Dr Greg Bahnsen - In Understanding Be Men: The Covenant Promises of God (Part 2)

In our last session, I told you we need to grow up. It's time to put away childish things and to become full grown men in understanding the pattern of sound words that is found for us in the Scripture. In this lesson, I would like to focus specifically on the character of God and how in history he has brought about our redemption. Because this is a sorely misunderstood subject if we're to judge from the kind of preaching and theology that we see about us in the Christian church today. And I'm thinking specifically here of a point of view that is often known as dispensationalism. If we would grow up and make mature decisions based on the word of God as to what the Scripture actually teaches, we have to get into some of this divisive stuff. There are differences of opinion. People don't agree with one another. And I'd like to present in this lesson two points of view with respect to redemptive history. But before we talk about redemptive history, it would be a good idea to tell you what that's all about. Why do we refer to redemptive history? If you're young in the faith, you may not have even thought about this. Because the most important thing to us when we become Christians is am I right with God? Who is God? What's wrong with me? What provision has he made? What am I to believe and what am I to do? And that one on one intimate relationship with God in which we are saved, of course, is crucial to us and will have eternal consequences. But the way in which God has saved us didn't begin with us. You know, God's work in history to bring about salvation didn't start the day that you became a believer. After all, you believe something about a man who lived many years ago, Jesus Christ. And Jesus Christ didn't just come into the world, and that was the beginning of Christianity. There was a long history of preparation for his coming into the world. And so that history by which God brought about redemption is known as redemptive history. And there are different opinions about God's work in redemptive history that you need to be aware of. The two that I'm interested in tonight are known as dispensationalism on the one hand, and covenant theology on the other. The Bible tells us that in mercy toward undeserving sinners, God established a promise, a bond between Himself and those who would trust him and submit to him as his people. And this promise, this bond by which we are united to God in faith and submission, is known as a covenant God has entered into, if we wanted to be more commercial in our way of putting it, a contract. God has bound Himself to His own word. He's made a promise in which he calls on us to submit to him, to trust him, to become his people. And this covenant, this covenant is not something that we have devised. God didn't ask us to come to the negotiation table and sit down. Kind of like the baseball strike. What is it you want? What is it I'm willing to give? And can we meet somewhere in the middle? God sovereignly imposes this promise, this bonded relationship that we know as a covenant. God is the one who determines the terms. And so it's very one sided. But of course the benefit that comes is ours. That's why it's known as a gracious covenant. Because God did not need to enter into this relationship with man. God did not need to make promise. God did not need to bind himself for our good and for our salvation. God imposes this covenant. But it's a gracious transaction and it's transacted for the benefit for the good of those who will trust Him. It brings us undeserved benefit. It brings us grace in the midst of our sin and the hope of eternal salvation. Now, where did all this begin? Where did redemptive history and get underway? Please open your Bibles with me now to Genesis, the third chapter. We're going to pick up the story in Genesis 3. With mankind in a very bad situation, God has created man upright. He's given Adam and Eve all they need for life and a task to subdue the garden, to learn more and more about it, and to live in this world to his glory, under his dominion and under his guidance. God says, there's only one thing that you may not do. You may not eat of this particular tree. Because God wanted to make it clear how they know good and evil. Good and evil will be defined and will be known according to my word and my authority, not according to your own thinking and your experience. And so God said, as a probation on our first parents, he said, you do not eat of the tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil. Well, you know the story, of course. It's the most famous story in human history. It's the story of how mankind entered into sin and rebellion and misery and ultimate eternal condemnation from God. One day, Eve was tending the garden and the serpent approached her, the evil one speaking through the serpent, and tempted her to eat of this tree and suggesting that in fact she wouldn't really die as God had said, and that God was just jealous. He didn't want Adam and Eve to be like him. And so Eve was taken in by this subtle temptation. And she ate of the tree and she gave to her husband, who apparently was there with her, and he ate as well. And they decided that they would be the final standard of right and wrong. And by making that decision, they rebelled against God and came under his condemnation. Now, what should God do at the this point. In the day that you eat thereof, you shall surely die, he said. Some people read the Genesis account and say, well, they didn't die. Well, you've really missed it if you don't think they died because they were separated from the source of life and from all good. And in the end, when all of history is wound up, that's what it's going to be to know eternal death. When God is separated from you or you are separated from him for all eternity, God will say, depart from me, ye who work iniquity, into the outer darkness where there is weeping and wailing and the gnashing of teeth. Adam and Eve entered into that hellish experience. Although it wasn't final. They entered into that hellish experience on the very day that they ate of the tree. But the Bible tells us that God did something which in a sense, should just bring you to your knees in tenderness and tears already. God didn't send them to hell immediately, though they were separated from