Elijah 41; Eph 505, 602ff; Anti-Sem 9 11/22/89; Isr 11ff 5/23/91
A. Definition and Classification.
1. The covenants to Israel are God’s gracious promises and provision for Israel as the new racial species called the Jew, as a client nation to God, and to the born again Jews as the possessors of eternal life.
2. Covenants are defined in the Old Testament Scriptures in terms of favorable disposition. God, as party of the first part, made a favorable disposition to Israel as party of the second part. By very definition, a covenant is a disposition made by one party (God) in favor of another party (Israel). So a covenant or contract cannot be a conditional covenant because it is an agreement between two parties with the first party favoring the second party. The primary issue is favor or grace. Therefore, “conditional” or “unconditional” is very secondary in consideration. The key to the covenants to Israel is based on two doctrines: the Jews as a new racial species and Israel as a client nation to God.
3. The Jew had to believe in Jesus Christ in order to qualify to receive the blessings of the unconditional covenants. The Jew cannot enter their spiritual heritage until they first believe in Jesus Christ. All the covenants to Israel have an eternal life clause based on the fact that Israel has a future in both time and eternity. Being born racially a Jew is not enough to benefit from these covenants. Spiritually dead persons cannot inherit eternal life or benefit from these unconditional covenants. Those who benefit from these covenants must have eternal life.
4. Covenants to Israel cover two dispensations when Israel is a client nation to God: the Jewish Age and the Millennium. These contracts apply to both dispensations.
5. A covenant to Israel must never be confused with a will or testament, which depends on the physical death of the testator for inheritance. Therefore, both “Old Testament” and “New Testament” are inaccurate terms (they should be called old and new covenants), even though the New Testament depends upon the perfect, efficacious sacrificial, substitutionary spiritual death of our Lord Jesus Christ.
6. The Hebrew word is BERITH; the Greek is DIATHEKE. These words refer to a covenant, not a testament, in which two parties are involved. One party favors the other party. Since God is party of the first part and is infinite, eternal, and cannot die, and since the humanity of Messiah is resurrected, the will/testament concept must be eliminated. The party of the second part is regenerate Israel. God’s covenants to Israel must be kept separate from other covenants found in the Old Testament.
7. There are two categories of covenants given to Israel.
a. The unconditional covenants include: the Abrahamic, Palestinian, Davidic, and New Covenants to Israel. All unconditional covenants have an eternal life clause based on the fact that Israel has a future both in time and in eternity. Unconditional covenants are given to Israel in three categories.
(1) To Israel as a new racial species.
(2) To Israel as a priest nation to God.
(3) To regenerate Israel as true Israel.
b. The conditional covenant is the Mosaic Law.
8. The key to the covenants to Israel is Jewish client nation status. There is no reason or purpose for the New Covenant to Israel apart from the client nation interpretation. Client nation Israel falls into four categories: United Israel, divided Israel, Judea, and restored Israel of the Millennium.
9. So the covenants to Israel can be defined as the sovereign disposition of God whereby He establishes a declarative compact with Israel, obligating Himself in grace to bless Israel.
10. In the case of the Mosaic Law, special blessing is provided for Israel if they fulfill certain conditions, and they are punished if they fail.
11. The covenant theory of Reformed theology is a system of interpretation using covenants for theological systems and not Biblical systems.
a. No where in the Bible is the term covenant applied to the idea that there is a system of interpretation which considers that all God’s purposes are worked out on the basis of covenants.
b. Covenant theology has three major covenants.
(1) The covenant of redemption - a prehistoric agreement between the members of the Trinity. The idea of a bargain between God the Father and God the Son is blasphemous. It implies that they did not trust each other; that God did not have enough virtue to depend on the other members of the Trinity.
(2) The covenant of works - made by God with Adam in the Garden of Eden. In this covenant, God put Adam under probation, offering eternal life to Adam, if he passed the test. This rejects the omniscience of God.
(3) The covenant of grace - after the fall of man, God made a covenant with the elect, and Christ represents the elect. They say that God promises to give His Holy Spirit to those ordained to eternal life, in order to make them willing and able to believe in Christ. There is no Biblical basis for this at all. This is the false doctrine of common and efficacious grace.
c. Covenants belong to Israel; they are not a part of the Church Age. There is no New Covenant to the Church. God does not deal with the Church on the basis of covenants.
12. The content of the promises located in the covenants to Israel have six categories.
a. There is a time category. Under this category, we have God’s promises for Israel in history and God’s promises for eternity.
b. There is a grace and law category. Under grace and law we have two categories: conditional promises in the Mosaic Law and unconditional promises.
c. There are covenants given to individuals—the Abrahamic and Davidic covenant. David was promised that he would have a son that would rule Israel forever.
d. There is a land category. There are two concepts here: the land given to Israel in the Millennium, which is the Palestinian covenant, and the land given to regenerate Israel in the eternal state, such as the new Jerusalem.
e. There is an eschatological category.
(1) Israel will be restored as a client nation to God at the Second Advent.
(2) The New Covenant to Israel is fulfilled beginning at the Second Advent with regenerate Jews only.
