or not that happens.
But we can talk about that inmore detail another time.
And then in the New Covenant,Jesus Christ is the federal head
because in the Covenant ofRedemption, as we said, God
(17:44):
appointed- the Father appointedthe Son to to obey and suffer on
behalf of a specific people.
And so those people are in JesusChrist- they're in the Son and
they receive his benefitsbecause he is their federal head
in the New Covenant.
That's how they enter into whatJesus Christ did for them.
So Adam, Noah, Abraham, David,Jesus Christ: those are the
(18:08):
federal heads that we have inmind when we're looking at the
covenants of scripture anddetermining who is in view in a
given covenant and who is attimes not in view.
Amy Mantravadi (18:19):
I think that it's such an important aspect of
our understanding of thecovenants, because if you don't
take account of federalheadship, then you can start
asking questions like,"Well, whyam I condemned in Adam?
Or why do all the good thingsthat Christ did get counted to
(18:42):
me?" And you could start askingyourself a lot of questions like
that.
But if you take into accountthat, as you said, you have-
particularly with Adam andChrist- you have those passages
where Paul is talking aboutthat.
They both imputed something tothe people who were part of
their covenants, and he doesn'tnecessarily use the exact
(19:02):
language, but it's clear fromthe context that that's what
he's talking about.
You can start to understand howin Adam, we all die, and then
those of us who are in Christ,we all live.
So that's definitely animportant concept to keep in
mind.
There are several passages inthe New Testament that also
discuss the similarities betweenthe Old and New Covenants, and
(19:24):
the relationship between the twohas certainly been a topic of
controversy among Christiansover the years.
I know cause we're both onTwitter.
We're always seeing peopledebating these topics.
And there are some differenceseven between Protestant
denominations, but you write inyour book at one point that the
Jewish Mosaic laws lookedforward to Christ and his
(19:47):
kingdom, but they were not inthemselves Christ in his
kingdom.
So in your opinion, could youdescribe for us how the Old and
New Covenants fit together inlight of what the New Testament
has to say about the covenantsof the Old Testament?
Samuel Renihan (20:04):
Sure.
I think that just in supersummary form, we could say that
the Old Covenant prepares theworld for the New Covenant.
So we're already asserting arelationship: not two disparate
and distinct and distant things,but a relationship.
The Old Covenant prepares theworld for the New Covenant.
(20:26):
So what do I mean by that, orhow can we explain that further?
First off, when I talk about theOld Covenant, I often mean
actually three covenants in one.
I'm often talking about God'scovenant with Abraham and God's
covenant with Israel throughMoses- as a mediator, not a
federal head- and God's covenantwith David, because those three
(20:48):
covenants all work together.
In the covenant with Abraham,God gives a land to a specific
people (20:54):
the descendants of Abraham, who are the Israelites.
And in the Mosaic Covenant, Godgives them laws for living in
that land.
And the Davidic Covenant- Godgives them a king to rule over
those people, according to thoselaws in that land.
And so the Old Covenant- youcan't really separate it from
the other two.
(21:14):
If we talk about the OldCovenant as the Mosaic Covenant-
which sometimes in scripture,that's specifically what the
reference is- when you do that,you can't divide it from God's
covenant with Abraham and God'scovenant with David.
And so those three covenants- IfI say the Old Covenant prepares
the world for the New Covenant,I mean the Abrahamic Covenant
prepares the world for the NewCovenant, the Mosaic Covenant
(21:37):
prepares the world for the NewCovenant, and the Davidic
Covenant prepares the world forthe New Covenant, because those
three covenants or the OldCovenant, they provide the
earthly context in which theChrist would be born.
And they provide the earthlycontext within which his mission
would make sense (21:55):
an incarnate Messiah who dies on a cross and
rises again on the third day.
That when that happens, that'snot new because there's been so
much that's been revealed aboutthat previously in history,
chief of which is perhaps theLaw of Moses with its temple,
(22:18):
its sacrifices, its priestlysystem- its Levitical system.
And then along with that, thekingly line of David.
Along with that, the fact that ablessing for the nations is
promised to come from Abraham'sline.
So the Old Covenant says,"Inthis place from this people will
come one who blesses thenations." And as you look at
that, the life and the historyof that nation, the Israelites,
(22:40):
you see a system of shed bloodand sacrifice that brings
purity, that brings holiness,that restores people- reconciles
them to God.
And you see a Davidic king whogoes out and acts on behalf of
the people and purifies theworship of the Temple.
And all these things arecontributing to preparing the
(23:03):
world for the birth of Christand the New Covenant that he
brings with him.
And so one of the ways I like toput it is to say that the Old
Covenant- Abraham, Moses andDavid- the Old Covenant was
pregnant with the New Covenant.
The Old Covenant was carryinginside it the New Covenant,
because it was carrying Christinside of it.
And when Jesus was born, then inquite literal ways, the Old
(23:26):
Covenant gives birth to the NewCovenant.
Something appears in historythat previously had been
announced, but had not yetarrived.
And Jesus came to fulfill thateternal purpose of redemption,
which we already spoke about,that which was before the ages
began.
Jesus came to fulfill that, andhe did by establishing a New
Covenant (23:46):
a New Covenant that granted blessings that the Old
Covenant announced, but couldnot provide in itself, such as
forgiveness of sins in theconscience and not just an
outward purification of theflesh, and also the New Covenant
grants entrance into heaven,whereas the Old Covenant simply
gives you entrance andmaintenance in Canaan.
(24:08):
And so the New Covenant isproviding something greater and
other (24:11):
something above and beyond the Old Covenant, but the
Old Covenant is preparing theworld for it.
The New Covenant doesn't comealong to deviate from the Old
Covenant.
It comes to fulfill and providewhat the Old Covenant was
preparing the world to receive.
And so the New Testamentscriptures- especially the Book
of Hebrews tells us that whenthe New Covenant arrived, when
(24:33):
Jesus established it in his ownblood, then the Old Covenant
became obsolete and it passedaway.
You can think of it as stage oneor two rockets that send NASA
spacecraft up into orbit, butonce they have completed their
phase of the ascent, they detachand they fall back to earth and
they're no longer needed.
(24:54):
Maybe they can reuse thembecause they're so smart and
everything, but you know what Imean: that what continues on
into space is distinct from[parts] that detach and fall
away.
And so the Old Covenant bringsthe New Covenant into history
and then it detaches and itfalls away and disappears.
And so this Old Covenant/NewCovenant relationship of the old
preparing the world for the new,bringing the new into the world:
(25:19):
it's so important because in thein the letter to the Galatians
or in the Book of Hebrews,denials of the New Covenant and
or returns to the Old Covenantare viewed as rejections of
Christianity.
They're viewed as rejections ofJesus as the Christ, because
when the Christ appears andestablishes the New Covenant,
(25:40):
there's no more need for the OldCovenant.
And so if we insist on the OldCovenant, if we insist that we
maintain it, what we're reallysaying is Jesus has not- or not
that Jesus has not yet come, butthe Christ has not yet come,
which is to say that Jesus wasnot the Christ.
And so the old giving way to thenew and the new providing what
the old could not (26:00):
this is the relationship that I see in the
scriptures and that I seeGalatians and Hebrews defending
so strongly.
No, Jesus is the Christ, and theNew Covenant gives us everything
that was promised in thescriptures, and we should
embrace that and believe inJesus Christ because he's
returning, he's coming back,he's going to judge the living
in the dead.
(26:21):
So to repeat and summarize, theOld Covenant prepares the world
for the New, when the Newarrives and Christ establishes
it, the Old Covenant fades away,becomes obsolete.
It's done away with.
It's removed.
Amy Mantravadi (26:35):
Yeah, I think you make some very good points
there because certainly we seein the early Church, one of the
biggest theological issues theystruggle with was this question
of how the Old and New covenantsrelate to one another.
And there was a lot of confusionthat you mentioned in the letter
to the Galatians.
We see they were trying to goback to the Law and it can be
(26:58):
somewhat confusing when we'relooking at the Old Covenant,
because it has so many aspectsof grace in it, and we see how
the animal sacrifices areallowing people to at least for
a time be made right with Godunder that covenant, and we see
everything that's pointing toChrist.