him. And they were, as it were, on the road to hell already. And they knew the misery of sin. You see it right away. Adam and Eve are guilty. They feel guilty. They try to clothe themselves. They run from God. Where they once enjoyed the voice of God walking in the garden with them, now when they hear God's voice, they run. Isn't that terrible? For the first time they knew what it was to be afraid and to be afraid of the one that they could not ever escape. God. Isn't that tragic? God? This is for dramatic effect. It's not because God really is in any doubt about the information. God says, adam, where are you? This is not like you, Adam. Why are you hiding from me? Why are you running away? God could have shown up and at that point declared the final doom of the human race, could have been the final judgment right there. But instead we see that God comes to Adam and Eve, who have rebelled against him for no good reason, have defied his word, defied his goodness, challenged his truth, lived to themselves, sided with the wicked one against him. God comes to them and makes a promise. That's why I say in tenderness and tears, do you hear that? God, instead of condemning the human race, makes a promise. And in Genesis 3, verse 15, I want you to see this important central part of God's promise. God here is speaking to the serpent who is now cursed. And in verse 15 continues, and I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed. He shall bruise thy head, thou shalt bruise his heel. If you ever want to know what the Bible is all about, you've got to go to that verse, because the Bible is the outworking of that promise. God shows up and he says to the one who has brought the human race down, brought it into sin and rebellion, brought it into misery and ultimate condemnation, he says, and I'm going to put enmity between you and the woman. Moreover, that enmity will be between your seed and the woman's seed. There are going to be those who belong to the evil one, who are the children of the devil, if you will. And yet there are going to be those who belong to the woman and will enjoy salvation. And one, one individual, one human being in particular is singled out, as God goes on to say. And he, he, of all those who are the seed of the woman, one in particular is going to be the Savior. And he's going to crush the head of the snake. He's going to destroy Satan in the process. He will undergo a bruising. His heel will be wounded, to be sure, but in the process of his heel being wounded, the head of the serpent will be crushed. I find that amazing that God would come to a rebellious couple, the human race as we knew it at that time. And instead of striking them dead for all eternity and separating himself, he said, I have a promise for you. I'm going to save you. You don't deserve this. There's nothing good in you by which I should do this. You have not earned this. In fact, you've earned the very opposite of it. You know, that's what grace is, God giving sinners the opposite of what they deserve. We sometimes say grace is unmerited favor. And it is it's favor that's unmerited. But that really doesn't get, it seems to me, to the depth of what grace is all about. Because grace is not simply giving something that's undeserved. It's giving the opposite of what is deserved. You understand what I'm saying? God could have blessed people who had not earned his blessing. But here God blesses people who have deserved his condemnation. And so he comes and he makes a promise. And this is the beginning of the biblical story. That's really all I want to talk to you about tonight is how is it now in history that God works out this promise of sending a savior who is the representative of the seed of the woman is going to destroy the evil one? God has made a promise and he didn't have to do that at all. You know, God could simply have required the human race to obey him and not given any kind of promise of reward afterwards. You know why? Because that's what creatures owe to their creator. He does not owe them some kind of reward for doing what they were made to do. And I've got a watch here that I'm trying to keep track of so I make sure I don't go over time tonight. Now, if this watch doesn't let me down, if it keeps running and Mattel's time correctly, do you think I'm going to go back to my room tonight? I'm going to take off this watch and say, oh, you good watch. What can I do for you? You are such a good watch. Well, not only would that be silly because it's an inanimate watch thing, but my point here is you don't reward a watch for doing what a watch is made to do. You know, what you do is when it doesn't work right, you say, get rid of it. But watches don't deserve any reward just because they've done what watches were made to do. And likewise, the human race would not have anything coming even if we perfectly obeyed God's requirements. God did not have to make a promise at all. He could have simply said, creatures are supposed to obey their Creator. That's all there is to it. But here we see that God comes to the creature, the Creator comes to the creature, and not just to the creature, to the rebellious, fallen creature, and makes a promise. And the best promise of all, he says, the one who's brought you all this misery, I'm going to destroy on your behalf. And here God divides the human race into two camps, into two groups of people. You notice that he says there's going to be enmity between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent. The serpent. Here, of course, is the evil one, Satan. And there are going to be those who belong to Satan, who are going to be, as it were, his children, and they are going to live in enmity against those who belong to Satan. To the woman, to the church, if you will, to those who are in the company of the redeemed those who have the seed of the woman that he, that singular seed to be their savior. And so those who are saved, those who are the seed of the woman, and those who are in rebellion against God and following Satan, are going to have hostility and antagonism. There's going to be an antithesis between them throughout all of history. And by the way, that antithesis is going to be continued all the way into eternity, isn't it? As the day is coming, Jesus says, when he will separate the sheep from the goats, the wheat from the tares, and the one will go into the kingdom