(3) Israel will be the client nation to God in the eternal state.
f. The Old Testament category. The Mosaic Law provided for Israel a new racial species, a client nation to God, a spiritual heritage for true or regenerate Israel.
B. The Client Nation Interpretation of the Covenants to Israel. There are five covenants to Israel; four unconditional and one conditional.
1. The Abrahamic Covenant defines the race for client nation Israel. Abraham became a Jew at age 99; circumcision was the sign, Gen 12:1-3, 13:15-16, 15:18, 22:15-18, 26:3-4; Ex 6:2-8.
2. The Palestinian Covenant defines the land for client nation Israel, Gen 15:18; Num 34:1-12; Deut 30:1-9; Josh 1:3-4. This is the real estate of the client nation.
3. The Mosaic Law defines the policy for client nation Israel (both spiritual and temporal policy). This is the one conditional covenant.
4. The Davidic Covenant defines the dynasty for client nation Israel, 2 Sam 7:8-16; Ps 89:20-37.
5. The New Covenant defines the restoration of the client nation Israel at the Second Advent and its millennial modus operandi, Jer 31:31-34. This part of the contract is not operational until the Second Advent.
C. The Covenants of the Messianic Line.
1. These deal with how the Messiah came into the world in Hypostatic Union. They have some overlap with the covenants to Israel.
2. Covenants with God did not begin with the Jew, but with Gentiles (the first two). So there was a time when Gentiles had a monopoly, but they failed. Because of their failure, God brought in a new racial species, Israel. Because of their failure, culminating during the great power experiment of the Hypostatic Union, God brought in the new spiritual species in the Church. We too have failed in almost every generation to understand the protocol plan of God.
3. The Adamic Covenant, Gen 2:15, 3:15, says that the seed of the woman, the humanity of Christ, will originate from Adam’s seed. No angelic infiltration will destroy the human race. Salvation is a part of this contract.
4. The Noahic Covenant, Gen 6:18, 8:21-9:17 says that the seed of the woman, the humanity of Christ, will come through Seth, and his son Noah, and his son Shem.
a. Gen 6:18, “I will establish My covenant with you, and you will enter the ark.” This is an interesting twist, for until God gave Noah a covenant, Noah wouldn’t even enter the ark.
b. In the post-diluvian part of the covenant (after the Flood had subsided), God promised never again to destroy the human race by a flood. This is a promise to the entire human race, and that never again in human history will the population of the earth be reduced to eight people. This promise was given twice; first in Gen 8:21-22, then again in Gen 9:9-16.
c. One of the greatest parts of the Noahic Covenant, even reiterated for this dispensation, is capital punishment. This is one of the great protections of the human race.
5. The Abrahamic Covenant, Gen 12:1-3, 13:15-16, 15:18, 22:15-18, 26:3-4; Ex 6:2-8, says that the seed of the woman, the humanity of Christ, will descend from Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
6. The Davidic Covenant says that the seed of the woman, the humanity of Christ, will descend from the tribe of Judah through the family of David, 2 Sam 7:8-17; Ps 89:20-37. The two lines of our Lord originated from David and Bathsheba. Their son Solomon’s line, given in Matthew, ends with Joseph, the legal but not real father of our Lord’s humanity. Solomon’s line had the Coniah Curse and so was cut off from being the source of the Messiah. Nathan’s line, found in Luke, ends with Mary, the source of the true humanity of Christ.
7. The New Covenant to Israel, Jer 31:31-34; Rom 11:27; Gal 4:4; Heb 8:8-12, 10:15-17, says that the seed of the woman, the humanity of Christ, will return to the earth at the Second Advent to restore Israel from the fifth cycle of discipline, to rule and bless client nation Israel throughout the Millennium, and to make them a blessing by association as taught in Zech 8:23.
D. A Dispensational Analysis of the Covenants.
1. In the Age of the Gentiles there were two contracts, the Adamic and Noahic.
2. In the Age of Israel, there were four contracts: Abrahamic, Palestinian, Mosaic, and Davidic.
3. The Church Age does not have a covenant. Heb 9:15 says Christ is the mediator of a new covenant. In effect, this is simply saying that the salvation of people in the New Testament is exactly the same as the salvation of people in the Old Testament. The covenant is the blood of Christ. In the Old Testament, the blood of Christ was portrayed through animal sacrifice. In the New Testament, the blood of Christ is portrayed historically by unlimited atonement, reconciliation, redemption, propitiation, imputation, justification, i.e., the complete doctrine of soteriology. Only in this sense is there a “covenant” in the New Testament. Divine promises to the Church are not in the form of covenants, but are in the form of our portfolio of invisible assets, provided by God the Father in eternity past.
4. In the Millennium there is a New Covenant to restored Israel. Certain things exist in this covenant that did not exist in the Old Testament covenants. For example, the Sermon on the Mount is a part of the New Covenant to Israel and will be fulfilled in the Millennium.
E. The Covenant to Abraham.
1. This is a grace paragraph in which God made a favorable disposition to Abraham and to his seed as party of the second part.
2. The Abrahamic Covenant defines the Jewish race as the citizens of the first and last client nation in history. There must be racial vigor or population vigor in a client nation. There must be thought, where living and dying are based on principle and not just on trying to survive.
