Confessional Perspectives Review: True Love

The next book that we are reviewing in the “Confessional Perspectives” series, True Love: The Grace of Christian Fellowship, is written by James M. Renihan. This book had been previously published and is now republished as a part of this series for life in Confessional churches. Renihan is the President of International Reformed Baptist Seminary, distinguished Baptist historian, and has served in ministry in the local church and at the associational level. This book is brief—a hundred pages—and devotional as it presents a study of 1 Corinthians 13 for Christian love.

The book really consists of three main parts: chapter 1, chapter 2, and chapters 3–11. The final chapter, a conclusion, returns to some of the ideas from chapter 1. The summary below will give much attention to chapter 1 and more briefly describe the latter chapters.

In the first chapter, Renihan lays some important groundwork that is often forgotten in discussions of love. When people discuss love, they tend to immediately run to works or affections, but it is important to remember key affirmations regarding love that are made in Scripture and theology. First, love as it is often understood regarding the behaviors of rational creatures, falls under the category of law. In the famous declaration by the Lord, the sum of the law is to love God and love our neighbor. For this reason, Christians have often spoken of the “rule of love” (the Ten Commandments) alongside the “rule of faith” (the Apostles’ Creed). Second, love must be thought of alongside the gospel. It is because of the sanctifying work of God in us, as those who have been given new life from him, that we are able to work out our salvation with fear and trembling. This leads Renihan, third, to remind us that the God who works in us is the God who is love and has worked for us in the objective work of Christ. “Before any other love, God is love—the source and origin of all loves. The eternal mutual love of the Trinity is expressed toward humans, enabling and energizing our love” (8). Finally, God’s love toward us kindles in us a love toward him. The “personal affection . . . must not [be confused] with its fruits: duty worship, service, doctrine, etc. . . [The apostle John describes] the response that a believer gives to this great Object of affection, which is foundational to all true duty, worship, service and doctrine” (9). At the end of the book, Renihan returns to these themes, reminding the Christian that these things are essential for right thinking about the Christian life.

In the second chapter, Renihan gives a summary explanation of 1 Corinthians, situating it in the context of Act as well as outlining the basic structure of the book’s argument and the placement of the chapter on love. Though this contextual material may tempt the reader to skip the chapter, the themes he identifies here appear again through the rest of the book.

The rest of the book develops along the lines of 1 Corinthians 13 directly. It works one chapter at a time through grouped phrases and words of the passage. Renihan first draws out a definition of love, saying, 

It is a combination of affection and action, or perhaps better, it is action suffused with affection. It is a holy attachment of one person to another (or to the truth, or the church) in which both heart and hand express the reality. It is the inward sense of longing, desire and delight, and it is the outward expression of appropriate words and deeds. (24)

The chapters that follow trace out Paul’s explanation of what this sort of love looks like if it is to be considered true love. Finally, in Chapter 10, Renihan says, “After listing fifteen aspects, positive and negative, of love’s actions, Paul concludes with this grand statement[: ‘Love never fails.’]” (88). The reason for this is that “God is love” and our Mediator united deity and humanity and “lived before men and women a perfect life of unqualified love, in the power of the Holy Spirit” (90). The means by which we grow in grace is always “rooted in the gracious work done for us by God in Christ. . . True Christianity is working Christianity—one that works not for justification, but in grateful response to the gracious work done by divine power” (95).

Renihan’s book is particularly suited to secret worship (i.e., private devotions). A Christian would do well to give themselves to take two weeks and, at one chapter a day, work through the book with 1 Corinthians 13 open. Coupled with prayer for the Spirit to identify areas for growth in love, whether in the home, the workplace, the church, or other extended relationships, the Christian would find themselves growing in these marvelous graces. As a church, this would be useful in identifying a spirit of arrogance, especially since Renihan carefully notes key areas where we—particularly Reformed Christians—tend to find ourselves embodying the Corinthian spirit.

Read alongside the more doctrinally focused works in the series (e.g., Riddle, and S. Renihan), this book would aid in kindling the heart that pursues such heady truths.

Blackburn's "Critique," Chapter 5

This is our final article interacting with Earl M. Blackburn’s It Pleased the Lord to Make a Covenant of Grace: A Critique of 1689 Federalism. While there are appendices to the book, we have decided only to interact with the main content. In his final chapter, Blackburn offers five “Pastoral Observations & Concerns” regarding what he has called “Republicationism.” This chapter is a little under three pages, so our article will be short.

1. Blackburn is concerned that later generations of Reformed Baptists will reject the perpetuity of the moral law. He claims “already some Republicationists are rejecting, or leaning toward rejecting, the validity of the moral law as a rule of life for the Christian” (p. 45).