of God to enjoy the blessed presence of God forever, and the other will be banished from his presence and will know nothing but grief and misery for all eternity. So God shows up and he makes a promise. Redemptive history is the story of how God has worked out that promise. What kind of God do we know according to the scriptures, if our theology is going to be based on the word of God? It seems to me you have to include in any adequate definition, any adequate description of God that He is a promise keeping God. He is a God who has graciously made a promise of salvation and, and he lives up to his word over and over again. We see in the Bible, God enters in to promise bonded relationships, what we call covenants. In Genesis 6:18, you notice in your Bible, God says to Noah, I will establish my covenant with you. And then later in Genesis 17:2, God says to Abraham, and I will establish my covenant with you. And when we turn to the next book of the Bible, Exodus, the second chapter, verse 24, we read God remembered his covenant. So from the very opening chapters of the Bible we know that this is a crucial, a central concept and characteristic of God, that He is a covenant keeping, a covenant making and covenant keeping God. He makes promise to his people and he lives up to it. He remembers his covenant, he remembers his promise. And that tells us why the history of God's people is what it is. And now what is the basis for God entering into this kind of covenantal relationship with his people? Why does God make promise with Adam about a seed and a Savior to come? Why does he make promise, enter into covenant with Noah? Why does he enter into a covenant with Abraham? Why does he keep covenant and save the Jews who were in slavery and bring them out of that land to the land that he had promised them? And in Deuteronomy 7:7:9, the Bible answers why it is God keeps his covenant, why it is he establishes these promises and lives up to these Promises we read. The Lord did not set his love upon you, nor choose you, because you were more in number than any people, but because the Lord loves you and because he would keep the oath which he swore to our forefathers as the Lord brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you. Know, therefore, that the Lord your God, he is God, the faithful God, who keeps covenant and loving kindness with them that love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations. Why did God save Israel? Is because he remembered his promise. The promise made to Abraham and the promise made earlier to Adam. God remembers the covenant that he's entered into, and so he saves his people. He says it was not because you were mighty, not because you had accomplished a great deal, not because you were good, not because you earned it, but because I loved you. And in my love I keep my promises. You don't deserve my promise, nor do you deserve my keeping this promise. Because you haven't lived up to your end of the bargain, if I can put it in cheap human terms. God says, you haven't done what I ask you to do. You haven't been faithful to me. You haven't obeyed my commandments, you haven't trusted what I have said. But because I love you, and I remember that I made this promise of salvation, I. I stick with you. God tells us that if it weren't for his constancy, for his graciousness, for his reliability, we'd have no hope. God keeps the promise of salvation for the sake of those who do not have it coming at all. They have not accomplished anything. And why is it that God has entered into a covenant to save a portion of mankind? Why is it that God has promised that he will have a seed on earth that belonged to him and one particular seed that represents all the others in bringing salvation? The purpose of God's covenant is put many times in the Bible. You'll see it in Jeremiah 11, 2, 3, 4, when God says, hear the words of this covenant. Hear the words of this covenant. So shall you be my people, and I will be your God. There's nothing more intimate, nothing more beautiful in all of Scripture than that bonded relationship where God says, I am for you and you are for me. You're mine. That's why Jesus came into this world. Titus 2 tells us that he might redeem for himself a peculiar people. I always have enjoyed that translation, a little tongue in cheek. He's redeemed a peculiar people. You know, when we look out here tonight, we say, yeah, and there are some Peculiar ones among us aren't there now? That isn't what it means, though. What it means is God is a very special people, set apart from all the world that he has made his own. He says, you're mine. Can anything be more precious than that? God says, you're my people and I'm your God, and that's your hope, that's your stability. You have nothing to worry about in this life or that which is to come, because I'm your God. The pagans trust in the gods of the forest and the gods of the sea and the gods of fertility and all the rest. But those gods are nothing at best. There are demons in this world. Paul tells us in the New Testament, demons are nothing. In this world, God alone rules. He is sovereign. And he says, I will be your God. Unlike the vanities of the heathens, unlike the idols of the pagans, unlike the futile, miserable lives of those who live without me. I will be your God. I will care for you, and you will belong to me. You will be my precious possession, my treasure for all eternity. You will be my people. This is the heart of the Bible. How God, who could in wrath have destroyed the human race, comes in Genesis 3, and he makes a promise. He enters into a covenant. He binds himself when he didn't have to, totally contrary to what we had coming. He graciously promises that he is going to save his people. So now we have to go a step further and ask, well, now, who are his people and how has God done this in history? What is the history of redemption all about? The Bible teaches that God has transacted a covenant, a gracious covenant, and that this covenant has been revealed to man for the enjoyment of man in successive installments, successive installments, so that God doesn't tell us the whole story and doesn't bring us all the blessings of the covenant. At the very beginning, he gives a little bit, then he builds on that a bit more, then he builds a bit more on that, so that successively and progressively God works out this