3. Like all covenants related to client nation Israel, Abraham and his spiritual seed are the beneficiaries of blessing and logistical support from the justice of God. Abraham’s spiritual seed is patterned after Abraham’s own salvation in Gen 15:6. “Abraham believed in the Lord and it was credited to his account for righteousness.” Our vigor depends on our spiritual life, not our race. Abraham believed that what God had promised (that he and Sarah would have a son), God was able also to perform. The demonstration of his faith was submission to the ritual of circumcision.
4. Abraham became the father of a new race which would become the client nation Israel. Therefore, in setting up the contract, a specific people were involved.
5. The original presentation of Abraham’s paragraph included both race and nation, found as a three-point principle in Gen 12:1-3. This passage warns us against anti-Semitism.
6. The real estate promise is given for the first time in the Abrahamic Covenant, Gen 13:14-16; 15:18-21. This is to prove that the people of a client nation must have a piece of geography on which to operate as a client nation. Without the spiritual factor in your generation, your real estate or genes don’t even matter.
7. This covenant was confirmed in sequence to those to whom it would pertain—to Isaac in contrast to his brothers in Gen 26:3-4.
8. The covenant was confirmed to Jacob instead of his twin brother Esau in Gen 28:13-14, 35:12.
9. The covenant was the basis for the divine deliverance of the Jews from slavery in Egypt and the establishment of a client nation, Ex 6:2-8. Here we see how Moses applied this covenant to the situation for their deliverance.
10. The Jewish descent in the Abrahamic Covenant is based on the miracle of the revival of the sexual ability of Abraham and Sarah. The mechanics of the Abrahamic Covenant demanded at its very inception reaching spiritual maturity (for sexual prosperity), Gen 17:1-17, Rom 4:16-21.
11. The new racial species and client nation are brought together in this Covenant in Gen 17:8, and circumcision is the ritual of confirmation and acknowledgement of God’s grace, Gen 17:9-14.
12. The ultimate in blessing in this covenant is declared in Gen 22:15-18, where Abraham offered his son Isaac, only to receive him back. This taught both individual blessing imputed to the mature believer and blessing by association as a client nation for other nations to be blessed.
F. The Real Estate (Palestinian) Covenant.
1. It is better to call this the Real Estate Covenant, because “Palestinian” means land of the Philistines. They occupied certain parts of this designated land, but they represent uncircumcised Greeks, the great sea people.
2. God as party of the first part made a favorable land grant to Israel as His client nation forever. Israel will again be a client nation in the Millennium and forever. God will give Israel more than they could ever conquer or hold in Old Testament times. This covenant guarantees the entire Middle East as a land grant to Israel forever. It includes all of the Middle East to the Euphrates river, all of Turkey, and half of Egypt and Ethiopia.
3. This land will never be fully occupied by Israel as a client nation until the Second Advent of Christ in His millennial reign.
4. The grant was first proclaimed by God to Abraham as the father of the Jewish race in Gen 13:14-15; 15:18. It is mentioned in indefinite terms. “The land which you are seeing I will give to you and to your seed forever.” The word “forever” means that racial Jew must become the regenerate Jew to inherit this promise.
5. The land grant was confirmed to Isaac as the second generation of the new racial species, using geographical boundaries understood at that time, in Gen 26:3-4.
6. It was reconfirmed to Jacob as the third generation of the new racial species in Gen 35:12.
7. The land grant was reiterated to Moses as the father of the Jewish client nation in Ex 6:2-8.
8. Therefore, Moses described in detail the geographical boundaries of this land grant in Num 34:1-12.
9. Moses prophesied the fulfillment of the land grant in the Millennium in Deut 30:1-9.
10. To encourage the Jews to enter the land, the land grant was reconfirmed to Joshua in Josh 1:2-4. This was to give Joshua the motivation to conquer all he could.
11. Both Jeremiah and Ezekiel confirm the fact that this land grant will not be fulfilled to client nation Israel until the millennial reign of Christ, relating it to the New Covenant to Israel, Jer 31:31-34 cf. 32:36-44; Ezek 11:16-21, 36:21-38.
12. In summary, its modern geographical boundaries follows. The northwestern border of the land will be the Mediterranean Sea, including all of Turkey, because of the phrase “land of the Hittites.” The southern border will be the Nile river (the Red Sea will dry up), eastern Africa (Egypt, Kenya, Ethiopia) and all of Saudi Arabia. The eastern border will be Transjordania and Iraq. The Euphrates river is the northeastern border. That is the entire Middle East.
13. In application, you cannot have a client nation without property or property without the sanctity of that property. Freedom means the sanctity of property and your right to own and increase your property. God says that property is necessary for spiritual function. Where there is no personal property, you have tyranny. Property must be sacred in a client nation. When people lust for property which is not theirs, then the client nation collapses with no modus operandi because freedom is gone.
14. In the past, the Jews owned certain property; God has promised them different property in the future. In the past, Israel only owned what property it could conquer by military establishment. The military must maintain that ownership of property; today we use the police for this function.