2. Blackburn is concerned that “Unbiblical Republicationism has latent within it incipient Dispensationalism!” (p. 46).

3. Blackburn believes that “Making the Old Testament covenants typological seriously denigrates the relevance and importance for the Old Testament Believers” and that “it undermines the relevance of the Old Testament for believers” today (p. 46).

4. Blackburn says “Republicationism” and “1689 Federalism” will not, largely, “convert paedobaptists to credobaptists” (pp. 46–47).

5. Finally, Blackburn says, “do not depreciate and rate me (and other non-Republicationists) as second-class, less-enlightened 20th century confessional Reformed Baptists, with paedobaptist glasses, and those who embrace Republicationism as first-class, more-enlightened 21st century confessional Reformed Baptists, with Particular Baptist glasses” (p. 47).

Response

The personal and pastoral nature of this last chapter requires a little more subjectivity in our response as well. We will respond point-by-point, but we recognize that such responses could be “countered” by other experiences, just as Blackburn’s.

1. We have not met 1689 Federalists who “reject the perpetuity of the moral law.” In fact, because 1689 Federalism makes a clear distinction between the moral law and positive laws, and allows the latter especially to define the covenants, it has been easier for 1689 Federalists to both maintain the perpetuity of the moral law and resist the arguments of Theonomy. By making a distinction within the Mosaic Covenant, we have been able to answer the question, “why do these remain and not those.”

2. It would take a lot of work for Blackburn to show that 1689 Federalism has incipient dispensationalism, and it is hard to understand what he means by this. The claims of 1689 Federalism are that there is clear distinction between the old and new covenants. The natural seed of Abraham who believe the promise are among the spiritual seed that make up the one people of the new covenant. There is one people—the spiritual—in the new covenant, so the “Israel-church” distinction that defines dispensationalism does not carry over to 1689 Federalism.

3. We do not believe that recognizing the types of the old covenant made the OT irrelevant or unimportant. What it did, instead, was draw the eyes of believers to the Christ who was to come, thus ensuring that their faith and ours are the same faith with the same object. It is difficult to know how Blackburn’s critique at this point would not apply to the book of Hebrews.

4. The question of whether or not it would “convert paedobaptists to credobaptists” is one that we will have to see. What we can say, from our own experience, is that it has helped to guard credobaptists who discover the doctrines of grace and covenant theology from becoming paedobaptists. We know, to go back to a previous point, people who had been dispensationalist or New Covenant Theology (Progressive Covenantalists) who were helped to ‘come over’ to the RB fold because of 1689 Federalism. Will it “convert” paedobaptists? Perhaps. We have found that the “normal” arguments about the regulative principle and the definitions and examples of the New Testament have often been the means by which paedobaptists are moved. What 1689 Federalism does, though, is give a covenant theology undergirding to why the OT community and NT community look different (i.e., why circumcise infants but not baptize them). Renihan’s Mystery of Christ offers some of these connections in the opening chapters.

5. Our disagreement with the position of Blackburn, and others who agree with him, is not intended to be degrading. We do believe that our position is more faithful (biblically), and more consistent Baptist theology (confessionally). Because of that, we will make our arguments. While we should all be careful not to degrade other positions (something Blackburn does often in his book), it is important that we do not simply allow what we believe to be error to be treated the same as what we believe to be the truth of the Word.

We hope this series has been useful for others.

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Blackburn's "Critique," Chapter 4

In this fourth article, we respond to the chapter “Objections to Republicationism” in our continued interaction with Earl Blackburn’s It Pleased the Lord to Make a Covenant of Grace. To recap, the important question appears in Chapter 1. Blackburn says, “For the purposes of this monograph, Republication hinges upon this question: Is the Sinaitic or Mosaic Covenant a republication of the Covenant of works as it is supposedly taught by 1689 Federalism and a few other Reformed and Calvinistic evangelicals?” (p. 14).

The fourth chapter is his longest by far, amounting to more than half of the main text of his book. This chapter has seven objections, so the chapter may simply be easiest to summarize by listing those out. This article is about twice the length of our previous articles since the chapter is so lengthy.

1. “Republicationism does not take into full consideration the true nature of the Covenant of Works” (p. 25). By this, he seems to assume that 1689 Federalism simply asserts an absolute identity between the Sinaitic Covenant and the Covenant of Works.

2. Republication “confuses the issues.” To this, Blackburn has four sub-points.

1. “It confuses the nature of salvation and justification. Are salvation and justification by works, or by works and grace?” (p. 26) Those who hold to 1689 Federalism claim that the Siniatic covenant was a covenant of works for the land while affirming that a remnant is saved by receiving the promises (i.e., salvation by a coming Seed) by faith. Blackburn seems to conclude that these claims from 1689 Federalism confuse “works and grace.” One item to note here, though we are not yet responding to the chapter directly, is that he includes a large block quote from the late pastor Walt Chantry that seems to go directly against what he says in chapter 2 about distinguishing the moral law and the covenant of works (p. 27; cf. p. 18). (See our summary of/response to that chapter here). 