covenant of grace, this promise of salvation. And it's at this point that we find the first major difference between the theological system of Scripture and that Procrustean bed known as dispensationalism that's been brought to the Bible and imposed on it. Because the dispensationalist tells us that the various covenants that we find in the Bible are not the progressive outworking of the one single promise of God, but rather are all parallel arrangements that God has made so that God makes A covenant here with Abraham. And then he makes a separate covenant, which is not the outworking of the Abrahamic covenant, but it's a separate, completely different covenant with Moses. And then God makes another covenant with David. And then down the line in the days of Jeremiah the prophet, he makes the promise of a new covenant. And how are we to look upon all these covenants? Well, according to the dispensational understanding of redemptive history, each of these covenants is parallel to one another. They run side by side. Whereas the covenantal understanding, that is what is known as covenant theology, teaches that each of those supplement earlier covenants so that you have one covenant that progressively works out in history, rather than a series of covenants that stand side by side. Now, which is the appropriate way of looking at it? And what difference does it make how you look at it? We could maybe work out what the truth of the matter is, but many of you would still leave here tonight saying, big deal, so what? So you look at it as two lines of covenant, or plural lines of covenant parallel to each other, or you look at it as one progressively worked out. What difference could it make? Well, in the first place, earlier. Now, this is not so much true of dispensational teaching today, I'm very glad to say, but earlier dispensationalists say that in each one of God's dispensations or each one of God's covenantal dealings, he has a different way of relating to men. He has a different test that he puts on men, a different requirement that he. That he lays on men, a different way of salvation, if you will. Now, that, of course, is very troubling because that suggests that people who were under God's covenantal dealings in the Old Testament are saved in a way differently than those who live under the Gospel of Jesus Christ in the New Testament. But like I say, that is. I don't know that anybody teaches that today, though you can find that in the writings of older dispensationalists from time to time. We still have the difficulty that dispensationalists today will say, though there's only one way of salvation, God does have two separate plans for mankind. He has one plan that's found in the covenants made with the Jewish people, with Israel, and then he has a separate plan of salvation that's for all mankind, which we see in the new covenant come to expression, the Gospel of Jesus Christ. So that in a sense, there are two people of God. Two people of God, not one. Not one people that are found among the Jews and the Gentiles. But rather we have a Jewish plan, if you will, and you have the plan that God has for salvation for all mankind. Emphasis here. Then upon the Gentiles, a people of God set apart, known as the Jews from the Gentiles. They may not have a different way of salvation, but they do have different promises of God that are yet to be fulfilled in history or to be followed. Secondly, on a dispensational understanding of redemptive history, because there are these dispensational discontinuities or breaks throughout history, what happened under the old Covenant, those series of covenants that God made with the Jews, is not what binds us who live under the new covenant with Jesus Christ in the Gospel that we read in the New Testament. So that if you were to go to the Old Testament today and say, well, now here's what God has told us to do and this is how we are to live, dispensational would say, no, you've forgotten, that's old. That's the old covenant with, that's for the Jews, that no longer binds us today. In fact, the only thing that we have to live up to from the Old Testament today, according to dispensational teachers, is whatever is repeated in the New Testament. We would just say all the stuff that God told to the Jews, apart from the plan of redemption that we benefit from, all the things God says to the Jews, is no longer binding on God's people, known as the Church in the New Testament, except that some of those things do get repeated. So those things that are repeated are binding, but that's it. So what I'm getting at is that in a dispensational understanding of redemptive history, you have two types of discontinuity, two major breaks, or, if you will, discontinuities that are very important. First of all, the discontinuity within the people of God, you have the Jewish people who have certain covenants that were made with them. And then you have a separate covenant or set of covenants that benefits the Gentiles who are going to be saved. And then secondly, you have a discontinuity within the very word of God as to what is binding on the peoples of God, because those who are not the Jews in the literal sense are not under the Old Testament, they are New Testament Christians. And it's this mistaken view of redemptive history that I'd like to address in the time that we have remaining tonight. Because I believe that what the Bible teaches us about God being a promise keeping God, a covenant keeping God runs contrary to both of these emphases in dispensationalism. The Bible teaches us that all of the post fall covenants, all of the covenants that God has made with men after we fell into sin, all of the post fall covenants are essentially one. There's not two sets of covenants, one for the Jewish people and one for all mankind. There is one covenant that God has made so that those individual covenants supplement each other rather than supplant each other. That is, they are the progressive outworking of one basic promise rather than the giving of separate lines of promise. Now how can we see that? Well, I think we can see this first of all in that the Bible teaches us that Christ is central to all of the covenantal promises of God. That God doesn't have one set of promises, one plan for the Jews and then another one for those who are going to be in Jesus Christ and be saved for all eternity, but rather