G. The Policy Covenant to Moses—the Mosaic Law, the Torah, or the Client Nation Code.
1. This is the divine covenant to the client nation Israel. It is a conditional covenant and addressed to the believer and unbeliever alike. It denotes a policy in every realm of life in client nation Israel, including freedom, establishment function, and spiritual function.
2. The recipient of the Mosaic Law is client nation Israel only, not any individual believers, Ex 19:3; Lev 26:46; Rom 3:19, 9:4. (There has never been a nation of all believers.)
3. The Mosaic Law was never given to the Gentiles, because in the Old Testament no Gentile nation could be a client nation (except during the seventy years of the fifth cycle of discipline), Deut 4:8; Rom 2:12-14.
4. The Mosaic Law was never given to the Church, Acts 15:5,24; Rom 6:14; Gal 2:19. We have a much higher way of life than the Mosaic Law.
5. Jesus Christ, the God of Israel, is party of the first part. Every citizen of client nation Israel in the past is party of the second part, both believer and unbeliever.
6. As the divine policy for client nation Israel, the Mosaic Covenant was divided into three parts.
a. Codex One is called the commandments or decalogue. This is the freedom code which defines freedom in terms of morality, privacy, property, and authority. The basic heritage of the client nation is freedom, a necessity for self-determination, so that evangelism, spiritual growth, and missionary function can follow.
b. Codex Two is called the ordinances, the spiritual code. This is the ritual plan of God for Israel. The spiritual heritage includes a complete christology and soteriology taught through ritual and oral communication which includes the sacred furniture, the structure of the tabernacle and temple, the delineation of the holy days, the modus operandi of the Levitical priesthood, and the function of the Levitical offerings. Essentially, the spiritual heritage of Israel is Jesus Christ, the God of Israel, Emmanuel, the Messiah, the Shekinah Glory.
c. Codex Three is called the judgments or the establishment code. It is a compilation of the laws of divine establishment or the code for civilization. It was for believers and unbelievers alike in Israel. Every principle related to the modus vivendi of a client nation is included in it.
(1) It includes the divine institutions, such as freedom of self-determination, marriage, family, and nationalism.
(2) It includes the sacredness of life and property, freedom through military victory, the separation of the state and business, the legitimacy of profit motivation, and a system of tax laws called tithing.
(3) The judgments also included diet, health, sanitation, quarantine, universal military training, criminal law, capital punishment, and civil law. It included in criminal law apprehension, trial, and the laws of evidence and punishment.
(4) It rejects socialism, the welfare state, or any implication that men are born equal. Equal opportunity does not imply equality.
(5) It also rejects civil disobedience, revolution in any form, the use of violence against establishment authority, and anti-Semitism.
(6) The Mosaic Law came directly from God and was not in any way influenced by the laws of Hammurabi, which were so inferior that they cannot even be compared with God’s laws. (The only possible reference to Hammurabi in the Bible is under his other name, Amraphel, the King of Shinar, in Gen 14:1; even that is speculation.)
7. The Mosaic Law established both the policy and blessing patterns for a client nation to God.
a. It authorized the function of the Levitical priesthood, Heb 7:11-12.
b. It authorized the tabernacle and temple as sacred buildings for worship, Heb 9:1-6.
c. It authorized Levitical sacrifices to communicate salvation as the work of Christ on the cross, and to make it possible to evangelize, Heb 9:12-13.
d. It authorized the blood of animals as the dedication of shadows, Heb 9:18-22 cf 10:1.
8. The Mosaic Law had definite limitations.
a. It could not provide salvation through its system of works, and it could not justify, Rom 3:20-28; Gal 2:16; Phil 3:9.
b. It could not provide a spiritual life for the believer, Gal 3.
c. It could not solve problems of the old sin nature, Rom 8:3.
d. It could not give life, Gal 3:21.
e. It could not provide the Holy Spirit, Gal 3:2.
f. So the purpose of the law was to set up modus operandi for the client nation, not to provide spiritual heritage. It was a vehicle by which spiritual heritage and freedom could be perpetuated.
9. The Mosaic Law was set aside in two ways.
a. It was fulfilled by Jesus Christ during the great power experiment of the Hypostatic Union, Matt 5:17; Rom 10:4.
b. It was set aside as the policy for client nation Judah when the fifth cycle of discipline was administered in A.D. 70.
10. Although the Mosaic Law is not a part of the protocol plan of God for the Church Age, it still has certain legitimate functions in every dispensation after the Age of Israel. It defines morality for believers and unbelievers alike; this is illustrated by Rom 13. Morality is not a part of the Christian way of life except as a base. It is virtue which is the issue in the Christian life, not morality. Morality is very easily corrupted by arrogance and becomes moral degeneration.
11. The Mosaic Law also provides a pattern for the modus operandi for Gentile client nations in such fields as taxation, military policy, economic growth, jurisprudence, public health, and so on. It defines lawlessness, rebellion, and criminality as well as sinfulness, 1 Tim 1:8-11. This passage explains the present purpose of the Mosaic Law, that is not the Christian life but it is for all people in the human race.
12. The animal blood of the Levitical offerings portrayed the blood of Jesus Christ in the New Covenant to Israel; for no Jew can benefit from the Abrahamic, Palestinian, Davidic, or New Covenants to Israel apart from the possession of eternal life. All the promises are eternal in nature and they require eternal life to benefit from them.