2. “It confuses the nature of the New Covenant. The New Covenant is not the Covenant of Grace, as claimed by 1689 Federalism” (p. 28).

3. “Republicationism can potentially confuse people as to who is the federal head and representative of all humanity. Did the fallen Israelites have the same ability as unfallen Adam to keep God’s covenant? Was Israel’s eternal life dependent upon a perfect obedience as it was with Adam, or a sincere but imperfect obedience? If not, then how can Sinai be a republication of the Covenant of Works without it distorting the original Covenant of Works?” (p. 29)

4. “If the Covenant of Works is republished in the Sinaitic covenant, it has the subtle implication that once someone believes in Christ that person is not under the moral Law of God as a rule of life.” (p. 30) 

3. Republicationism “obscures the original intent of why the Law was given at Mt. Sinai. . . it was initially given to show God’s people how to live in a pagan and heathen culture.” (p. 31)

4. “Republicationism is extremely inconsistent, to say the least” (p. 34).

5. “Not all the 17th century Particular Baptists embraced Republicationism. It has been erroneously claimed in writing that all our forefathers (allegedly following John Owen) believed in some form of Republicationism, and 1689 Federalism was the position of all 17th century Particular Baptists. Thankfully, the position of all has been modified to ‘the majority opinion of Particular Baptists’” (p. 37).

6. “Republicationism is neither evidently or noticeably spelled out in our Confession to any degree” (p. 40).

7. “Republicationism has too many close companions with other aberrant views. What one aberrant thread does Dispensationalism, New Perspective of [sic] Paul, Federal Vision, and New Covenant Theology have in common? The Mosaic or Sinaitic Covenant is a Covenant of Works” (p. 42).

Response

Because this chapter includes more content than the others, and because it is more directly concerned with critiquing ‘1689 Federalism,’ or what he calls ‘Republicationism,’ our response will necessarily be lengthier than our responses to the other chapters.

1) While there are ways he may be confused by the conversation about the covenant of works, it is actually not the case that the weight of the covenant of works with Adam is dismissed. While the Sinaitic covenant is, at bottom, a covenant of works (i.e., based on the stipulation, “do this and live”), it is not claimed to be the covenant of works. As Renihan says, “Based on the laws, the promises, and the threats of the covenant, the Mosaic Covenant was a covenant of works for life in the land of Canaan” (Mystery of Christ, p. 110). However, he continues,

The Mosaic Covenant is a covenant of obedience for life in the land of Canaan. But it is not the original covenant of works made with Adam in the garden of Eden. The Mosaic Covenant echoes Adam’s covenant in Eden and revives the Covenant of Works in key ways, but it is not the same covenant. The place is different, the parties are different, the promises are different, and the positive laws are entirely different. The threats, though, are very different. The threats of the Mosaic Covenant demonstrate one aspect of the kindness of this covenant. In Adam’s covenant, he was threatened with immediate and complete condemnation if he disobeyed. It was an all or nothing arrangement dealing with perfect absolute righteousness. In the Mosaic Covenant, God makes demands of obedience and threatens curses based on Israel’s performance, but there are many things about the Mosaic Covenant that make it a kinder covenant than Adam’s covenant (p. 111). 

2) Blackburn's accusations of confusion stem from a lack of engagement with good source material. For instance, many of charges are answered and explained in Renihan's From Shadow to Substance, not to mention other works representing the position.

2.1) Our response to the question about grace and/or works is, quite simply, we believe that salvation is by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. We distinguish between salvation in the covenant of grace, which is by grace alone through faith alone, and what is going on in the Mosaic covenant, which required obedience in order to stay in the land of Israel even though it pointed to Christ and the covenant of grace. Since we do not simply collapse the Mosaic Covenant into the covenant of grace, we have not confused the issues. For a clear affirmation of justification by faith alone, simply read the “republicationist” Benjamin Keach’s Marrow of True Justification.

2.2) It is strange that he would deny that the new covenant is “the” covenant of grace. Are we to assume that the saints of the Old Testament were saved by a different covenant? Not only that, we confess specifically that, “Although the price of redemption was not actually paid by Christ till after his incarnation, yet the virtue, efficacy, and benefit thereof were communicated to the elect in all ages, successively from the beginning of the world, in and by those promises, types, and sacrifices wherein he was revealed, and signified to be the seed which should bruise the serpent's head; and the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world, being the same yesterday, and today and for ever” (2LBCF 8.6). The benefit of Christ’s work extends backward to all who looked with the eyes of faith upon those types and shadows that made up the old covenant’s picture of the Christ who was to come, and believed in him.

2.3) Our response to this section can be seen in the quotes from Samuel Renihan above.