(27:18):
But I think, like you said, whenyou look at the Book of Hebrews
where the author there is makingsuch a strong case for the
superiority of the New Covenant,making clear that yes, even
though there were all thoseaspects of grace in the Old
Covenant, and it definitely wasin a way proclaiming the gospel
to people because it was showingthem a preview of Christ, it
(27:41):
didn't have the power in itselfto save, and that's why the New
Covenant was necessary.
So when Paul was seeing peoplegoing back to the Old Covenant,
he said that obviously that isan issue that really needs to be
confronted.
It's not one that we can justsort of agree to disagree on
because the Law doesn't have thepower to save us.
(28:02):
So moving on to the nextquestion that I have here, one
biblical character who is verycentral to the biblical
discussion of the covenants isAbraham.
He received his own covenant inthe Book of Genesis that led
into the creation of the nationof Israel, or as you talk about
in the book, the Kingdom ofIsrael, and you mentioned how
(28:25):
just, kind of making a littletangent here- You mentioned how
each of the covenants isconnected to a kingdom and how,
as you mentioned, the AbrahamicCovenant, the Mosaic Covenant
and the Davidic Covenant are allrelated to that Kingdom of
Israel.
So in addition to receiving hisown covenant, Paul also writes
in the New Testament thatAbraham is connected to everyone
(28:46):
who has faith in Christ.
For example, Paul says thefollowing in Romans 4:13-16.
He writes,"For the promise toAbraham or to his descendants
that he would be heir of theworld was not through the Law,
but through the righteousness offaith, for if those who are of
the Law are heirs, faith is madevoid and the promise is
(29:06):
nullified.
For the Law brings about wrath,but where there is no law, there
also is no violation.
For this reason, it is by faith,in order that it may be in
accordance with grace, so thatthe promise will be guaranteed
to all the descendants, not onlyto those who are off the law,
but also to those who are of thefaith of Abraham, who is the
father of us all." So keepingthat in mind, how should we
(29:29):
understand this connection withAbraham and what effects does it
have on our understanding of theNew Covenant in particular?
Samuel Renihan (29:39):
Well, in Romans 4 or similarly in Galatians 3,
Paul speaks of promises made toAbraham.
That may seem a little bitsurprising.
Abraham is heir of the world?
Where did God say that?
Or in Galatians 3, when he talksabout a blessing for the world,
(30:02):
that's promised to Abraham.
So we begin to see that God madepromises to Abraham that had a
much larger scope, and in someways, a higher level than just,
"Canaan is the land for you, andyou will give birth to the
Christ." There was more that wasbeing portrayed.
There was more that was beingrevealed to Abraham during that
time (30:23):
inheriting the world, blessing the world.
So we need to understand thatPaul's purpose- as he explains
in Ephesians and Colossians-Paul's purpose is to show that
what has been unveiled infullness now- Christ and his
covenant and his kingdom- thatthis unveiled mystery, this
(30:44):
blessing for the world orinheritance of the world- Paul
is telling people this isn'tnew.
This isn't the first time thatwe've been told these things.
This is what God has beenrevealing all along: Jesus
Christ and his covenant and hiskingdom is not a jack in the box
surprise.
It's precisely what God has beenplanning.
(31:05):
It's precisely what God has beenrevealing to his people.
And so Paul many times goes backto Abraham to prove this point,
and this is so important againstJewish errors, because being
Jewish is all about beingdescended from Abraham.
And so if Paul can show thatfrom the time of Abraham, this
(31:25):
was always the plan, then theJews can never make a complaint.
They can never say that Christand his covenant, his kingdom is
not Jewish or that it's abetrayal or that it's a
deviation.
If this is what God revealed toAbraham, if this is what is in
the law of Moses, if this iswhat was promised to David and
his sons, then the Jews have twooptions: believe it and join it,
or reject it and and bedestroyed by the Messiah himself
(31:49):
when he returns.
So in Romans 4 and in Galatians3, this is what I understand
Paul's purpose to be (31:53):
to prove that what has now been unveiled
in fullness was previouslypartially revealed and
sufficiently revealed.
What's new is the fullness ofknowledge.
What's not new is the plan.
So none of this- the fact thatPaul points beyond the earthly
Israelite promises- none of thatdenies or changes the fact that
(32:16):
God's covenant with Abraham wasa covenant with the people born
according to the flesh (32:20):
a covenant to give them a land,
and that the Law was given tothat people in the land.
Paul is just saying there wasmore than that.
There was something greater thanthat there that was made known
even then, and now we're seeingit in reality.
And so this affects ourunderstanding of the New
Covenant in that again we'verealized that the New Covenant
is not newly revealed.
(32:41):
It's just newly accomplished andestablished in history.
And so the Abrahamic covenantwas anticipating the New
Covenant all along, because itpromised the blessing for the
nations, the one who wouldprovide the New Covenant: Jesus
Christ.
So we're really asserting twothings.
We're saying the AbrahamicCovenant is the Abrahamic
Covenant (32:59):
people, land, birth of the Messiah.
But we're also affirming that aswe already said, that context
was preparing the world andrevealing to the world something
greater- Jesus Christ and hiscovenant and his kingdom- and
that Abraham would inherit thatby faith, through grace, and
that the blessing for thenations is this free salvation.
(33:20):
And so we can assert thatAbraham was a member of that New
Covenant by looking forward tothose things, while also
acknowledging and affirming thatAbraham had his own covenant
about life in the land of Canaanand the birth of the Messiah
from his descendants.
So Paul proves this was God'splan all along, and he goes to
Abraham to prove it in Galatiansand to prove it in Romans
(33:42):
especially- both of thoseplaces.
The way you approach thosepassages is strongly affected by
what you think Paul is trying toaccomplish and what you think
Paul is trying to argue.
And to me, it's very importantto put Galatians 3 and Romans 4
in the context of Paul's otherarguments in Ephesians and
Colossians about the mystery ofChrist and the unveiled plan.
(34:05):
If you're dealing with Jews whosay,"Jesus isn't the Christ," or
"This isn't what the Law leadsto," there's no better way to
confute them or refute them thanto point to Abraham and say,"No,
look at our father, Abraham,according to the flesh.
These things were made known tohim, so at no point in our
history was this ever not thecase." You have no excuse at
(34:27):
that point.
So I don't know how clearly Ianswered your question, but
Abraham features- let me try tosum up- Abraham features heavily
in Paul's writings, because he'strying to prove that what has
been unveiled now was previouslyrevealed.
The history of Israel showsthey've never existed as a
nation without these promisesbeing made known to them.
Amy Mantravadi (34:50):
Yeah, I think at least personally, for me, the
Abrahamic Covenant is thetrickiest one to analyze and
understand.
It has two different sort offoundation passages in Genesis
chapters 15 and 17 that whilenot contradictory, can be a
(35:11):
little difficult to put togetherbecause in one of them, it seems
like God is just making thiscompletely unconditional grant
to Abraham, and then in chapter17, he comes back with this
requirement of circumcision.
And so that can be a littleconfusing, but you know, this
year I've been working onwriting a series of articles
about the imputed righteousnessof Christ, which is the
(35:35):
Protestant understanding ofsalvation compared with a Roman
Catholic understanding ofsalvation.
And certainly these passageswhere Paul is talking about
Abraham's spiritual descendantsand talking about how Abraham
itself was justified by faith insomething that God was going to
do later and had righteousnesscredited to him- you see how
(35:58):
Abraham to Paul is kind of theexample of faith par excellence.
So he's using Abraham as anexample of- the patriarch of the
Jewish people himself was savedby faith, looking ahead to what
was going to happen in the NewCovenant.
And that's important becausewhen you also look- even some of
(36:20):
the people Jesus interacted withand John the Baptist interacted
with- very proud of theirdescent from Abraham- and John
the Baptist tells them that Godcan raise up children for
Abraham from stones.
Jesus says,"You're not Abraham'schildren.
You're the children of yourfather the devil." Obviously
that didn't make them very happywhen he said that, but you then
(36:42):
see in the letters of Paul andwhoever the author of Hebrews
was, there's a debate aboutthat, but you see them
continuing this argument abouthow the connection with Abraham-
you can be connected with himtwo different ways, and it's
being connected to him by faiththat is the most important.
So given that those who are inthe New Covenant now are
(37:04):
connected to Abraham throughfaith, and that that's the key
under the New Covenant, asopposed to the earlier covenants
we talked about, how does thataffect a person's relationship
with God and how we approachthat relationship, knowing that
we're under the New Covenant,and how should it flow into our
Christian worship and practice,as opposed to the kind of
(37:26):
worship and practice that theyhad under the Old Covenant?