13. The Church celebrates the blood of the New Covenant in the Eucharist, emphasizing the fact that salvation is the same in every generation, and that salvation is not a part of the mystery doctrine for the Church Age. Mystery doctrine really defines what we do after salvation.
14. Since the Mosaic Law has no application to Israel during the times of the Gentiles, what is the purpose of the Mosaic Law in the Church Age?
a. It is a pattern for Gentile client nation function. It teaches about freedom, and that freedom can only be maintained through a strong military. It distinguishes between taxation and confiscation. It tells how government should operate in a client nation. It teaches free enterprise.
b. It is written for the believer’s instruction, Rom 15:4. Although it is not a part of the Christian way of life (see the doctrine of Precedence), we learn so much about life in general from it.
c. It is written for the believer’s example, 1 Cor 10:11-12.
d. It is used as a divine standard to establish the reality of the universal sinfulness of mankind and man’s need for a savior. It establishes not only the existence of the old sin nature, but it also defines authority. The person who rejects authority inevitably becomes involved in many kinds of sin which produce his own unhappiness and suffering under self-induced misery. So the Mosaic Law teaches man’s need to submit to human authority in order that the old sin nature does not destroy humanity, Rom 3:20; Gal 2.
H. The Davidic or Dynasty Covenant.
1. This covenant is given in 2 Sam 7:8-17 and Ps 89:20-37. “I will establish his seed forever.”
2. Party of the first part, God, made a gracious disposition to party of the second part, David. This is the divine promise to David that he would have a son [the Lord Jesus Christ] who would rule Israel forever. It is the promise of the perpetuation of the Davidic dynasty.
3. While the Davidic line continued for about seventy-two years in the Northern Kingdom from 998-926 BC, and for over 400 years in the Southern Kingdom from 1000-586 BC, this was not the fulfillment of the covenant.
4. The fulfillment of this covenant occurs in two increments.
a. The virgin birth of the humanity of Christ, classified as the First Advent, which we call the great power experiment of the Hypostatic Union.
b. The final fulfillment occurs at the Second Advent of Jesus Christ in His millennial and eternal reign. The Son of David will rule not only for the last 1000 years of human history, but forever and ever.
5. The Davidic Covenant defines the ruling family, the eternal authority of the client nation Israel under the rule of Christ.
6. Jer 22:28,30 declares the curse on Coniah. Josiah was king; his second son was made a vassal to Nebuchadnezzar after the fourth cycle of discipline at the battle of Carchemish. As a reversionist he destroyed copies of Scripture. In Jer 36:29-31 his death was prophesied (Jehoiakim). His son was Coniah, who in 597 B.C. ruled for three months and ten days. He was made a prisoner for thirty-six years.
7. The curse of Coniah said that Coniah would never have a son to sit on David’s throne in fulfillment of the Davidic Covenant.
8. This curse was fulfilled with the virgin birth, when Joseph (Solomon and Coniah’s line) became the legal but not the real father. Matthew traces Solomon’s line of the genealogy of Christ through Joseph. Luke traces Nathan’s line of genealogy of Christ through Mary, 1 Chr 3:5 cf Lk 3:23-38. The virgin birth was necessary because our Lord had to be born as Adam was created—minus the sin nature.
9. The Davidic Covenant cannot be fulfilled without the bodily physical resurrection of Christ, 2 Tim 2:8; Rom 1:3-4; Acts 26:6-8.
10. The Church Age presented a problem in the fulfillment of this covenant, but it was solved by the ascension and session of Christ which now allows for the Second Advent.
I. The Covenant to Jeremiah, or The New Covenant to Israel.
1. The basic Scripture for this covenant is Jer 31:31-34. “`Behold, the days are coming,’ declares the Lord, `when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not like the covenant I made with their fathers [Mosaic Law] in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, although I was a husband to them,’ declares the Lord. `But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days [Tribulation],’ declares the Lord. `I will put My law within them and on their right lobes I will write it; and I will be their God and they shall be My people. And they shall not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother saying, “Know the Lord,” for they shall all know Me [in the Millennium], from the least of them to the greatest of them,’ declares the Lord, `for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.’”
a. This is an unconditional covenant, not conditional like the Mosaic Law. This covenant confirms and guarantees the fulfillment of all of the unconditional promises of God.
b. Being a husband to Israel is an analogy to the faithfulness of the Lord to the Exodus generation. The Lord was always faithful to them; they went apostate.
c. The New Covenant will be fulfilled in two parts.
(1) During the great power experiment of the Hypostatic Union, the New Covenant is fulfilled in the provision of a savior. The New Covenant cannot be fulfilled to any Jew unless he has eternal life. The point of the cross fulfills this salvation requirement. This is taught in Isa 61:1.
(2) During the Millennium and the eternal state. This is taught in Isa 61:2-11, 59:20-21, quoted in Rom 11:26-27.
d. While the Mosaic Law was written in stone during the dispensation of Israel and later on paper, it will be written on the right lobes of Jewish believers in the Millennium. Furthermore, the millennial interpretation of the Mosaic Law is the Sermon on the Mount, which will be fulfilled at that time also.
e. Only two dispensations speak of both the least and the greatest having the same privileges and opportunities: the Church Age, where the least and the greatest have identical portfolio of invisible assets, and in the Millennium all will know the Lord.
f. All the national failures of Israel are forgiven, and Israel is restored as a client nation to God during the 1000 year millennial reign of Christ.