2.4) As mentioned above, it is not clear how Blackburn sees a denial of “the moral Law of God as a rule of life” to be a danger if we affirm a distinction between moral law and covenants.

3) In section 3, Blackburn quotes Pink saying,

What was the nature and design of that covenant? Did God mock His fallen creatures by formally renewing the (Adamic) covenant of works, which they had already broken, under the curse of which all by nature lay, and which He knew they could not keep for a single hour? Such a question answers itself. Or did God do with Israel then as He does with His people now; first redeem, and then put them under the law as a rule of life, a standard of conduct (A. W. Pink, The Divine Covenants, 142, quoted in Blackburn, p. 33).

Here, Blackburn is treating the Mosaic covenant like it is purely within the third use of the law. But he cuts Pink off. Pink continues shortly after this statement by saying,

There is no doubt in my mind that many have been led astray when considering the typical teaching of Israel’s history and the antitype in the experience of Christians, by failing to duly note the contrasts as well as the comparisons between them. It is true that God’s deliverance of Israel from the bondage of Egypt blessedly foreshadowed the redemption of His elect from sin and Satan; yet let it not be forgotten that the majority of those who were emancipated from Pharaoh’s slavery perished in the wilderness, not being suffered to enter the promised land. Nor are we left to mere reasoning at this point: it is placed upon the inspired record that ‘behold, the days come saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant. . .’ (Heb. 8:8, 9). Thus we have divine authority for saying that God’s dealings with Israel at Sinai were not a parallel with His dealings with His people under the gospel, but a contrast!

Blackburn says that Pink called Witsius’s mixed covenant view “plausible” but erroneous and, actually highly dangerous (Blackburn p. 33). But is this what Pink says? No. He actually says that insofar as Witsius’s view that the Sinaitic covenant was neither the covenant of works, nor the covenant of grace, “but a national covenant which presupposed them both” and that it promised both temporal and eternal blessings, it was “So far so good” (Pink p. 143). Pink was very specific in what he was rejecting. He rejected the idea that the covenant allowed for sincere but imperfect obedience.

To see someone walking through many texts from earlier writers, including Gill and Pink, feel free to take a look at Brandon Adams’ website.

At several points, Blackburn speaks of republicationism as including the idea of “sincere, albeit imperfect” obedience. However, consider, again, the fact that an actual text representing our view (Samuel Renihan’s From Shadow to Substance quoting Nehemiah Coxe’s Discourse of the Covenants), includes this statement: “Though God vouchesafed ‘for the Ensurance of the Promises. . .a strict and intire Obedience to his Precepts is required in order to the Inheritance of the good things that were to be given by this Covenant” (Renihan, p. 247, emphasis original). Likewise, in The Mystery of Christ, Renihan says, “God never changed his standard of justice. The law never became more lenient, but the sacrifices accounted for Israel’s sin and provided a way of atonement” (p. 114).

4) While he calls “republicationism” inconsistent, it is not clear that he has interacted honestly with the literature. He largely seems to miss the distinction labeled “two-level typology” by Samuel Renihan, who explains how it is present in the earlier Baptists and gives language to what we are trying to affirm today.

5) While Blackburn admits that the claim to ‘exclusivity’ has been modified to ‘majority,’ the fact that he opens with the claim is misleading. Again, the fact that he does not interact with any works directly makes it difficult to know who he is referring to, but, for the sake of argument, we will assume that he is referring to Pascal Denault (Distinctiveness of Baptist Covenant Theology). The problem here is that Denault modified his claim in 2017, which was six years ago. Not only that, he fully acknowledges the change as one of the very first things he mentions in his “Forward to the Revised Edition” (p. 19). 

Further, while he includes a long quote from Robert Steed, three things are worth noting. First, Renihan interacts with Steed plenty in From Shadow to Substance and helps us to understand more clearly what is going on in the context of credobaptist–paedobaptist polemics (esp. pp. 138–147). Second, in the quote Blackburn himself uses, Steed calls the old covenant “altogether of another nature” than the new covenant (Blackburn, 39). Third, in the sentence just after what Blackburn quotes, Steed calls the covenant of circumcision a “ministering” covenant in distinction from the new covenant (Steed, 13), which coincides with what we find elsewhere in writers who use the language of “subservient” covenant. Again, see Renihan for a more thorough presentation of Steed.

6) There are several responses to Blackburn’s statements in this section. First, he asks several times why the view is “not clear in our Confession” (p. 40-41). He assumes that it would be foisted upon all by the majority. He says, “It would have been easy for the supposed majority to amend its final publication at the London General Assembly in 1689 and have their position clearly stated in the LBC” (p. 41). Is this how Confessions work? Are they the simple enforcement of majority opinion on all and the exclusion of others? Is it not rather that confessions serve as consensus documents?