all of the promises of God, no matter what they are, center on Jesus Christ. Now if they all have the same center, then they have the same essence, they have the same purpose, they have the same goal. And therefore they are not separate lines, but one line having the same issue or purpose. And how can I prove that? Well, turn in your Bibles to 2 Corinthians 1:20, 2nd Corinthians 1:20. There Paul says, for how many soever be the promises of God, In him is the yes, wherefore also through him is the amen unto the glory of God through us. Notice that Paul says it makes no difference how many promises of God you consider. How many soever be the promises of God. In Christ they are yes, and in Christ they are amen. What's this yes and amen all about? Well, to use our language, they are affirmed and they are confirmed in Christ. All these promises are made in Christ. They're affirmed for his sake and he is the one who fulfills them and confirms all of them. All of the promises of God center on the Lord Jesus Christ. There are not two paths, not two grand plans, but one. And it all centers on the Lord Jesus Christ. In Luke 24:27, Jesus on the road to Emmaus after his resurrection encounters a couple of dejected followers. They at first don't even recognize who they're talking to. And when he asked them why they're so dejected, they talk about how their master has been slain and so forth. And Jesus said, didn't it be who the Christ to first suffer, then enter into his glory. Look at verse 27 and beginning from Moses and from all the prophets, he interpreted for them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself. What is all the Bible about? Is the Bible about a plan for the Jewish nation and a plan for salvation for Gentiles and Jews alike? The whole Bible is about the Lord Jesus Christ, so that everything from Moses and all the prophets Jesus could find pointed to him. John 5:39. You search the scriptures, Jesus said, because you think that in them you have eternal life. Yet these scriptures testify about me. Everything that we find in the Scriptures testified about the Lord Jesus Christ. So let's just real quickly go through in our minds the provisions of God's promise in the Old Testament, the covenants that he gave in the Old Testament and see how they point to the Lord Jesus Christ. God made a covenant promise with Adam. I said that one of his descendants would be the Savior. That utterly destroys the tempter. Well, it's not hard to see how that's about the Lord Jesus Christ, is it? As we know that Jesus came into this world to destroy the works of the evil one, Right? That's why the demons, by the way, they would cry out on occasion. Why have you come to torment us before the time? They know that you know their day is going to be up. They know that the Savior's coming to the world to destroy them in their kingdom. Jesus said, the gates of hell will not prevail against the building of my church. Jesus at one point, after he cast out demons, explained that he had bound the strong man. He says, now I will spoil his house. Jesus came into this world to destroy Satan and his works. Well, in the Old Testament we read that God made a covenant with Noah that the earth would be preserved while God accomplished the salvation of his people. That too is a promise that's made in Christ and for the sake of Christ. For you see, if God didn't keep the Noah covenant, then there would not be time in history for the Savior to come and to save his people, to pay the price of their sin and through the power of the Spirit, to gather them out of the world to himself. But God will not again destroy the earth until the day comes when he will finally destroy the earth at the second judgment. And then in the Old Testament, God made a promise to Abraham. And what he said to Abraham is that God's people would multiply and the seed would become plenteous, that all nations would be blessed in it and Abraham would be granted a Kingdom, in this case, a land that would be his. Now, was that promise vouchsafed in Jesus Christ? Of course it was. Jesus Christ is the promised son of Abraham who comes into this world so that there might be many who belong to him. He draws from all the world to himself, believers that will make up a kingdom. And in his kingdom, well, the Bible tells us that what we are in his kingdom is a foretaste of that new heavens and new earth which is to come, so that the promise made to Abraham is fulfilled in Jesus. Later, in the Old Testament, God made a covenant with Moses. And in that covenant we see that righteousness must prevail in men's affairs. That's why the law is given, because God requires righteousness if we would live in his kingdom. But God also indicates through the animal sacrifices and the ceremonies of the Old Testament that those who have violated his righteousness must be saved through blood atonement. Does that point to the Lord Jesus Christ? Well, of course it does. Who is the righteous one that keeps all of God's commandments so that we can be right with him? It's not us. It's Jesus himself. And for the sake of our transgressions, his blood is shed that we might be saved. That's what the Mosaic covenant was all about. It was pointing to Jesus. And in David, the covenant is made that there would be a Savior who has an everlasting kingdom, whose kingdom would be blessed and would be a widespread rule. So God promises to do David. But David knew that God was speaking to his greater son. The Lord said to my Lord, sit on my right hand until I make your enemies the footstool of your feet. That was a promise about the Lord Jesus Christ, who comes into the world again to win a people for God, to save them and to subdue all their enemies. And then in the new covenant that Jeremiah declared for God, God promised the full forgiveness of sins. And he said, the law will now be written upon your heart that you may keep it, unlike the day in which I revealed the law at Sinai. And there would be a widespread knowledge of God so that all from the least of the greatest will know me. And again, this is fulfilled in the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the one who brings the full salvation the animal sacrifices of the old covenant could not save. They could not finally accomplish the work. But when Jesus made purification for sin, the Bible says he sat down, his work was finished. It was