2. The New Covenant to Israel is an eternal covenant, Ezek 16:60. Therefore, the Jewish recipients of this covenant must have eternal life to be beneficiaries. To have eternal life, they must have believed in Jesus Christ as He was revealed in the Old Testament, or as He is presented by the 144,000 Jewish evangelists during the Tribulation, or as He is presented in the Millennium.
3. The New Covenant to Israel applies to two categories of Jewish people.
a. The historical Jews of the Old Testament who believed in Christ as He was revealed to them.
b. The eschatological Jews of the Tribulation and Millennium who believe in Christ.
4. As the book of Romans teaches, all Israel is not true Israel. To be true Israel, you must be born again.
5. So the guarantee of the salvation part of the New Covenant is fulfilled in the great power experiment of the Hypostatic Union.
6. The covenants to Israel guarantee Jewish monopoly and privilege in the dispensation in Israel, the privilege of evangelism in the Tribulation, and again becoming the client nation to God in the Millennial reign of Christ. These monopolies and privileges exist for true Jews in the Millennium and eternal state. This is guaranteed by the New Covenant to Israel.
7. However, certain radical changes have occurred in Jewish monopoly as a racial species. That monopoly has been superseded by the creation of a new spiritual species in the Church Age, when there are no covenants. Every Church Age believer is a new spiritual species having equal privilege and equal opportunity, there being no more human distinctions among believers by means of the baptism of the Spirit. So during the Church Age the past Jewish monopoly during the dispensation of Israel no longer exists.
8. The book of Hebrews was addressed to Jewish believers of the Church Age. It teaches about the future of their ancestors and progeny after the Church Age, but it also teaches that God has something far better for Jews who believe in Christ during the Church Age.
a. Heb 7:22, “Jesus has become the guarantee of a better covenant.” The guarantee of the New Covenant to Israel is our Lord Jesus Christ, here called a “better covenant.”
b. We know that the better covenant refers to the New Covenant because the guarantee of the saving work of Christ on the cross is called the blood of Christ in Heb 8:6-13. Verses 6-7, “But now He [Jesus Christ in Hypostatic Union] has obtained a more excellent ministry by so much as He is also the mediator of a better covenant which has been enacted on the basis of better promises [than in the Mosaic Law]. For if the first covenant [Mosaic Law] had been faultless, there would have been no occasion sought for a second.” Keeping the Mosaic Law could not provide eternal salvation.
c. What follows in Heb 8:8-12 is a quotation from Jer 31:31-34. This means that “better covenant” in Heb 7:22 and 8:6-7 refers to the New Covenant to Israel.
d. The fact that the Jews have a better covenant in the future will be the basis for evangelism in the Tribulation and in the Millennium where the covenant is functional. Jews in the Tribulation will survive with hope and motivation from this doctrine.
e. Heb 8:13, “When He said, `A new covenant,’ He made the first [the Mosaic Law] obsolete. But whatever is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to disappear.”
9. The New Covenant to Israel is based on the saving work of Jesus Christ on the cross during the great power experiment of the Hypostatic Union. Heb 9:14-16, “How much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit [omnipotence of the Spirit in the prototype divine dynasphere] offered Himself without blemish to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? And for this reason He is the mediator of a new covenant, in order that since a death has taken place for the redemption of the transgressions that were committed under the first covenant [Mosaic Law], those [Jews] who have been called may receive the promise of eternal inheritance.”
a. Your conscience can be cleansed from two categories of dead works.
(1) Any works added to faith in Christ for salvation, which is an absolute.
(2) Anything you add to the filling of the Spirit for spirituality, which is an absolute.
b. In the great power experiment of the Hypostatic Union, our Lord became the mediator of a new covenant. Jesus Christ made it possible for the New Covenant to be fulfilled because He became the mediator between God and regenerate Israel by His death on the cross.
c. The eternal inheritance is the fulfillment of the Abrahamic, Palestinian, and Davidic Covenants to regenerate Israel, both in the Millennium and in the eternal state. Only those Jews who believe in Jesus Christ and have eternal life are beneficiaries of this eternal inheritance—the New Covenant. A spiritual heritage demands a spiritual birth.
10. Heb 10:5-14 is a description of the great power experiment of the Hypostatic Union with emphasis on our Lord’s sacrifice for sins on the cross. In Heb 10:15-17, this sacrifice for sin during the First Advent is related to the New Covenant to Israel; for there Jer 31:33-34 is quoted. This passage also says to those Jews who have believed in Christ for salvation, “they have not come to Mount Sinai [Mosaic Law], but they have come to Mount Zion.”