Samuel Renihan (37:30):
Being in the New Covenant means that you belong
to Christ, and if you are inhim, then you get everything
that's his.
You know, Romans chapter 8 talksabout if God gave us the Son
-which is the greatest thingever, everything else is lesser
than him- how could God not giveus freely all things?
So being in Christ, havingChrist, being in the New
(37:52):
Covenant means that we geteverything that belongs to Jesus
Christ, all of the benefits andblessings that he won for his
people, through his obedientlife and death and resurrection.
So being in the New Covenantmeans for an individual that we
enjoy regeneration.
We enjoy that new birth, and weenjoy justification: our sins
being forgiven and Christ'srighteousness being attributed
(38:14):
to us.
We receive and enjoy adoptionand the indwelling of the Spirit
in us.
We enjoy sanctification (38:20):
God continuing to work on us and to
make us more and more Holy.
We have all of these blessingsand we have the Holy Spirit.
Christ is our Savior.
God is our Father.
So we have so many reasons topraise and to thank our God, and
we worship him therefore, and wepray to him because of what he
has done for us in Christ.
(38:41):
Everything we do as Christianworship has Christ at the center
of it, whether it's baptism orthe Lord's Supper or hymns or
prayer or preaching (38:49):
all of these things revolve around
Christ in his work, his work forhis people and his work in his
people.
If we look at the Old Covenant,we see that the Israelites
praised God for rescuing themfrom Egypt.
They thank him for the Exodusand for the crossing- the Red
Sea and all sorts of thewilderness years, bringing them
safely, the conquest of Canaan.
(39:10):
They praise God for his mightyworks of salvation and
deliverance.
And so we do that too, but wedon't say,"Oh God, thank you for
bringing us up out of the landof Egypt." We say,"Thank you for
bringing us up out of hell andthe chains of our sin." And so
we praise and we worship himbecause Christ did that and we
praise and worship him becauseChrist is at the Father's right
(39:30):
hand.
And so we know that we will beheard.
We know that we will be receivedbecause we have a perfect priest
at the Father's right hand,perfecting our worship and
presenting us to God in his ownblood and in his own
righteousness.
So the New Covenant- there's noway in which it does not affect
us and our worship by it.
It shapes us.
(39:51):
It defines us.
It gives us purpose and reasonfor everything that we do, and
it should infuse us with joy andgratitude for God's goodness.
And you think about the NewCovenant and you say,"Wow, this
is a good deal for us! What didwe do to deserve this?" And
that's why it's grace: extravagant, abundant, luxurious (40:07):
undefined
grace, just grace upon grace,that God would give this to us
when we hated him- when wedeserved nothing but death, he
lavished upon us goodness andmercy in Christ Jesus through
the New Covenant.
So if you ask me it shapeseverything we do in our worship
and in our daily lives.
Amy Mantravadi (40:29):
Yeah, I think that's kind of a good place to
end because we're ending withthe gratitude we have for
everything that Christ has donefor us.
I mean, that is one of the mostimportant things to take home.
So I really appreciated yourbook, which again- The Mystery
of Christ, His Covenant and HisKingdom.
(40:49):
And even though I've read somuch about covenant theology the
past few years, I still got alot out of it that.
It just caused me to think aboutthings in some different ways,
so I definitely recommend yourbook to people.
But in addition to that, ifthere's someone who wants to get
more into the study of covenanttheology, what are some other
(41:10):
good resources that you wouldrecommend for them?
Samuel Renihan (41:14):
As a starter book or even just a refresher or
overview, I'd really recommendTom Schreiner's short book
called Covenant and God'sPurpose for the World.
It's shorter than my book.
It's simpler.
It's very helpful.
It's easy to read in a shortperiod of time.
It's not going to answer everyquestion you might have about
covenant theology.
It's a really good introduction.
(41:34):
It's trying to be anintroduction, so I'm not blaming
it for not being more.
If you want to get more detailedthan that, a lot of the good
works are much older.
If you're curious about thehistory of Baptist covenant
theology, you mentioned a bookthat I worked on called From
Shadow to Substance that dealswith sort of the covenant
theology of 1689 Baptists and inthe 17th century.
(41:57):
For resources beyond that, I'mvery critical of Baptist
covenant theology because in myexperience it's very polemical
and it's hard to read because itpauses every other sentence to
attack another position, and Idon't find that very helpful.
So I really struggle torecommend books about that
(42:19):
subject, so I usually don't.
Amy Mantravadi (42:22):
Well, I think it's fair to say, so many of the
great works of covenant theologyhistorically have been written
by Reformed and Presbyterianbrothers.
Well, I would say brothers andsisters, but really they've just
been brothers.
And we would find a lot to agreewith in those books: you would,
(42:43):
I would as Particular Baptists.
So I'm sure some of those wouldbe very good.
Of course we would disagree atsome critical points.
But the one thing I doappreciate with a lot of
Protestant groups, even if wehave some disagreements, is that
we definitely agree on that keyelement about the gracious
nature of the New Covenant thatwe're under now: about being
(43:07):
saved by grace through faith,even as Abraham was.
So I appreciate you- There areso many books on the covenants
there and I mean, you could doworse than just reading the
Bible, honestly.
Samuel Renihan (43:22):
It's so funny.
Cause I, I wrote down as I waspreparing for this, I said,"Do a
one month Bible reading plan."In my opinion, if you want to
really study the covenants, do aone month- read the Bible in a
month plan and see what's- withan eye to, with sort of with
your sensors attuned to, lookingfor the development of the
(43:43):
history of redemption and God'splans and purposes.
I think it's a very eye openingexperience and it's had an
impact on me when I do that kindof thing, as I prepared to write
the book that we're discussingnow.
So I would really stronglyrecommend that.
As you recommend books aboutcovenant theology, it depends on
what people want to get out ofit.
If they want to really have acomparison and a contrast
(44:05):
between paedobaptism andcredobaptism, then there's a lot
of books that we could recommendthat are really trying to
accomplish that kind of thing.
But I find that a lot of peoplejust want to learn covenant
theology, and that's where Istruggle to recommend books
written by Baptists, Because fewof them are written with the
purpose of just teachingcovenant theology.
Many of them also have thepurpose of proving something
(44:28):
else wrong.
So if people ask me, I kind ofsay,"Well, what are you looking
for?
You know, what's your purpose?
What's your desire in readingthe literature?" And then you
have to make choices about whereto point them from there.
Amy Mantravadi (44:42):
Yeah, and the best commentary you're ever
going to get on this issue wouldbe the books of Romans,
Galatians, and Hebrews.
So that would be, of course, agreat place to start.
Or like you said, doing a surveyof the whole Bible because it's
a long story, and to reallyunderstand it all.
I don't think there's any partof scripture that isn't in some
(45:02):
way connected to covenants, andI'm quite certain that all the
scriptural authors as they werewriting had that covenantal
frame of mind, even though wedon't always have it today.
I've really appreciated ourdiscussion.
Thank you so much for taking thetime to discuss this.
I hope you've had a good timebecause I have.
Samuel Renihan (45:22):
Thanks, Amy.
I really enjoyed it.
Jon Guerra (45:24):
(MUSIC PLAYING)
Amy Mantravadi (45:51):
It was a pleasure to speak with Sam
today.
His book, The Mystery of Christ,His Covenant and His Kingdom, is
available from Founders Press.
I encourage you to check it out.
At the top of this podcast, Ireferenced that the Funk Music
Hall of Fame and ExhibitionCenter here in Dayton is seeking
some new digs after the rentalcosts on its previous exhibition
space went through the roof,which I'm assured is different
(46:14):
than blowing the roof off aplace.
If you would like to donatetoward a permanent home for this
cultural gem in the Midwest,please visit
www.thefunkcenter.org, which isspelled exactly how you would
think.
The music you've been listeningto on this podcast episode is
the song"Citizens" by JohnGuerra off his album Keeper of
(46:34):
Days.
Give it a listen, and with theholidays upon us, also make sure
to check out the album It'sAlmost Christmas that he
released with his wife, Valerie.
You will not be disappointed.
I'd like to close us today withPaul's parting words to the
Romans.