Second, at several points, he repeats paedobaptists saying that “republication doctrine” was a minority in the Reformed community, and he even quotes Letham saying, “no version of this doctrine was adopted by any Reformed confession” (Blackburn, p. 40). The issue here is twofold. First, Letham also denies the covenant of redemption and claims that it was not included in any Reformed confession, obviously excluding the Savoy and, even more obvious and important here, the Second London. Second, a minority in the Reformed community is not what we are dealing with; we are dealing with what the majority opinion of the Particular Baptist community was. Is it true that congregationalism was a majority or minority among the Reformed community? Is it true that credobaptism was a majority or minority among the Reformed community? Is it true that a requirement of ordination for public proclamation of the Word was the majority or minority in the Reformed community? There are many areas where we can point to “majorities” and “minorities” within the Reformed community broadly considered, but we are focused on the Baptists (or “baptistic congregationalists”).

Third, and this could be in reference to either his fifth point or his sixth, his dismissal of the idea of reading “with the right glasses on” dismisses a very important aspect of hermeneutics (as a general discipline, not just in biblical interpretation). He mentions a few people, like Owen and Coxe, who may have held to the view he is rejecting. He asks if “anyone earnestly reading the LBC” would ever come to these positions. The problem, of course, is that Owen was a major influence on the thinking behind those who constructed the Savoy Declaration, the immediate parent document to the Second London. Goodwin, another major influence, held to basically the same position, as seen in his Of the Holy Ghost in Our Salvation (Works 6.354-58; begins at the bottom of p. 600 in Monergism version). Coxe was, it has been strongly suggested, the primary editor of the Second London Confession. If we dismiss their views as though they have no bearing on how we understand the phrasing and terminology of the Confession, we are being naïve at best. We must do this with earlier documents like the Nicene Creed as well. We do not (or ought not to) read it and come to the conclusion that the Son is lesser than the Father, and the Spirit is lesser than the Father and the Son, or that there is not one will, one power, one authority. Proponents of all sorts of different Trinitarian positions might claim that no one “earnestly reading” the Creed would come to our conclusions. We can make logical arguments, but we could also make historical ones in which we say, “Look, the men that put this together mean these things by these words.”

Fourth, and this is to more simply point out another way in which Blackburn does not seem to be pursuing consistency. He includes a large quote from Samuel Bolton. However, Bolton appreciated and affirmed John Cameron’s arguments, as seen in, again, Samuel Renihan’s From Shadow to Substance. To be fair at this point, Blackburn does admit in a footnote that he is aware of this and simply agrees with these earlier statements by Bolton.

7) The most obvious response we can make to his last point is that guilt by association is a bad argument. We could make a number of counterarguments to one’s covenant theology due to some guilt by association, but that would be poor argumentation.

In our next article, we will conclude this response to Blackburn’s Critique by looking at his short chapter 5, entitled, “Pastoral Observations & Concerns.”

Progressive Covenantalism and the "1689"

1. We love our Confession of Faith. That statement could startle one in an environment like ours, one in which creeds and confessions of faith are viewed skeptically as impositions on the Bible and the Christian. However, we hold to these documents because we believe they accurately summarize the biblical teaching.[1] Since we believe the Second London Baptist Confession of Faith (1677/89), hereafter 2LBCF, accurately summarizes the Scriptures on each point of which it speaks, we not only agree with it, but our hearts are warmed by the truth it communicates.

2. We remain convinced that the covenantal theology standing in the background of, and expressed in, the 2LBCF represents an accurate handling of Scripture. Our aim in this article is to interact with what has been called “progressive covenantalism” and offer some preliminary assessments of how this proposal intersects with and diverges from the covenantal theology most prominent among early confessors of the 2LBCF and recovered more recently by various pastor-theologians.[2] To interact with progressive covenantalism, we will first provide a basic explanation of covenantal theology contained in the 2LBCF. Next, we will point to some particular ways progressive covenantalism expresses commonalities with the 2LBCF. Finally, we will point at some ways progressive covenantalism diverges from the Confession.

Second London Covenant Theology

First, the 2LBCF is purposely broad in its expression of covenant theology in chapter 7. While its differences from its parent documents—the Westminster Confession (WCF) and Savoy Declaration (SD)—are quite noticeable, it is also true that the language could be affirmed by confessional Presbyterians and Congregationalists.[3] In the 2LBCF, the language of “promise” and its distinction from the completion finds its emphasis. Paragraph 3 says,

This covenant is revealed in the gospel; first of all to Adam in the promise of salvation by the seed of the woman, and afterwards by farther steps, until the full discovery thereof was completed in the New Testament; and it is founded in that eternal covenant transaction that was between the Father and the Son about the redemption of the elect; and it is alone by the grace of this covenant that all the posterity of fallen Adam that ever were saved did obtain life and blessed immortality, man being now utterly incapable of acceptance with God upon those terms on which Adam stood in his state of innocency.[4]

While the covenant of grace was promised in the Old Testament, and it was made known by its types and shadows, the covenant is only fully present in Christ’s coming. The old covenant elect believed upon the same Christ, and the same grace was communicated to them, but the old covenant was not in itself the covenant of grace.

