Month: October 2021

The Doctor: We Bear His Name

“This is the astounding thing that happens to all who are Christians, all who are members of this body, which is the Bride of Christ. You have been given a new name by the Prince of glory, and wonder of wonders! it is His own name. There is no honour or glory greater than this. You are lost in a new name, and it is the highest name of all. We read that a day is coming when (at the name of Jesus every knee shall bow, of things in heaven, and things on earth, and things under the earth’ – and that is the name that is given to us who are constituted the Bride of Christ.

Then we see that out of that comes the fact that we are sharers in His dignity, in His great and glorious posidon. The Apostle has already said as much in chapter 2 where he has told us the amazing truth that ‘He hath raised us up together (in Christ), and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus.’ That is true of us now. If we are Chrisdans at all we are ‘in Christ’ and that means that we are ‘seated with Him in the heavenly places.’ Wherever the bridegroom is the bride is also, and the standing, the dignity, and the position that belong to him belong to her. It does not matter at all who she was; the moment she becomes his bride she shares all with him. And woe betide anyone who does not accord to her the posidon and the dignity! There is no greater insult that can be offered to the bridegroom than a refusal to honour his bride. This is the truth, says the New Testament, about the Christian. It is something that we are told repeatedly. One statement of it occurs in the 17th chapter of John’s Gospel, verse 22, where our Lord says: ‘And the glory which Thou gavest Me I have given them.’ The glory. He says, which the Father had given Him He has given to His people. It is something that happens invariably in a marriage; the bride, being a part of the husband, and having his name on her, shares his whole position. The glory which Thou gavest Me I have eiven them.'” —D. Martyn Lloyd Jones, Life in the Spirit

Yes, But What Kind of Relationship? (Genesis 1:26–31; 2:5–17)

16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, 17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” —Genesis 2:16–17

“Christianity is not a religion. It’s a relationship,” so many an evangelical says. Ok, but what kind of relationship is it? It is a covenantal one. The saint’s relationship to God is a covenantal relationship and because that is so, we may say it is a religious relationship, for covenants involve oaths, vows, commandments, and sacrifices.

Also, insofar as we say Christianity is a relationship, that alone doesn’t make the Christian distinct from any other man. All men relate to God covenantally. The question isn’t whether or not you have a relationship with God, but what kind of relationship it is? Do you relate to God in Adam, under the covenant of creation, as one cursed, or, do you relate to God in Christ, under the new covenant, as one blessed?

As man fell in Adam, so He is redeemed in Christ. Man fell covenantally. He is redeemed covenantally. Both Adam and Christ function as covenant heads. A study of Romans 5 and 1 Corinthians 15 makes this clear and proves illuminating for Genesis 1 and 2. As Adam’s disobedience condemns, so Christ’s obedience justifies. In Adam we see the old humanity, fallen. In Christ we see a new humanity, raised up.

We call this covenant made with Adam the covenant of creation or the covenant of works and it is still in effect; not with promise, but with condemnation. It is in effect on all humanity as violated in Adam. When God makes a covenant, He makes it for keeps. His yes is yes and His no is no. He doesn’t make covenants lightly to break them once man has broken them. Left to himself, this is where man is, covenantally in Adam.

If you think you got a bad rep in Adam consider two things. First, how many times have you proven that Adam represented you well? You are no fine red citizen with an immoral blue representative. Second, if you are to have any hope of salvation, you want it so that another can rep you as your federal head. You are saved in a sense by the covenant of works. Saints, we are saved by works. They’re just not our own. Jesus bore the curse of God for our law breaking and He obeyed the Father perfectly in our place meriting our salvation that we might be clothed with His righteousness. He is the second Adam, the head of a new humanity.

And blessed be our God, things are now far better for us in Christ than they ever could have been in Adam. In Christ, we are not simply made in the image of God; we are being conformed to image of the Son. In Adam, there is the possibility of falling; in Christ, there is the assurance we never will. In Adam, the creation under man’s feet was under threat of a possible curse. In Christ, all is made new, and eternally glorious.

The Doctor: The Real Division of the Bible

“What then, are the ways in which the covenant of grace has been dispensed under”the”old dispensation? Well, you go first of all Genesis 3:15. If you are interested in the technical term it is generally called the protevangel. In other words, there is a kind of foreshadowing of the whole gospel in Genesis 3:15. Now to me this is one of the most fascinating and thrilling things anyone can ever encounter. Here is this great book; we divide it up and we call it the Old Testament and the New Testament and we all know what we mean by that. But, you know, if we were to be strictly accurate we would not describe it in that way. The real division of the Bible is this: first, everything you get from Genesis 1:1 to Genesis 3:14; then everything from Genesis 3:15 to the very end of the Bible. What you have up until Genesis 3:14 is the account of the creation, and of God’s original covenant of works with man, and of how that failed because man broke it. Beginning with Genesis 3:15 you get the announcement of the gospel, the covenant of grace, the way of salvation, and that is the whole theme of the Bible until you come to the last verse of the book of Revelation. That is the real division of the Bible.” —D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Great Doctrines of the Bible

No Longer Strangers (Ephesians 2:11–13)

Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called “the uncircumcision” by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands— remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

—Ephesians 2:11–12

Why study the covenants? Saints, because they’re ours. Your Bible is divided up into an Old Testament and a New Testament. “Testament” is an unfortunate though understandable rendering. “Covenant” is the idea. Old Covenant. New Covenant. That’s your Bible.

It is true that these labels are man made, but they are goodun’s. Read Hebrews again if you doubt that. If you don’t doubt it, then you can reach this conclusion: you cannot understand your Bible if you do not understand covenant. “Covenant” is like the spine of your Bible holding all its pages together. The Bible is thoroughly covenantal. The covenants are yours the way the Bible is yours. Because the Bible itself is covenantal through and through and because the covenants are yours, the Bible is yours.

There are many who would dispute this. Dispensationalist Bibles have weak spines. When you pick up a Scofield or Ryrie study Bible, a lot of stuff falls out. Dispensationalism has been the majority report within Evangelicalism since shortly after J.N. Darby planted the invasive seeds of it in the mid 19th century. Dispensationalism basically sorts all the Bible into one of two boxes labeled “Ethnic Israel” and “Spiritual Church.” Sure, upon close examination they say there are seven boxes in total, but those others are more like jewelry boxes whereas these two are shipping containers. Progressive dispensationalists allow some things to go into both boxes, but for the classic guys like Lewis Sperry Chafer, founder of Dallas Theological Seminary, those boxes didn’t leak. Regardless, in both schemes, progressive and classic, there are two distinct plans, one for ethnic Israel, one for the church. The people of God are divided, and thus, so too is the Bible.

But what God has joined together, let not man separate. Two have become one, Jew and Gentile are made a new humanity, a singular people in Christ. All that was foreshadowed in the Old Covenant, the saints enjoy in fulness. Abraham is ours. Our hearts have been circumcised. The blood of the Passover Lamb marks us. We draw near to the most holy place coming to a throne of Grace. We are part of the true Exodus. Like the patriarchs, we are exiles looking for that city whose builder and maker is God. We are heirs according to the promise—the promise made in the Old Testament.

Let us not be strangers to what we are no longer strangers to—the covenants of promise. The covenants (plural) promised (singular) the Christ. In Christ, all of God’s promises are yes to His people, and by His blood, we are part of that people.