"Now to him who is able toestablish you according to my
gospel and the preaching ofJesus Christ, according to the
(46:56):
revelation of the mystery whichhas been kept secret for long
ages past, but now hasmanifested, and by the
scriptures of the prophets,according to the commandment of
the eternal God, has been madeknown to all the nations leading
to obedience of faith, to theonly wise God through Jesus
Christ, be the glory forever."Amen.
(47:16):
Have a great week!
Jon Guerra (47:19):
(MUSIC PLAYING) Is there a way to love always
living in enemy hallways?
Don't know my foes from myfriends and don't know my
friends anymore.
Power has several prizes.
Handcuffs can come in all sizes.
Love has a million disguises,but winning is simply not one.
(47:41):
(MUSIC STOPS)
(MUSIC PLAYING) I have a heart full of questions
quieting all my suggestions.
What is the meaning of Christianin this American life?
I'm feeling awfully foolishspending my life on a message.
I look around and I wonder everif I heard it right.
(MUSIC STOPS)
Amy Mantravadi (00:28):
Welcome to the (A)Millennial podcast, where we
have theological conversationsfor today's world.
I'm your host, Amy Mantravadi,coming to you live from Dayton,
Ohio, home of the Funk MusicHall of Fame and Exhibition
Center, or at least a will bewhen they find a new exhibition
space.
What's that you say?
You didn't know there was a FunkMusic Hall of Fame and
Exhibition Center, and you wouldnever have associated funk music
(00:52):
with Dayton?Well, that showswhat you know! This was the land
of the funk in the 70s and 80s.
Funkadelic, my friends! Movingon to our main topic for today,
I'm going to be speaking withSamuel Renihan about his book,
The Mystery of Christ, HisCovenant and His Kingdom.
We'll be considering that branchof theology popularly known as
(01:12):
covenant theology, which is theconsideration of God's plan of
salvation as it has played outthrough the covenants he has
made with mankind.
If you've had much exposure tothe Bible, you know that God
makes covenants, most especiallythe Old and New Covenants.
ut often in our study ofscripture, we tend to focus in
on various details withoutmaking some of the big
(01:33):
connections that God intended usto draw from this covenantal
framework.
So the aim of today's podcast isto help us become better readers
of all of scripture by zoomingout and looking at the big
picture.
To begin today's episode, I'dlike to read to you from the
book of the Bible that providesone of the best examinations of
covenant theology, the Epistleto the Hebrews, beginning with
(01:54):
the first verse of chapter 10.
"For the law, since it is only ashadow of the good things to
come and not the very form ofthings, can never by the same
sacrifices which they offercontinually year by year, make
perfect those who draw near.
Otherwise, would they not haveceased to be offered?
Because the worshipers havingonce been cleansed would no
(02:15):
longer have had consciousness ofsins, but in those sacrifices,
there is a reminder of sins yearby year.
For it is impossible for theblood of bulls and goats to take
away sins.
Therefore, when he comes intothe world, he says,'Sacrifice
and offering you have notdesired, but a body you have
prepared for me.
In whole burnt offerings andsacrifices for sin you have
(02:37):
taken no pleasure.' Then I said,'Behold, I have come.
In the scroll of the book it iswritten of me to do your will
God.' After saying above'sacrifices and offerings and
whole burnt offerings andsacrifices for sin you have not
desired.
Nor have you taken pleasure inthem, which are offered
according to the law,' then hesaid,'Behold, I have come to do
(02:58):
your will.' He takes away thefirst in order to establish a
second.
By this will, we have beensanctified through the offering
of the body of Jesus Christ oncefor all.
Every priest stands dailyministering and offering time
after time the same sacrifices,which can never take away sins,
but he having offered onesacrifice for sins for all time,
(03:20):
sat down at the right hand ofGod, waiting from that time
onward until his enemies be madea footstool for his feet.
For by one offering He hasperfected for all time those who
are sanctified.
And the Holy spirit alsotestifies to us, for after
saying,'"This is the covenantthat I will make with them:
After those days," says theLord,"I will put my laws upon
(03:42):
their heart and on their mind Iwill write them."' He then says,
'And their sins and theirlawless deeds I will remember no
more.' Now where there isforgiveness of these things,
there is no longer any offeringfor sin." That was Hebrews
10:1-18 from the New AmericanStandard Bible.
Thanks be to God for his Word.
(04:02):
Let's head to the interview.
Jon Guerra (04:05):
(MUSIC PLAYING)
Amy Mantravadi (04:16):
And I'm here with Samuel Renihan, the author
of The Mystery of Christ, HisCovenant and His Kingdom.
He received his masters ofdivinity at Westminster
Seminary,California and theInstitute of Reformed Baptist
Studies and his PhD from theFree University of Amsterdam.
He regularly conducts researchon the Particular Baptists of
(04:37):
17th century England.
Those would be the predecessorsof most of the Reformed Baptists
today.
And he is a pastor at TrinityReformed Baptist Church in La
Mirada, California, and anoccasional lecture at the
Institute for Reformed Baptiststudies.
He's put out several books,including God Without Passions:
A Primer, From Shadow toSubstance: The Federal Theology
(05:01):
of the English ParticularBaptists, The Petty France
Church (05:04):
Part One, which I think at some point is going to be
followed by part two, and thebook we're going to talk about
today, The Mystery of Christ,His Covenant and His Kingdom,
and you can catch him on Twitter@PettyFrance.
That's P E T T Y underscore F RA N C E.
So Sam, welcome to the program.
Samuel Renihan (05:26):
Thanks Amy.
I'm delighted to join you.
Amy Mantravadi (05:28):
Well, I'm delighted to have you here.
So before we begin, I wanted toask you for a little
clarification because Iunderstand you play something
called a keytar.
Is that correct?
Samuel Renihan (05:42):
Oh, man! I wish that I could play the keytar
because it's pretty much thecoolest instrument ever.
I can only dream.
Actually, I play a low D tinwhistle, which is right here in
my office, and I play theseawesome guitars, which are here
(06:03):
in my office.
But you can see them- podcasterscan't see them.
Amy Mantravadi (06:07):
Yeah, it's too bad we're not releasing the
video.
He's just been pullinginstruments out of every space
in his office.
Samuel Renihan (06:15):
The keytar is- I guess that'll have to be a
Christmas wish for the rest ofus.
Amy Mantravadi (06:24):
Okay.
And am I correct inunderstanding it's a kind of
cross between a guitar and apiano?
Samuel Renihan (06:29):
It's a keyboard that you hold and play like a
guitar, so it has a strap, andso you can play it.
You can move around on stage,but you're really just playing a
keyboard.
So it's a keytar (06:38):
a keyboard guitar.
Amy Mantravadi (06:41):
Well, now that you've put that desire of yours
out there, maybe Santa Clauswill get wind of it and you will
receive it this Christmas.
Samuel Renihan (06:51):
I have to be a really good boy to get a keytar
from Santa.
Amy Mantravadi (06:54):
Well, I'm doing what I can to help you.
So anyways, we're actually hereto talk about the biblical
covenants today, and I guessI'll just start off by
discussing the beginning of yourbook.
You say a couple of things aboutcovenants in the opening pages
that I think are a great way tointroduce the topic.
First you note that,"Studyingthe covenant theology of the
(07:17):
Bible magnifies the majesty ofthe triune God's plan of
redemption." And you expand onthat a little later by writing,
"Covenant theology seeks tounderstand and explain the
united purpose of God in allhistory past, present, and
future." So keeping that inmind, we should probably start
with some basic definitions.
(07:37):
What is a covenant in biblicalterms and how was one
established?
Samuel Renihan (07:42):
I think that the easiest way to define a covenant
is to think of it ascommitments.
Covenants are made out ofcommitments and those
commitments are guaranteed orprotected by threats.
So when I say commitment, thinkof,"I will, you will"
statements.
In a covenant, one party says, Iwill do this and you, the other
(08:04):
party will do that.
And then there are oaths that weswear, and if I don't do this,
then this penalty comes upon me.
Or if you don't do this, thenthis penalty comes upon you." So
they're not just agreements: they're commitments. (08:15):
undefined
And they are commitments thatare guaranteed or protected by
some kind of threat, which issometimes called a sanction.
And so you'll see biblicallanguage- A lot of"you will, I
will, and you will." And you'llalso see language of.
"May the Lord do so to me andmore also if I do not," and then
(08:37):
they state their commitment.
So they're sort of threateningthemselves as they make oaths.
So covenants are commitmentsguaranteed by threats.