Progressive Covenantalism: Some Important Intersections

Consider some important ways this intersects with the proposal for progressive covenantalism. Stephen Wellum says, “Progressive covenantalism argues that the Bible presents a plurality of covenants that progressively reveal our triune God’s one redemptive plan for his one people, which reach their fulfillment, telos, and terminus in Christ and the new covenant.”[5]

A first, and important, point of intersection is the emphasis on continuity from the Old to New Testament, from the promise to fulfillment. Standing in notable difference from dispensationalism, progressive covenantalists and their confessional brothers agree that the “church is not a parenthesis in God’s plan or a present illustration of what national Israel and Gentile nations will be in the millennium and/or consummation as recipients of ‘distinct’ blessings.”[6] Between us, there is a common emphasis on the fulfillment that comes in the first advent of Christ and the presence of the new covenant.

Second, we both want to recognize the particular purpose of the old covenant, both in its typological significance and particular contextual significance. Wellum says, “[Michael] Horton misses various nuances of the land promise in the old covenant. . . Possession of the land is tied to Israel’s obedience, but Israel’s land is also typological: it looks back to Eden and what was lost, and forward to the new creation won by Christ.”[7] Both of these emphases are shared (with some differences) by adherents to the 2LBCF. Largely, confessional Baptists hold that the old covenant is a covenant of works for the land. [8] Not only was the land lost in their disobedience, but this arrangement hearkens back to the covenant of works and points forward to Christ’s work.

Third, we both emphasize the “newness” of the new covenant. While all Christians seek to affirm that Christ’s work also purchased freedom for the saints of the old covenant (2LBCF 21.1), these two Baptist systems agree in their emphasis on the “newness” of the new covenant. Unlike the old covenant, which typified the new but was characterized by earthly promises and the inclusion of an earthly seed, both progressive covenantalists and confessional Baptists look at Hebrews’ interpretation of Jer. 31 and draw out the important differences between the old and new covenants.[9]

Progressive Covenantalism: Some Important Divergences

While progressive covenantalism intersects with the emphases of Confessional covenantalism at many points, there remain some important points where it does not cohere with the 2LBCF. Here are two.

First, consider our understanding of the covenant of works. Confessional Baptists believe that the covenant of works was, first, something added to nature, since it is a covenant (2LBCF 7.1), and, second, definitively broken in the garden.[10]

Progressive covenantalists, however, place great emphasis on the continuity of what they call the “covenant of creation” and its fulfillment in Christ. The way they tend to discuss this differs from the particular points of distinction which confessional Baptists hold. We believe covenants are grounded on nature but not identical with it; covenants are positive. However, in many ways, progressive covenantalists seem to identify nature and covenant with their proposal of a creation covenant. There are signs they are changing their view on this point[11], but the standard works (Kingdom through Covenant, Progressive Covenantalism, and “Progressive Covenantalism” in Covenantal and Dispensational Theologies, in addition to Biblical Studies), all represent less distinction. By contrast, the standard 1689 Federalist works (Getting the Garden Right, The Mystery of Christ, and From Shadow to Substance) have all been clear on this.

Second, consider our understanding of the moral law and the tripartite division of the law. Confessional Baptists recognize the particular way the moral law—summarized in the Decalogue—was integrated into the old covenant, but we also recognize it as a distinct and enduring law which has continued to today. This law was “written on the heart of man” and “delivered by God upon Mount Sinai, in ten commandments” (2LBCF 19.2). Since we have a distinction between the moral and positive laws, with the latter being necessary for covenants, we can speak of the “abrogation” and “expiration” of ceremonial and judicial laws with the conclusion of the old covenant (2 LBCF 19.3-4).

Progressive covenantalists speak of applying the whole Old Testament in ways that seek to uphold the covenantal situations, but they do not view the Decalogue as the summary of the moral law. This appears most practically in our disagreement over the application of the Sabbath command, but we see that more foundational differences are present.

Keeping Dialogue

Progressive covenantalism has helpfully made arguments that are similar to confessional Baptists. Together, we disagree with both dispensationalists and paedobaptist covenantalists in our understanding of the relation between the old and new covenants. Together, we believe that the Abrahamic and Mosaic covenants must both be taken together, and we seek to emphasize both as pointing ultimately to Christ. Together, we believe that there are key reasons for seeing the makeup of the new covenant community (i.e., the church) as different than the old covenant community. Together, we seek to distinguish between the types and antitype in ways that consistently affirm the fulfillment of God’s promises in Christ. While key points of disagreement remain, we rejoice that both groups strive to make known the gospel of grace offered in Christ.