completely done, not to be repeated anymore. There is no repeating of that sacrifice, because once it has been made God's justice has been satisfied. And based on that sacrifice, the Holy Spirit has given in such a way that now God's people, people can keep the law of God in a way that is fuller and more powerful than anything that was known in the old covenant. And so the promises of the new covenant are fulfilled in Christ. As Paul said, how many soever be the promises of God? In him is the yes. Wherefore also through him is the amen unto the glory of God. All the covenants of God therefore, are united into one covenant. They are the progressive outworking of the details of the one basic promise that God had made at the very beginning of redemptive history. Ephesians 2:12. Ephesians 2:12. I want to specifically address the issue of whether God has one way of dealing with men through the Abrahamic covenant and a separate way of dealing with men through the Mosaic covenant. Because this is the heart of that way of looking at redemptive history that we know as dispensationalism. That Abraham represents the way of faith. Moses represents the way of law keeping. And so God has two separate plans. And one is for all mankind, the way of faith. And then the Mosaic law was for the Jewish people. Is this true that God's promises are divided according to a faith approach and a law approach? Ephesians 2:12. Paul says you were at that time separate from Christ. And then he goes on to describe those who were separate from Christ. He says, you were strangers from the covenants of the promise, having no hope. And without God in the world, you who were Gentiles, you had no hope at that time. You were separate from Christ. And strangers from. Now listen to this expression, because it's crucial. Strangers from the covenants. The promise. Notice, plural covenants. Many covenants. The covenants of one promise. The promise. There is a single promise of God that has been worked out covenantally, progressively in the Old Testament. He says, that's what you didn't enjoy until you were incorporated into Christ. All of the covenants are covenants of the promise. Promise. And that means what? That the Mosaic covenant, just like the Abrahamic covenant, is a covenant of promise. It's a covenant of grace. Earlier, when I was telling you about God being a covenant keeping God and I explained to you the basis for God's covenants. We read from the book of Deuteronomy that says, it's because of my love, because of my keeping of promise, that you belong to me and that you are saved. It's in the Mosaic covenant as much as in the Abrahamic covenant that we read of the grace of God and hear of the grace of God. Turn also to Galatians, the third chapter, where Paul specifically addresses this issue of the relationship between Abraham and Moses. Galatians 3 and verse 17. Paul says, now this I say, a covenant confirmed beforehand by God. The law which came 430 years after doth not disannul so as to make the promise of none effect. Could anything be more clear? How can we miss this? Paul? Paul says there was a covenant that God made with Abraham called the promise. And he says a covenant that God made 430 years after does not disannul it to make that promise of none effect. And so is it possible that we could pit the law of Moses against the promise that God gave to Abraham? Absolutely not. Is the law contrary to the promise then? God forbid, may it never be. Paul says. And so how does the Bible look upon redemptive history? I want to argue that the Bible does not take the approach of our dispensational brothers with their procrustean bed. The Bible doesn't teach that each of these covenants stand separate from one another. And all the covenant promises of God are centered in the Lord Jesus Christ. And they're all the progressive outworking of the one underlying promise of God. Well then, secondly, what does the Bible teach us about the people of God? How should we look upon this question of God having a separate plan for the Jews and then a plan of salvation for all mankind? Dispensationalism teaches that there are two peoples, Israel the one hand and then the Church on the other. Very quickly, let's survey what the Bible teaches us regarding this. In the first place, Scripture teaches that there is no special status for Israel today. There is no special status for Israel today. In Acts the tenth chapter, when Cornelius has Peter visit him. The very purpose of Peter visiting him is to show that God no longer draws a distinction distinction between Jew and Gentile. But both are welcome to the church. Both enter the kingdom of Jesus Christ on the same footing. In Ephesians 2, which we were talking about just a moment ago, Paul tells us about the oneness of the people of God. I'd like to read verses 2:12 to 19. He says, you were at that time separate from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, strangers from the covenants of the promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus, you that once were far off are made near by the blood of Christ, for he is our peace who made both one and broke down the middle wall of partition, having abolished in his flesh the enmity even the law of commandments contained in ordinances that he might create in himself of the two one new man, so making peace and might reconcile them both in one body unto God through the cross, having slain the enmity thereby. And he came and preached peace to you that were far off, and peace to them that were near. For through him we both have our access in one spirit unto the Father. So then you are no more strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God. Again, isn't it clear? Paul says there was a time when God worked especially with the Jewish people and they had the privilege of being known as his people. But now in Christ there is no separation between the two. They are made into one new man. There is no middle wall of partition. They all have access through the one Spirit to the Father. They are on equal footing with God. In fact, the Bible teaches us that Israel has been rejected in drastic and final terms. The kingdom has been taken away from the Jews. Matthew 21:41, 43, Matthew 21:41:43. Jesus is told the story of the wicked husbandman. And he says, what will the Lord of the vineyard do when he comes and encounters these wicked husbandmen? Verse 