Amy Mantravadi (08:46):
Okay, thanks.
I think that's a good basicdefinition.
Reading through your book, youmentioned two covenants with
which some Christians may not beas familiar.
I think most people havecertainly heard of the Old
Covenant and the New Covenant ifthey've had any exposure to the
Bible, and they probably evenheard about the covenants with
(09:07):
Abraham and David and Noah, butyou also mentioned the Covenant
of Works and the Covenant ofRedemption, which maybe not
everyone has heard of.
And in the framework youdescribe in your book, these
covenants set the stage foreverything that comes after
them.
So could you give a briefdefinition of each of those and
(09:29):
explain where we see them inscripture?
Samuel Renihan (09:32):
Sure.
The Covenant of Works comes fromlooking at the way in which God
related to Adam or the ways inwhich God dealt with Adam in the
garden and paying attention tohow later scriptures interpret
and develop what happened inGenesis 1-3.
And so when we look at Genesis1-3 and we look at God's
dealings with Adam in the garden, we find that God gave him a
(09:55):
command not to eat of the treeof the knowledge of good and
evil and that God threatenedAdam with death if he disobeyed
God.
And we also find in thescriptures that God promised
eternal life to Adam, which issymbolized in the tree of life.
And so here we have a covenant: God is saying,"You will obey me (10:10):
undefined
and h eed my voice.
You will do what I havecommanded or else." And God is
saying,"I will give you eternallife," which is not explicitly
stated in Genesis 2, but it isdeveloped through other
scriptures later on.
And even in Genesis 3, the angelwith the flaming sword is set
(10:32):
there that they may not eat ofthe tree of life and live
forever.
So there's an understanding ofeternal life being promised to
Adam.
So when we see these commitmentswith threats, when we see this
promise of eternal life, we say,"God made a covenant with Adam,"
and we call that a Covenant ofWorks because it is A dam's
obedience or disobedience thatdetermines whether or not he
(10:54):
enjoys the reward.
And obviously Adam sinned, hedisobeyed God, he ate of the
forbidden fruit.
And so he all his- Adam andmankind in him fell into that
curse of sin and death.
And so the Covenant of Works isthat covenant that God made with
Adam and mankind i n him.
Now, m an being fallen, we findthat God had an eternal purpose
(11:16):
to save fallen mankind.
And so if you read i n 2 Timothy1, or in Titus 1, Paul says that
God's purpose to save- he saysit was before the ages began.
And so the Covenant of Works and man's fallen state is- God
already had a purpose to savethem from that darkness and sin
(11:37):
in which men had fallen.
But how do the scripturesdescribe that eternal purpose of
salvation or that eternalpurpose of redemption?
Well, if we look at passageslike what are called the Servant
songs i n Isaiah like Isaiah 49,50, 53 and others in those
passages, we see commitments.
We see that the Father commitsthe Son to a certain work.
(12:00):
He must go and obey and sufferin the place of a people.
The Son i s now committed to awork by the Father and the
Father- well, in the Servantsongs, it's Jehovah and the
servant of Jehovah, but weunderstand this to be the Father
and the Son, because Jesusapplies that language to
himself.
And then we also see that notonly does the Father commit the
(12:20):
Son to do a work of obeying andsuffering, but he also- the
Father or Jehovah- commitshimself to reward the Son, to
reward the Servant.
"When you have poured out yourlife," Isaiah 53 says,"You
will...your days will beprolonged.
You will see your offspring." Sothe Father commits to resurrect
the Son when he offers his lifeup and to glorify and magnify
(12:44):
and exalt the Son after he hasfaithfully completed his
mission.
And the Holy Spirit is alsocommitted to enable the Son in
his incarnate nature to fulfillhis mission.
And so we look at these biblicalpassages and we say, we have an
eternal purpose of redemptionthat is portrayed to us or
presented to us as t he Fatherand Son making commitments and
(13:05):
promises to one another.
And so we look at that and wecall that the Covenant of
Redemption, where the Fathersays,"You will and I will." And
the Son says,"Okay, yes, I willand you will." So that's what we
mean by the Covenant ofRedemption, and as you
mentioned, those two covenantsin many ways set the stage for
history.
Man has fallen.
(13:26):
What's going to happen to him?
Will they all die?
W ill they all be left in sin?
But we find that God had aneternal purpose of redemption,
which is that Covenant ofRedemption is worked out in
history.
It's manifested in history byChrist and his actions because
he did what he was sent to do.
Amy Mantravadi (13:43):
Well, thank you.
I appreciate you providing thosedefinitions here at the
beginning, because when we aretalking about covenant theology,
it gets really complicated.
We're dealing with the entiretyof scripture and several
different covenants, all withtheir own stipulations and
members.
So I think it's good to get someof the basics established before
(14:04):
we dig any deeper.
You write a lot in your bookabout the concept of federal
headship in covenants, whichagain is something I think a lot
of people will have some basicconcept of, but not everyone
will have heard it developedquite as in-depth.
So I'll read a quote here fromyour book.
You say,"Covenantal membershiptherefore is determined and
(14:27):
defined exclusively by federalheadship.
To determine one's membership ina given covenant.
the question that one must askis,'Do I belong to the federal
head?
Did the federal head covenant onmy behalf?'" Could you explain
for our listeners, what exactlydoes it mean to be a federal
head of a covenant and who arethe federal heads of some of the
(14:51):
various biblical covenants thatwe've been discussing?
Samuel Renihan (14:55):
We often talk about our government as the
federal government, and that'sbecause we have a government
based on representation.
We have representatives who acton behalf of a certain people in
a geographic region who haveelected them.
And so a federal head is arepresentative.
It's one person with whom Godcovenants on behalf of a group
(15:17):
of people.
So the federal- meaningcovenantal- head, one person
who's the head of a group ofpeople in a covenant.
And we see this in thescriptures in a variety of
places.
So I'll run through some ofthose examples as you asked.
First off, think about theCovenant of Works and Adam.
In Romans 5, we're told that oneman sinned, and the many are
(15:39):
regarded as transgressors.
They're regarded as sinners.
So one person acts and it countsfor- it represents an entire
group of people.
And so Adam's the federal headof the Covenant of Works.
God covenanted with Noah and Goduses the language of,"With you
and with all your generationsafter you throughout all their
(15:59):
generations forever." So youknow that Noah and all people in
him are included in the NoahicCovenant or the covenant that
God made with Noah.
So Noah is a federal head.
God made a covenant withAbraham:"With you and with your
offspring after you, throughouttheir generations." And
throughout the scriptures, wesee that the children of Abraham
(16:20):
are self-consciously aware- it'sa little bit redundant, but they
are aware of their own identity.
"We are the children of Abraham,and so therefore we are entitled
to the promises that God made toAbraham.
The land belongs to us.
Canaan belongs to us because weare the offspring of Abraham."
And so Abraham is the federalhead of the Abrahamic Covenant.
The Davidic Covenant (16:42):
David is the head.
And oftentimes the name of thecovenant bears the name of the
head of the covenant.
Why is it that David's sons havea right to this dynastic
succession?
Why is it that they have a rightto the throne of Israel?
Well, it's because God made acovenant with David that he and
his sons would sit on thethrone.
and so it's descent from David.
(17:02):
There's no alternate kingshipthat can rule the tribe of Judah
and can establish itself inJerusalem.
David is the only rightful heir,and only his offspring.
So David's the federal head.
Their right to those thingsderives from him and the
promises God made to him.
The Mosaic Covenant doesn't havea federal head initially, but
(17:22):
the Davidic Kings become thefederal heads of the Mosaic
Covenant, where God says,"Youmust obey to remain in the
land." And eventually it's theking's obedience and leadership
and obedience that determineswhether or not that happens.
But we can talk about that inmore detail another time.
And then in the New Covenant,Jesus Christ is the federal head
because in the Covenant ofRedemption, as we said, God
(17:44):
appointed- the Father appointedthe Son to to obey and suffer on
behalf of a specific people.
And so those people are in JesusChrist- they're in the Son and
they receive his benefitsbecause he is their federal head
in the New Covenant.
That's how they enter into whatJesus Christ did for them.
So Adam, Noah, Abraham, David,Jesus Christ: those are the
(18:08):
federal heads that we have inmind when we're looking at the
covenants of scripture anddetermining who is in view in a
given covenant and who is attimes not in view.