[1] Admittedly, this is not the uniform way of wording an expression of confessional adherence. For some, among whom I count myself, the statement is made that a particular confession of faith is held to because (Latin: quia) it is biblical, that is, it accurately communicates the teachings of Scripture. For others, the statement is made that a particular confession of faith is held to insofar as (Latin: quatenus) it is biblical, that is, with the exception of any places where it contradicts Scripture.

[2] Particularly Pascal Denault, Richard Barcellos, and James and Samuel Renihan.

[3] Samuel Renihan makes the same point: “The language is carefully broad and specific at the same time. Any of the Particular Baptists’ opponents could have subscribed to these statements… The model they confessed was not so exclusively or distinctively Baptist that others would disagree with it.” Samuel D. Renihan, “From Shadow to Substance”: The Federal Theology of the English Particular Baptists (1642-1704), Centre for Baptist History and Heritage Studies, vol. 16 (Oxford: Regent’s Park College, 2018), 188-89.

[4] Second London Baptist Confession of Faith (1677/89) 7.3.

[5] Stephen J. Wellum, “Progressive Covenantalism,” in Covenantal and Dispensational Theologies: Four Views on the Continuity of Scripture, ed. Brent E. Parker, and Richard J. Lucas, Spectrum Multiviews Books (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2022), 75.

[6] Wellum, “Progressive Covenantalism,” 105-06.

[7] Stephen J. Wellum, “A Progressive Covenantalism Response,” in Covenantal and Dispensational Theologies: Four Views on the Continuity of Scripture, ed. Brent E. Parker, and Richard J. Lucas, Spectrum Multiviews Books (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2022), 208.

[8] For the development of how the Particular Baptists understood the old covenant as a covenant of works, see Samuel D. Renihan, “Above and Beyond: Seventeenth-Century Particular Baptist Covenant Theology,” SBJT 26, no. 1 (2022): 90-114. https://sbts-wordpress-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/equip/uploads/2023/02/SBJT-26.1-17th-Century-Particular-Baptist-Cov-Theology-S.-Renihan.pdf

[9] For example, see Stephen J. Wellum, “Progressive Covenantalism,” in Covenantal and Dispensational Theologies: Four Views on the Continuity of Scripture, ed. Brent E. Parker, and Richard J. Lucas, Spectrum Multiviews Books (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2022), 98; Samuel D. Renihan, The Mystery of Christ, His Covenant, and His Kingdom (Cape Coral, FL: Founders Press, 2019), 160-70.

[10] Samuel D. Renihan, The Mystery of Christ, His Covenant, and His Kingdom (Cape Coral, FL: Founders Press, 2019), 74. “The Covenant of Works depends on positive laws. It is much more than the moral law. And with no more Eden and no more sacramental trees, there are no more positive commands to obey.”

[11] Michael Carlino, for instance has recently sought to make a harder distinction here: https://christoverall.com/article/longform/the-noahic-covenant-reaffirms-gods-universal-demand-on-his-creation-a-progressive-covenantalist-response-to-david-vandrunen/

A Baptist Doctrine of the Covenant of Grace?

For two reasons, we thought it would be helpful to produce an introduction to a particular take on the covenant of grace that was prominent among Baptists for much of our history. First, I (Daniel) have been preparing to teach on the covenant of redemption at a family conference which has caused me to go back and look at some of what I wrote in my dissertation again. Second, and more importantly as an impetus, there seems to be something of a widespread misunderstanding of what Baptists were saying when they spoke of the covenant of grace, and this has caused some misuse of their writing by present-day writers. Even with that background, this article seeks to be clarifying rather than polemical. In fact, it will be very minimal, straightforward, and introductory.

Some Baptist History

First, there’s a confessional statement. When one reads the Second London Confession, we see that there is a “covenant of grace” (7.2) which is revealed first to Adam and then “by farther steps” in the progress of revelation and redemptive history; finally, it came in its fulness in Christ (7.3). This covenant, however, is “founded on that eternal covenant…about the redemption of the elect” (7.3). Thus, we see a distinction between what is called the covenant of grace, which is first promised and then completed, and the covenant of redemption, which was between the Father and the Son in eternity.

Second, there’s a history. In the 1690s, one Particular Baptist, Benjamin Keach, was embroiled in a fight against Baxterians (or Neonomians). In early 1693, Keach preached a funeral sermon against them in which he said that we should no longer distinguish between the covenants of redemption and grace. He said that he once did, but he had come to reject the distinction and called the whole thing simply the covenant of grace. While I did not find the particular moment until after my dissertation (though I included it in an article that the Journal of International Reformed Baptist Seminary will hopefully publish), one can see that this shift was very recent in his thinking, between a publication the previous year and the one in early 1693. It seems Keach had come across Samuel Petto’s work, Covenant of Grace, and had been compelled that it was 1) right and 2) useful in arguing against the Baxterians.