11. Mount Zion represents the New Covenant to Israel, Heb 12:22ff. Those Jewish believers who are the eternal recipients of the New Covenant are described in Heb 12:23-24, “To the assembly of the first born [true Israel] whose names are written in heaven, you have come to God, the judge of all men, to the spirits of the righteous men made perfect [through justification by faith in Christ]; you have come to Jesus, the mediator of the new covenant which speaks of better than that of Abel.”
a. Abel was murdered by his brother Cain, who used Abel’s sacrificial knife to spill Abel’s blood. Gen 4:10 says “the blood of Abel cries out from the ground for vengeance from the murder.” Cain’s punishment was banishment.
b. In the same sense, the blood of Christ cries out from the ground for a better doctrine. Verse 24 could be translated, “ . . . which speaks of a better doctrine than that of Abel.” The better doctrine is the salvation of all mankind. In this context, the emphasis is on the salvation of the Jews so that they can participate in the New Covenant to Israel.
12. Therefore, in Heb 13:20 is written the phrase, “the blood of the eternal covenant,” which is used in connection with Israel.
13. When our Lord instituted the Eucharist the night before He was crucified, on the Passover Day of A.D. 30, He made a specific reference to the New Covenant to Israel in Lk 22:20. “And in the same way He took the cup after they had eaten, saying, `This cup which is poured out for you is the new covenant of My blood.’”
a. This indicated that Jesus Christ is the fulfillment of the Levitical offerings. All the animal blood shed under the Levitical offerings was designed to portray Jesus Christ as Savior so that Jews could believe in Him. This was a reference to the New Covenant to Israel.
b. The Eucharist is the only ritual which belongs to the Church, and it doesn’t belong to Israel. Yet the New Covenant which belongs to Israel is mentioned in this Church Age ritual.
c. The Church is not under the Mosaic Law, Rom 6:14; Gal 2:19.
d. Furthermore, while the New Covenant was known to Israel and recorded in the Old Testament, the mystery doctrine of the Church Age was unknown to Israel but now revealed to the Church, Rom 16:25-26; Col 1:25-27.
e. However, in every dispensation of human history, salvation is always the same and is always clearly revealed in every dispensation. The “new covenant” is mentioned in this passage to demonstrate this fact.
f. You cannot be a member of the royal family of God in the Church Age until you believe in Jesus Christ. No Jew can be a recipient of the New Covenant unless he believes in Jesus Christ. So salvation and the blood of Christ is a part of every dispensation in human history. So the blood of Christ is related to the New Covenant and to the Church.
g. So in order for people to understand, especially since His audience was strictly Jewish as He initiated the Lord’s table, our Lord mentioned the New Covenant so that it would be clear that salvation is always the same and is always revealed.
h. While the New Covenant was known to Israel and recorded in the Old Testament, the mystery doctrine of the Church Age was unknown.
i. Salvation through the blood of the New Covenant is the same as salvation through the blood of the Old Covenant, the Mosaic Law. Under the Mosaic Law, the Jews remember salvation through the blood of the animal sacrifices which taught about the saving work of Jesus Christ. Under the blood of the New Covenant, Church Age believers are saved through faith in the saving work of Jesus Christ. We look back to the cross; they looked forward to the cross.
j. The New Covenant to Israel both looked forward and looks backward to the cross. Therefore, it is sometimes used in salvation passages in a Church Age context.
k. While the plan, purpose, and will of God for believers differs in every dispensation, salvation is always the same—personal faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Salvation is therefore the same in every dispensation.
l. However, after salvation, God has a different plan and a different purpose and a different expression of His sovereign will in different dispensations. This is why the Mosaic Law can never answer the question: After salvation, what? Yet millions of Church Age believers since the Reformation have erroneously used the Mosaic Law for the Christian life.
m. In the Old Testament, salvation was taught through the blood of animal sacrifices. In the New Testament, salvation is taught through the blood of Christ which is His saving work on the cross. In the great power experiment of the Hypostatic Union, the blood of Christ is used to communicate redemption, propitiation, and reconciliation. Since salvation is the same in every dispensation, the blood of Christ is represented in the Eucharist by the cup. Soteriology and Christology is not a part of the mystery doctrine, but taught in every dispensation.
n. When we drink from the cup, we remember what our Savior did for us on the Cross. Drinking itself portrays faith, because drinking is a non-meritorious function as is faith. 1 Cor 11:25: “In the same way, the cup also, after supper, saying, `This cup is the new testament [covenant] of My blood. Keep on doing this, as often as you drink it, in memory of Me.’”
14. The “New Covenant” cannot apply to the Church.
a. There is only one “New Covenant” and it refers directly to Israel. Therefore, it is called the New Covenant to Israel. There is no New Covenant to the Church, for there are no covenants in the Church Age. Covenants belong to Israel. The baptism of the Spirit in the Church Age eliminates any covenants from the Church Age.
b. So many Old Testament references are found to the New Covenant that it could not be a part of the Church Age. Everything about the Church Age was a mystery and not revealed in the Old Testament.
c. Principal Old Testament references to the New Covenant to Israel include Jer 31:31-34; Ezek 16:60; Isa 59:20-21 (quoted in Rom 11:26-27); Isa 61:2-11; Hos 2:14-23.
d. The doctrine for the Church Age is mystery doctrine, defined in Rom 16 and Col 1:25-27, not revealed in the Old Testament. Since it was not revealed, it is obvious that there can be no such thing as a New Covenant to the Church.