Amy Mantravadi (18:19):
I think that it's such an important aspect of
our understanding of thecovenants, because if you don't
take account of federalheadship, then you can start
asking questions like,"Well, whyam I condemned in Adam?
Or why do all the good thingsthat Christ did get counted to
(18:42):
me?" And you could start askingyourself a lot of questions like
that.
But if you take into accountthat, as you said, you have-
particularly with Adam andChrist- you have those passages
where Paul is talking aboutthat.
They both imputed something tothe people who were part of
their covenants, and he doesn'tnecessarily use the exact
(19:02):
language, but it's clear fromthe context that that's what
he's talking about.
You can start to understand howin Adam, we all die, and then
those of us who are in Christ,we all live.
So that's definitely animportant concept to keep in
mind.
There are several passages inthe New Testament that also
discuss the similarities betweenthe Old and New Covenants, and
(19:24):
the relationship between the twohas certainly been a topic of
controversy among Christiansover the years.
I know cause we're both onTwitter.
We're always seeing peopledebating these topics.
And there are some differenceseven between Protestant
denominations, but you write inyour book at one point that the
Jewish Mosaic laws lookedforward to Christ and his
(19:47):
kingdom, but they were not inthemselves Christ in his
kingdom.
So in your opinion, could youdescribe for us how the Old and
New Covenants fit together inlight of what the New Testament
has to say about the covenantsof the Old Testament?
Samuel Renihan (20:04):
Sure.
I think that just in supersummary form, we could say that
the Old Covenant prepares theworld for the New Covenant.
So we're already asserting arelationship: not two disparate
and distinct and distant things,but a relationship.
The Old Covenant prepares theworld for the New Covenant.
(20:26):
So what do I mean by that, orhow can we explain that further?
First off, when I talk about theOld Covenant, I often mean
actually three covenants in one.
I'm often talking about God'scovenant with Abraham and God's
covenant with Israel throughMoses- as a mediator, not a
federal head- and God's covenantwith David, because those three
(20:48):
covenants all work together.
In the covenant with Abraham,God gives a land to a specific
people (20:54):
the descendants of Abraham, who are the Israelites.
And in the Mosaic Covenant, Godgives them laws for living in
that land.
And the Davidic Covenant- Godgives them a king to rule over
those people, according to thoselaws in that land.
And so the Old Covenant- youcan't really separate it from
the other two.
(21:14):
If we talk about the OldCovenant as the Mosaic Covenant-
which sometimes in scripture,that's specifically what the
reference is- when you do that,you can't divide it from God's
covenant with Abraham and God'scovenant with David.
And so those three covenants- IfI say the Old Covenant prepares
the world for the New Covenant,I mean the Abrahamic Covenant
prepares the world for the NewCovenant, the Mosaic Covenant
(21:37):
prepares the world for the NewCovenant, and the Davidic
Covenant prepares the world forthe New Covenant, because those
three covenants or the OldCovenant, they provide the
earthly context in which theChrist would be born.
And they provide the earthlycontext within which his mission
would make sense (21:55):
an incarnate Messiah who dies on a cross and
rises again on the third day.
That when that happens, that'snot new because there's been so
much that's been revealed aboutthat previously in history,
chief of which is perhaps theLaw of Moses with its temple,
(22:18):
its sacrifices, its priestlysystem- its Levitical system.
And then along with that, thekingly line of David.
Along with that, the fact that ablessing for the nations is
promised to come from Abraham'sline.
So the Old Covenant says,"Inthis place from this people will
come one who blesses thenations." And as you look at
that, the life and the historyof that nation, the Israelites,
(22:40):
you see a system of shed bloodand sacrifice that brings
purity, that brings holiness,that restores people- reconciles
them to God.
And you see a Davidic king whogoes out and acts on behalf of
the people and purifies theworship of the Temple.
And all these things arecontributing to preparing the
(23:03):
world for the birth of Christand the New Covenant that he
brings with him.
And so one of the ways I like toput it is to say that the Old
Covenant- Abraham, Moses andDavid- the Old Covenant was
pregnant with the New Covenant.
The Old Covenant was carryinginside it the New Covenant,
because it was carrying Christinside of it.
And when Jesus was born, then inquite literal ways, the Old
(23:26):
Covenant gives birth to the NewCovenant.
Something appears in historythat previously had been
announced, but had not yetarrived.
And Jesus came to fulfill thateternal purpose of redemption,
which we already spoke about,that which was before the ages
began.
Jesus came to fulfill that, andhe did by establishing a New
Covenant (23:46):
a New Covenant that granted blessings that the Old
Covenant announced, but couldnot provide in itself, such as
forgiveness of sins in theconscience and not just an
outward purification of theflesh, and also the New Covenant
grants entrance into heaven,whereas the Old Covenant simply
gives you entrance andmaintenance in Canaan.
(24:08):
And so the New Covenant isproviding something greater and
other (24:11):
something above and beyond the Old Covenant, but the
Old Covenant is preparing theworld for it.
The New Covenant doesn't comealong to deviate from the Old
Covenant.
It comes to fulfill and providewhat the Old Covenant was
preparing the world to receive.
And so the New Testamentscriptures- especially the Book
of Hebrews tells us that whenthe New Covenant arrived, when
(24:33):
Jesus established it in his ownblood, then the Old Covenant
became obsolete and it passedaway.
You can think of it as stage oneor two rockets that send NASA
spacecraft up into orbit, butonce they have completed their
phase of the ascent, they detachand they fall back to earth and
they're no longer needed.
(24:54):
Maybe they can reuse thembecause they're so smart and
everything, but you know what Imean: that what continues on
into space is distinct from[parts] that detach and fall
away.
And so the Old Covenant bringsthe New Covenant into history
and then it detaches and itfalls away and disappears.
And so this Old Covenant/NewCovenant relationship of the old
preparing the world for the new,bringing the new into the world:
(25:19):
it's so important because in thein the letter to the Galatians
or in the Book of Hebrews,denials of the New Covenant and
or returns to the Old Covenantare viewed as rejections of
Christianity.
They're viewed as rejections ofJesus as the Christ, because
when the Christ appears andestablishes the New Covenant,
(25:40):
there's no more need for the OldCovenant.
And so if we insist on the OldCovenant, if we insist that we
maintain it, what we're reallysaying is Jesus has not- or not
that Jesus has not yet come, butthe Christ has not yet come,
which is to say that Jesus wasnot the Christ.
And so the old giving way to thenew and the new providing what
the old could not (26:00):
this is the relationship that I see in the
scriptures and that I seeGalatians and Hebrews defending
so strongly.
No, Jesus is the Christ, and theNew Covenant gives us everything
that was promised in thescriptures, and we should
embrace that and believe inJesus Christ because he's
returning, he's coming back,he's going to judge the living
in the dead.
(26:21):
So to repeat and summarize, theOld Covenant prepares the world
for the New, when the Newarrives and Christ establishes
it, the Old Covenant fades away,becomes obsolete.
It's done away with.
It's removed.
Amy Mantravadi (26:35):
Yeah, I think you make some very good points
there because certainly we seein the early Church, one of the
biggest theological issues theystruggle with was this question
of how the Old and New covenantsrelate to one another.
And there was a lot of confusionthat you mentioned in the letter
to the Galatians.
We see they were trying to goback to the Law and it can be
(26:58):
somewhat confusing when we'relooking at the Old Covenant,
because it has so many aspectsof grace in it, and we see how
the animal sacrifices areallowing people to at least for
a time be made right with Godunder that covenant, and we see
everything that's pointing toChrist.
(27:18):
But I think, like you said, whenyou look at the Book of Hebrews
where the author there is makingsuch a strong case for the
superiority of the New Covenant,making clear that yes, even
though there were all thoseaspects of grace in the Old
Covenant, and it definitely wasin a way proclaiming the gospel
to people because it was showingthem a preview of Christ, it
(27:41):
didn't have the power in itselfto save, and that's why the New
Covenant was necessary.
So when Paul was seeing peoplegoing back to the Old Covenant,
he said that obviously that isan issue that really needs to be
confronted.
It's not one that we can justsort of agree to disagree on
because the Law doesn't have thepower to save us.
(28:02):
So moving on to the nextquestion that I have here, one
biblical character who is verycentral to the biblical
discussion of the covenants isAbraham.