There is much to the argument, but this article is intended more as a survey of the history. It is easiest to understand Keach as arguing for the singular covenant of redemption rather than the singular covenant of grace because he was primarily arguing that it was a covenant made immediately with Christ and that man is brought into it by consequence of Christ’s work.

Third, there’s a successor. John Gill—Keach’s successor at the Horselydown Church in London—maintained the same position against the distinction, and it seems this was the position of Baptists long afterward. Consider the Baptists’ “Catechism for Girls and Boys,” which asks, “What is the covenant of grace?” The answer: “It is an eternal agreement within the Trinity to save certain persons called the elect, and to provide all the means for their salvation.” That answer would seem, based on common affirmations of the distinction between the covenants of redemption and grace today, to be more appropriately associated with the covenant of redemption. 

Fourth, there’s evidence of continuity. We see Spurgeon, Keach’s and Gill’s successor in the congregation, making the same argument. In a sermon entitled “The Blood of the Everlasting Covenant,” he says,

Now, in this covenant of grace, we must first of all observe the high contracting parties between whom it was made. The covenant of grace was made before the foundation of the world between God the Father, and God the Son; or to put it in a yet more scriptural light, it was made mutually between the three divine persons of the adorable Trinity. This covenant was not made mutually between God and man. Man did not at that time exist; but Christ stood in the covenant as man's representative. In that sense we will allow that it was a covenant between God and man, but not a covenant between God and any man personally and individually. It was a covenant between God with Christ, and through Christ indirectly with all the blood-bought seed who were loved of Christ from the foundation of the world. (1)

In this sermon, we see one of the clearest and most concise expressions of the “Keachian” understanding of the covenant of grace, i.e., (for the sake of simplicity) the covenant of redemption but under the title “covenant of grace.”

Further Explanations

Several clarifications should be made based on what we see in these writers. First, the “collapsing” (to speak somewhat pejoratively) was not exclusively Baptist. As mentioned, Keach got it from Petto, who was an Independent (i.e., Congregationalist), and others have expressed the same doctrine. In fact, an Independent church meeting at Horselydown included the same idea in their local church confession. Even more recently, Joel Beeke and Paul Smalley have included this understanding in their Reformed Systematic Theology. Second, to refer to it as Baptist is not to say that all Baptists held to it. As mentioned above, Keach did not always hold to his understanding, and the Confession of Faith makes what seems to be a clear distinction. The Confession’s principal editor, Nehemiah Coxe, also refers to the covenant of redemption.

Third, and this is perhaps most important, this means that one must be careful about reading early Baptist writers speaking of the “convent of grace” across time. When they do so, they operate with a different distinction than others. It is under this rubric that someone like Gill could speak of the old covenant as “a covenant of works” (comments on Rom 10:4) and still speak of the covenant of grace being administered across time. He says, “I have considered the covenant of grace in a former part of this work, as it was a compact in eternity, between the three divine persons, Father, Son, and Spirit; in which each person agreed to take his part in the economy of man’s salvation: and now I shall consider the administration of that covenant in the several periods of time, from the beginning of the world to the end of it.” (2)

Finally, we (at Baptist Dogmatics) should say that we do hold to the distinction between the covenants of redemption and grace. We say this because our explanation of a historic development could be taken as an advocacy for it. It seems best, in our opinion, to preserve the distinction maintained in the Confession, one in which we say that the covenant of redemption is the grounds and security of the covenant of grace, but that in the one, Christ purchases a people and in the other, those people “close with God” (to use an old Puritan phrase) by faith in Christ. The Son receives his throne and the ends of the earth are given to him (Pss 2, 110), and they offer themselves to him freely (Ps 110:3).

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1. Charles H. Spurgeon, “The Blood of the Everlasting Covenant,” New Park Street Pulpit, vol. 5 (October 2, 1859). https://www.spurgeon.org/resource-library/sermons/the-blood-of-the-everlasting-covenant/#flipbook/

2. John Gill, A Complete Body of Doctrinal and Practical Divinity: Or A System of Evangelical Truths, Deduced from the Sacred Scriptures, New Edition., vol. 1 (Tegg & Company, 1839), 491.

Intermission

We are both intending to devote more of our attention to the completion of our dissertations, with the aim of receiving our PhDs at the May graduation. Due to this goal, we have decided to institute a hiatus on our aim at public dogmatics on this site until we have made sufficient progress toward our dissertations (i.e. either completed them, or reached a near point of completion). We are thankful for the readership we have had since starting this site in February, and we look forward to continuing our efforts in the future. We also recognize that our priorities in our families, local churches, and degree commitments must be front loaded. We welcome questions, so still feel free to contact us. We will pick up on our respective series (on 2LBCF chapter 1 & natural theology among the Reformed) when we return to our writing on this site.