41. They say unto him, he will miserably destroy those miserable men and will let out the vineyard unto other husbandmen, who shall render him the fruits in their season. Jesus saith unto them, did ye never read in the Scriptures the stone which the builders rejected? The same was made the head of the corner. This was from the Lord, and it's marvelous in our eyes. Therefore say I unto you, the kingdom of God shall be taken away from you and shall be given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof. Jesus explicitly says the kingdom is no longer Israel centered, it's and it's been taken away from Israel and given to a nation producing the fruit of the kingdom. The kingdom of God centers no longer on the Jewish people as a special ethnic group. Therefore, the Bible calls the church of the Lord Jesus Christ the Israel of God. In Galatians 6:16, Paul pronounces benediction upon the church, calling it the Israel of God. In Galatians, the third chapter, Paul says that those who are of faith, they are the seed of Abraham. Now let's stop and ask ourselves, how could Paul say that? How could Paul say that those who are of faith are the seed of Abraham? If you're a literalist, that's the approach you take. And this is what dispensationalists like, like to tell us they do, even though, in fact, no one can carry out that program. But if you're a literalist, you'll say, well, now, Paul, he couldn't possibly mean that because Gentiles are not the children of Abraham. But if you go back and read what God promised to Abraham, early on, you will notice that God said to Abraham in Genesis 17, verses 4 through 8, that he would be a father of what? A multitude of nations. Abraham would be the father, he said, of a multitude of nations. And elsewhere in you, all the nations of the earth will be blessed. Abraham will be the father of the nations. Well, now, how could Abraham be the father of a multitude of nations? He could be the father of one. He could be the father of the Jewish nation. But how could he be the father of the Gentiles as well? Well, obviously from the very beginning, the promise of God was not saved simply and exclusively for the Jews then, was it? Because Abraham would be the one who brings blessing to a multitude of nations about whom he would be called their Father. The Bible tells us that Abraham is the father of all those who believe. Look at Romans 4, verses 11 and 12. Romans the fourth chapter, verses 11 and 12. And he received the sign of circumcision, a sign of the righteousness of the faith which he had while he was in uncircumcision, that he might be the father of all them that believe, though they be in uncircumcision, that righteousness might be reckoned unto them. And the father of circumcision to them who not only are of the circumcision, but who also walk in the steps of that faith. Faith of our Father Abraham, which he had in uncircumcision. You see, Abraham's the father of all those who believed. Jesus said of Abraham that he saw that Abraham saw Jesus day and rejoiced. Abraham did not become the father simply to an ethnic group that we call the Jews, but rather, Abraham looked ahead to the day of the Lord Jesus Christ, where all of God's people would be united in one new man in Christ. This is not God changing his mind like, well, I had plan A. This is not working out. Now I'll go to plan B. The Bible shows us that from the very beginning, the seed of the woman, the seed of Abraham, would be Jew and Gentile alike. And it's in Christ that we see the fulfillment of. And so there are two major mistakes, theological mistakes that are made by our brothers who are dispensationalists. The first is they don't see how God has worked in redemptive history in terms of the covenants. They don't see that Abraham and Moses cannot be pitted against one another. They see these as parallel lines of God dealing with mankind. Whereas the Bible says there's but one promise underlying it all, and what God has done is worked out progressively in history the details of that promise of salvation. Secondly, they don't see that there's but one people of God, and there's always and only been one people of God, and they're the people of faith. Israel has no special place in God's plan apart from faith. There is no promise to those who crucify the Messiah that they are yet the people of God in their rebellion. That is horrible theology in the name of literalism. The Bible itself interprets the Bible and clearly tells us the Jews have been set aside having any special privilege of the people of God. But you know how good God is. You want to know how the the promises of God are yet fulfilled in history? Read Romans 9, 10 and 11. Because there Paul tells us that though the Jews have been broken off as a branch, the natural branch who should have enjoyed the promises of God, nevertheless God is so good that in the final days he will re engraft Israel into his people again, so that Jew and Gentile alike will be seen in the great magnificent kingdom of salvation that is yet future. Nevertheless, there is no place for Israel apart from the Messiah, no place of promise apart from faith in what God has commanded and required. And so dispensationalists have misunderstood the relationship of the covenants and they've misunderstood the question of who are the people of God. This leads the thirdly and lastly then to the mistake of not seeing how much of the Bible is binding on us today. You see, dispensationalists, as I said in my first lecture this evening, tell us that if it's in the Old Testament, we don't have to pay attention to it because that's for the Jews, right? We're not that people. That's an old covenant. And all these covenants run parallel to each other rather than supplementing each other, rather than seeing continuity, they see discontinuity. So I'll ask you to turn again in your Bibles now to Matthew, the fifth chapter, where Jesus, our Lord, the Lord of the covenant, explicitly addresses this issue of his relation to the Old Testament and what we ought to make of it. Verse 17. Jesus says think not that I came to destroy the law of the prophets. I came not to destroy, but to fulfill. Now we're going to read more, so keep your finger there, but notice what Jesus has said here. Don't have the idea that what I'm bringing in in the New Testament and the New Covenant is somehow standing against the law