He received his own covenant inthe Book of Genesis that led
into the creation of the nationof Israel, or as you talk about
in the book, the Kingdom ofIsrael, and you mentioned how
(28:25):
just, kind of making a littletangent here- You mentioned how
each of the covenants isconnected to a kingdom and how,
as you mentioned, the AbrahamicCovenant, the Mosaic Covenant
and the Davidic Covenant are allrelated to that Kingdom of
Israel.
So in addition to receiving hisown covenant, Paul also writes
in the New Testament thatAbraham is connected to everyone
(28:46):
who has faith in Christ.
For example, Paul says thefollowing in Romans 4:13-16.
He writes,"For the promise toAbraham or to his descendants
that he would be heir of theworld was not through the Law,
but through the righteousness offaith, for if those who are of
the Law are heirs, faith is madevoid and the promise is
(29:06):
nullified.
For the Law brings about wrath,but where there is no law, there
also is no violation.
For this reason, it is by faith,in order that it may be in
accordance with grace, so thatthe promise will be guaranteed
to all the descendants, not onlyto those who are off the law,
but also to those who are of thefaith of Abraham, who is the
father of us all." So keepingthat in mind, how should we
(29:29):
understand this connection withAbraham and what effects does it
have on our understanding of theNew Covenant in particular?
Samuel Renihan (29:39):
Well, in Romans 4 or similarly in Galatians 3,
Paul speaks of promises made toAbraham.
That may seem a little bitsurprising.
Abraham is heir of the world?
Where did God say that?
Or in Galatians 3, when he talksabout a blessing for the world,
(30:02):
that's promised to Abraham.
So we begin to see that God madepromises to Abraham that had a
much larger scope, and in someways, a higher level than just,
"Canaan is the land for you, andyou will give birth to the
Christ." There was more that wasbeing portrayed.
There was more that was beingrevealed to Abraham during that
time (30:23):
inheriting the world, blessing the world.
So we need to understand thatPaul's purpose- as he explains
in Ephesians and Colossians-Paul's purpose is to show that
what has been unveiled infullness now- Christ and his
covenant and his kingdom- thatthis unveiled mystery, this
(30:44):
blessing for the world orinheritance of the world- Paul
is telling people this isn'tnew.
This isn't the first time thatwe've been told these things.
This is what God has beenrevealing all along: Jesus
Christ and his covenant and hiskingdom is not a jack in the box
surprise.
It's precisely what God has beenplanning.
(31:05):
It's precisely what God has beenrevealing to his people.
And so Paul many times goes backto Abraham to prove this point,
and this is so important againstJewish errors, because being
Jewish is all about beingdescended from Abraham.
And so if Paul can show thatfrom the time of Abraham, this
(31:25):
was always the plan, then theJews can never make a complaint.
They can never say that Christand his covenant, his kingdom is
not Jewish or that it's abetrayal or that it's a
deviation.
If this is what God revealed toAbraham, if this is what is in
the law of Moses, if this iswhat was promised to David and
his sons, then the Jews have twooptions: believe it and join it,
or reject it and and bedestroyed by the Messiah himself
(31:49):
when he returns.
So in Romans 4 and in Galatians3, this is what I understand
Paul's purpose to be (31:53):
to prove that what has now been unveiled
in fullness was previouslypartially revealed and
sufficiently revealed.
What's new is the fullness ofknowledge.
What's not new is the plan.
So none of this- the fact thatPaul points beyond the earthly
Israelite promises- none of thatdenies or changes the fact that
(32:16):
God's covenant with Abraham wasa covenant with the people born
according to the flesh (32:20):
a covenant to give them a land,
and that the Law was given tothat people in the land.
Paul is just saying there wasmore than that.
There was something greater thanthat there that was made known
even then, and now we're seeingit in reality.
And so this affects ourunderstanding of the New
Covenant in that again we'verealized that the New Covenant
is not newly revealed.
(32:41):
It's just newly accomplished andestablished in history.
And so the Abrahamic covenantwas anticipating the New
Covenant all along, because itpromised the blessing for the
nations, the one who wouldprovide the New Covenant: Jesus
Christ.
So we're really asserting twothings.
We're saying the AbrahamicCovenant is the Abrahamic
Covenant (32:59):
people, land, birth of the Messiah.
But we're also affirming that aswe already said, that context
was preparing the world andrevealing to the world something
greater- Jesus Christ and hiscovenant and his kingdom- and
that Abraham would inherit thatby faith, through grace, and
that the blessing for thenations is this free salvation.
(33:20):
And so we can assert thatAbraham was a member of that New
Covenant by looking forward tothose things, while also
acknowledging and affirming thatAbraham had his own covenant
about life in the land of Canaanand the birth of the Messiah
from his descendants.
So Paul proves this was God'splan all along, and he goes to
Abraham to prove it in Galatiansand to prove it in Romans
(33:42):
especially- both of thoseplaces.
The way you approach thosepassages is strongly affected by
what you think Paul is trying toaccomplish and what you think
Paul is trying to argue.
And to me, it's very importantto put Galatians 3 and Romans 4
in the context of Paul's otherarguments in Ephesians and
Colossians about the mystery ofChrist and the unveiled plan.
(34:05):
If you're dealing with Jews whosay,"Jesus isn't the Christ," or
"This isn't what the Law leadsto," there's no better way to
confute them or refute them thanto point to Abraham and say,"No,
look at our father, Abraham,according to the flesh.
These things were made known tohim, so at no point in our
history was this ever not thecase." You have no excuse at
(34:27):
that point.
So I don't know how clearly Ianswered your question, but
Abraham features- let me try tosum up- Abraham features heavily
in Paul's writings, because he'strying to prove that what has
been unveiled now was previouslyrevealed.
The history of Israel showsthey've never existed as a
nation without these promisesbeing made known to them.
Amy Mantravadi (34:50):
Yeah, I think at least personally, for me, the
Abrahamic Covenant is thetrickiest one to analyze and
understand.
It has two different sort offoundation passages in Genesis
chapters 15 and 17 that whilenot contradictory, can be a
(35:11):
little difficult to put togetherbecause in one of them, it seems
like God is just making thiscompletely unconditional grant
to Abraham, and then in chapter17, he comes back with this
requirement of circumcision.
And so that can be a littleconfusing, but you know, this
year I've been working onwriting a series of articles
about the imputed righteousnessof Christ, which is the
(35:35):
Protestant understanding ofsalvation compared with a Roman
Catholic understanding ofsalvation.
And certainly these passageswhere Paul is talking about
Abraham's spiritual descendantsand talking about how Abraham
itself was justified by faith insomething that God was going to
do later and had righteousnesscredited to him- you see how
(35:58):
Abraham to Paul is kind of theexample of faith par excellence.
So he's using Abraham as anexample of- the patriarch of the
Jewish people himself was savedby faith, looking ahead to what
was going to happen in the NewCovenant.
And that's important becausewhen you also look- even some of
(36:20):
the people Jesus interacted withand John the Baptist interacted
with- very proud of theirdescent from Abraham- and John
the Baptist tells them that Godcan raise up children for
Abraham from stones.
Jesus says,"You're not Abraham'schildren.
You're the children of yourfather the devil." Obviously
that didn't make them very happywhen he said that, but you then
(36:42):
see in the letters of Paul andwhoever the author of Hebrews
was, there's a debate aboutthat, but you see them
continuing this argument abouthow the connection with Abraham-
you can be connected with himtwo different ways, and it's
being connected to him by faiththat is the most important.
So given that those who are inthe New Covenant now are
(37:04):
connected to Abraham throughfaith, and that that's the key
under the New Covenant, asopposed to the earlier covenants
we talked about, how does thataffect a person's relationship
with God and how we approachthat relationship, knowing that
we're under the New Covenant,and how should it flow into our
Christian worship and practice,as opposed to the kind of
(37:26):
worship and practice that theyhad under the Old Covenant?
Samuel Renihan (37:30):
Being in the New Covenant means that you belong
to Christ, and if you are inhim, then you get everything
that's his.
You know, Romans chapter 8 talksabout if God gave us the Son
-which is the greatest thingever, everything else is lesser
than him- how could God not giveus freely all things?
So being in Christ, havingChrist, being in the New
(37:52):
Covenant means that we geteverything that belongs to Jesus
Christ, all of the benefits andblessings that he won for his
people, through his obedientlife and death and resurrection.
So being in the New Covenantmeans for an individual that we
enjoy regeneration.