and prophets of the old rather than standing in a relationship of abrogation. Jesus says, I've come to fulfill all that the Old Testament was talking about. I've come to make it stand, to give it its full measure, to fulfill it. And then he applies his words in verse 18, saying, Truly I say unto you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass away from the law until everything has happened. How much of the Old Testament is going to pass away before the earth is finished, before earthly history is done? Jesus says, not the slightest stroke of a pen, not even a part of a letter. And so we're dispensationalists. Look at the Old Testament and say, it's all done away with unless it's repeated. What does Jesus say? Jesus says it's all continuing in its authority until heaven and earth pass away. And if you have any doubt about the interpretation of these two verses, notice the application in verse 19. Therefore, whosoever shall break one of these least commandments and shall teach men so shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven. Anybody who teaches that you have the right, apart from God himself teaching it in the Word. Anybody who tells you you may automatically dismiss even the least commandment will be least in the kingdom of heaven. That doesn't sound like Jesus is very happy with those who teach that kind of theology. If you teach men that they can break Old Testament commandments and you don't have God's word to back that up, if you just assume that because you say, well, that's old covenant, we now live in the days of the New Testament. Jesus says, then you're least in the kingdom of heaven. We need to understand that God is a good and gracious God. That when we fell into sin and our first parents, he didn't come and wipe out the human race. He came and he made a promise. And God is a covenant keeping God, he keeps his promises. And therefore we see unity throughout redemptive history. Now we see progress. To be sure, the animal sacrifices are shadows that have passed away for the reality of Christ's true sacrifice. They're no longer repeated. Christ once for all has brought about salvation. There is progress but all of that progress is seen because the Bible teaches us this is how the old has come to fruition in fulfillment in the new. We don't approach therefore the promises of God and say, well, these are all separate lines. There's rather one promise that God progressively works out. Moreover, we don't say God has two different people, Israel as a nation and then Jews and Gentiles alike in the church. Rather, the church today is the new Israel. We are the seed of Abraham. We are the ones who inherit the promises that God made. And Israel, ethnic Israel, when it comes to faith in the Savior, will be grafted back into that in the future day. And thirdly, we don't approach the old covenant scriptures that God gave to every ethnic Israel and say, oh, that was for them. None of that's binding today. Jesus says every jot and tittle of that. Every principle that's taught there in the Old Testament continues to be binding in the New in the same way that I teach it to you according to the qualifications that I might make. But you don't have the right to subtract anything from God's word. This is what we know as covenant theology. God has made a promise, a gracious covenant with his people. It calls for us to trust him and to submit to his stipulations. And those stipulations carry both blessing and cursing. All of the post fall covenants are one, essentially one. They supplement each other rather than supplant each other. And therefore we believe today that God's people, the church, are one with God's people. In the Old Testament there is but one people of God. And we believe that there's but one word of God. We're whole Bible Christians. Our assumption is every bit of the Old Testament and its principles is binding until the Lord of the covenant tells us otherwise. Let's pray. God, how can we thank you enough for promising to save us? None of us here deserves that. None of us here deserves to be incorporated into your people and to know the blessed promise that you will be our God. None of us deserves the promise of a Savior who would crush Satan and be wounded in the process of doing that in our behalf. We confess, Lord, that there's nothing in us that would lead you to make such glorious prosperity promises, much less to keep such promises with us. So we thank you for your grace and we pray that you would make us more mindful of it, that we would be faithful in interpreting what you have done in history, that we would read the Bible and what you have done. Throughout the history of redemption, to understand it clearly, to understand that you've always had but one people, the people of faith. How we thank you for the example of Abraham, who believed God and it was reckoned to him for righteousness. How we thank you that this is the way in which we are saved, by believing your promise and that is reckoned to us as righteousness. How we thank you for the Lord Jesus Christ, who was the sum and substance of all of your promises of old. And we thank you that every covenant centers on him and he was faithful in fulfilling them all and bringing to us every benefit that you have promised. We thank you for the oneness of your people. And we thank you Lord, for the oneness of your covenant, the oneness of your word. We thank you that you don't change your mind, Lord. If you were not a covenant keeping God, we'd have no hope that you might not change your mind yet in the future and we would not be saved. We thank you that you are not like that, that what you have declared and what has proceeded from your mouth, you do not alter. Help us to live in light of that truth, to not only enjoy the benefit that you do not change your mind, but to live more responsibly, to see that all of the scripture therefore is ours to be kept. That we are responsible to study every word that's proceeded from your mouth and to obey everything that you have told us to do from COVID to cover. Help us to be more worthy as your people. By your spirit, fulfill in us the promise that the law will be kept by those who have been born again. Lord, we thank you for your gracious promises and ask that you would make us diligent students of them, that we would rightly divide the word of truth. We pray in Jesus name, Amen.