We enjoy that new birth, and weenjoy justification: our sins
being forgiven and Christ'srighteousness being attributed
(38:14):
to us.
We receive and enjoy adoptionand the indwelling of the Spirit
in us.
We enjoy sanctification (38:20):
God continuing to work on us and to
make us more and more Holy.
We have all of these blessingsand we have the Holy Spirit.
Christ is our Savior.
God is our Father.
So we have so many reasons topraise and to thank our God, and
we worship him therefore, and wepray to him because of what he
has done for us in Christ.
(38:41):
Everything we do as Christianworship has Christ at the center
of it, whether it's baptism orthe Lord's Supper or hymns or
prayer or preaching (38:49):
all of these things revolve around
Christ in his work, his work forhis people and his work in his
people.
If we look at the Old Covenant,we see that the Israelites
praised God for rescuing themfrom Egypt.
They thank him for the Exodusand for the crossing- the Red
Sea and all sorts of thewilderness years, bringing them
safely, the conquest of Canaan.
(39:10):
They praise God for his mightyworks of salvation and
deliverance.
And so we do that too, but wedon't say,"Oh God, thank you for
bringing us up out of the landof Egypt." We say,"Thank you for
bringing us up out of hell andthe chains of our sin." And so
we praise and we worship himbecause Christ did that and we
praise and worship him becauseChrist is at the Father's right
(39:30):
hand.
And so we know that we will beheard.
We know that we will be receivedbecause we have a perfect priest
at the Father's right hand,perfecting our worship and
presenting us to God in his ownblood and in his own
righteousness.
So the New Covenant- there's noway in which it does not affect
us and our worship by it.
It shapes us.
(39:51):
It defines us.
It gives us purpose and reasonfor everything that we do, and
it should infuse us with joy andgratitude for God's goodness.
And you think about the NewCovenant and you say,"Wow, this
is a good deal for us! What didwe do to deserve this?" And
that's why it's grace: extravagant, abundant, luxurious (40:07):
undefined
grace, just grace upon grace,that God would give this to us
when we hated him- when wedeserved nothing but death, he
lavished upon us goodness andmercy in Christ Jesus through
the New Covenant.
So if you ask me it shapeseverything we do in our worship
and in our daily lives.
Amy Mantravadi (40:29):
Yeah, I think that's kind of a good place to
end because we're ending withthe gratitude we have for
everything that Christ has donefor us.
I mean, that is one of the mostimportant things to take home.
So I really appreciated yourbook, which again- The Mystery
of Christ, His Covenant and HisKingdom.
(40:49):
And even though I've read somuch about covenant theology the
past few years, I still got alot out of it that.
It just caused me to think aboutthings in some different ways,
so I definitely recommend yourbook to people.
But in addition to that, ifthere's someone who wants to get
more into the study of covenanttheology, what are some other
(41:10):
good resources that you wouldrecommend for them?
Samuel Renihan (41:14):
As a starter book or even just a refresher or
overview, I'd really recommendTom Schreiner's short book
called Covenant and God'sPurpose for the World.
It's shorter than my book.
It's simpler.
It's very helpful.
It's easy to read in a shortperiod of time.
It's not going to answer everyquestion you might have about
covenant theology.
It's a really good introduction.
(41:34):
It's trying to be anintroduction, so I'm not blaming
it for not being more.
If you want to get more detailedthan that, a lot of the good
works are much older.
If you're curious about thehistory of Baptist covenant
theology, you mentioned a bookthat I worked on called From
Shadow to Substance that dealswith sort of the covenant
theology of 1689 Baptists and inthe 17th century.
(41:57):
For resources beyond that, I'mvery critical of Baptist
covenant theology because in myexperience it's very polemical
and it's hard to read because itpauses every other sentence to
attack another position, and Idon't find that very helpful.
So I really struggle torecommend books about that
(42:19):
subject, so I usually don't.
Amy Mantravadi (42:22):
Well, I think it's fair to say, so many of the
great works of covenant theologyhistorically have been written
by Reformed and Presbyterianbrothers.
Well, I would say brothers andsisters, but really they've just
been brothers.
And we would find a lot to agreewith in those books: you would,
(42:43):
I would as Particular Baptists.
So I'm sure some of those wouldbe very good.
Of course we would disagree atsome critical points.
But the one thing I doappreciate with a lot of
Protestant groups, even if wehave some disagreements, is that
we definitely agree on that keyelement about the gracious
nature of the New Covenant thatwe're under now: about being
(43:07):
saved by grace through faith,even as Abraham was.
So I appreciate you- There areso many books on the covenants
there and I mean, you could doworse than just reading the
Bible, honestly.
Samuel Renihan (43:22):
It's so funny.
Cause I, I wrote down as I waspreparing for this, I said,"Do a
one month Bible reading plan."In my opinion, if you want to
really study the covenants, do aone month- read the Bible in a
month plan and see what's- withan eye to, with sort of with
your sensors attuned to, lookingfor the development of the
(43:43):
history of redemption and God'splans and purposes.
I think it's a very eye openingexperience and it's had an
impact on me when I do that kindof thing, as I prepared to write
the book that we're discussingnow.
So I would really stronglyrecommend that.
As you recommend books aboutcovenant theology, it depends on
what people want to get out ofit.
If they want to really have acomparison and a contrast
(44:05):
between paedobaptism andcredobaptism, then there's a lot
of books that we could recommendthat are really trying to
accomplish that kind of thing.
But I find that a lot of peoplejust want to learn covenant
theology, and that's where Istruggle to recommend books
written by Baptists, Because fewof them are written with the
purpose of just teachingcovenant theology.
Many of them also have thepurpose of proving something
(44:28):
else wrong.
So if people ask me, I kind ofsay,"Well, what are you looking
for?
You know, what's your purpose?
What's your desire in readingthe literature?" And then you
have to make choices about whereto point them from there.
Amy Mantravadi (44:42):
Yeah, and the best commentary you're ever
going to get on this issue wouldbe the books of Romans,
Galatians, and Hebrews.
So that would be, of course, agreat place to start.
Or like you said, doing a surveyof the whole Bible because it's
a long story, and to reallyunderstand it all.
I don't think there's any partof scripture that isn't in some
(45:02):
way connected to covenants, andI'm quite certain that all the
scriptural authors as they werewriting had that covenantal
frame of mind, even though wedon't always have it today.
I've really appreciated ourdiscussion.
Thank you so much for taking thetime to discuss this.
I hope you've had a good timebecause I have.
Samuel Renihan (45:22):
Thanks, Amy.
I really enjoyed it.
Jon Guerra (45:24):
(MUSIC PLAYING)
Amy Mantravadi (45:51):
It was a pleasure to speak with Sam
today.
His book, The Mystery of Christ,His Covenant and His Kingdom, is
available from Founders Press.
I encourage you to check it out.
At the top of this podcast, Ireferenced that the Funk Music
Hall of Fame and ExhibitionCenter here in Dayton is seeking
some new digs after the rentalcosts on its previous exhibition
space went through the roof,which I'm assured is different
(46:14):
than blowing the roof off aplace.
If you would like to donatetoward a permanent home for this
cultural gem in the Midwest,please visit
www.thefunkcenter.org, which isspelled exactly how you would
think.
The music you've been listeningto on this podcast episode is
the song"Citizens" by JohnGuerra off his album Keeper of
(46:34):
Days.
Give it a listen, and with theholidays upon us, also make sure
to check out the album It'sAlmost Christmas that he
released with his wife, Valerie.
You will not be disappointed.
I'd like to close us today withPaul's parting words to the
Romans.
"Now to him who is able toestablish you according to my
gospel and the preaching ofJesus Christ, according to the
(46:56):
revelation of the mystery whichhas been kept secret for long
ages past, but now hasmanifested, and by the
scriptures of the prophets,according to the commandment of
the eternal God, has been madeknown to all the nations leading
to obedience of faith, to theonly wise God through Jesus
Christ, be the glory forever."Amen.
(47:16):
Have a great week!
Jon Guerra (47:19):
(MUSIC PLAYING) Is there a way to love always
living in enemy hallways?
Don't know my foes from myfriends and don't know my
friends anymore.
Power has several prizes.
Handcuffs can come in all sizes.
Love has a million disguises,but winning is simply not one.
(47:41):
(MUSIC STOPS)
Popular Podcasts
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com