e. The New Covenant to Israel is found extensively in the book of Hebrews as an explanation of this; e.g., Heb 7:22, 8:6-13, 9:1, 9:11-22, 10:15-20, 10:28-29, 12:18-29, 13:20-21.
f. To indicate that the Church is not under the Mosaic Law, a contrast is established between the Old Covenant (Mosaic Law) and the New Covenant to Israel. A major contrast is between legalism which came as a distortion of the Law, and salvation by grace through faith.
g. Therefore, the New Covenant is used in relationship to the Church to establish a contrast between salvation by works and salvation by grace through faith in Christ.
h. Since the Church did not have the old covenant (Mosaic Law), and the New Covenant was called new before the First Advent and the Church existed, therefore the New Covenant applies to Israel in the past and in future, but does not apply to the Church except in the presentation of the Gospel.
i. The New Covenant establishes the perpetuation of Israel, not the Church.
15. In reality, the New Covenant is a series of promises to disciplined and dispersed Israel that they will be restored as a client nation to God at the Second Advent. Furthermore, the restored client nation Israel will continue in the Millennium and in the eternal state forever.
16. The Old Covenant or Mosaic Law was abrogated by the great power experiment of the Hypostatic Union, Matt 5:17; Rom 10:4. (This is another reason why the great power experiment of the Hypostatic Union must be regarded as a separate and distinct dispensation.) When our Lord was judged for our sins on the cross, the Mosaic Law was finished and out! Christ fulfilled Codex Two, but Codices One and Three have never been abrogated or set aside. They function for all client nations in history and will again in the Millennium.
17. The removal of Israel as a client nation to God in August of 70 A.D. through the administration of the fifth cycle of discipline resulted in the times of the Gentiles, Lk 21:20-24, which now runs coterminously with the Church Age. The times of the Gentiles, prophesied by our Lord, is when only Gentile nations can be client nations to God until the Rapture of the Church.
18. The removal of Israel as a client nation means the removal of the Mosaic Law. The setting aside of the Mosaic Law, called the Old Covenant, demands a New Covenant for Israel; something that will guarantee eternal life for the Jew in the Tribulation and the Millennium.
19. So the New Covenant to Israel guarantees to Israel the fulfillment of their unconditional covenants.
20. Jeremiah calls this a New Covenant because it’s in direct contrast to the Mosaic Law. It’s on a higher plane than the Mosaic Law as illustrated by the Sermon on the Mount. The New Covenant is defined in terms of regeneration.
21. The New Covenant replaces the Mosaic Law for the function of Israel’s priesthood in the millennial temple, Ezek 40-48.
22. The New Covenant emphasizes the fact that God has not cast off Israel because of the formation of the royal family of God or because of their failures and dispersion. Jewish failure in the past doesn’t mean God has abrogated His covenants, Rom 11:1, 27; Gal 4:4; Heb 8:8-12, 10:15-17. All Jewish believers of the Old Testament, Tribulation, and Millennium will be blessed under this New Covenant.
23. Through the New Covenant, God as party of the first part guarantees the future of Israel as party of the second part. However, all Israel is not Israel. To be true Israel and to be under the unconditional covenants, the Jews must personally believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. The only exception is the Jew who believes in Christ during the Church Age and then, through the baptism of the Holy Spirit, is no longer a Jew but becomes royal family of God.
24. All ministers of the Church Age are advised that their competency does not come from the Mosaic Law but from God. 2 Cor 3:5-6, “Not that we are adequate in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves, but our adequacy is from God, who also made us adequate as ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter [Mosaic Law] but of the Spirit. For the letter [Mosaic Law] kills, but the Spirit gives life.”
a. Pastors are not adequate in themselves, and do not have the gift because of any natural talent or ability. The gift of pastor-teacher does not depend in any way on any form of natural ability. Even the great Paul recognized that all his own abilities were inadequate.
b. Anything the pastor teaches which may be a blessing to you comes from the Holy Spirit and from the Word of God.
c. Being “ministers of a new covenant” refers to the pastors’ communication of the Gospel. The Gospel is the same in every generation and dispensation. So the New Covenant here refers to the blood of Christ.
d. While the minister of the Church Age must teach believers the mystery doctrine of the Church Age which was unknown in the Old Testament, he must also teach the Gospel of the blood of Jesus Christ which was known in the Old Testament, will be known in the Tribulation and the Millennium, and which must be emphasized at the present time.
e. Furthermore, no Jew qualifies for the New Covenant to Israel apart from salvation through faith in Christ. So when the New Covenant is mentioned, it’s not surprising to find so much reference to salvation. The Jews of the Old Testament, Tribulation, and Millennium cannot enter into the New Covenant apart from salvation through faith in Christ. Of course, the Jews of the Church Age are no longer Jews but royal family of God.
J. Application to the Church Age.
1. The Jewish monopoly during the dispensation of Israel caused several factors: the creation of a new racial species when Abraham was age ninety-nine, and the promise to Israel in the form of the unconditional covenants.
2. The Jew as a new racial species in the Old Testament had a spiritual monopoly which existed until Jesus Christ was rejected as Messiah during the great power experiment of the Hypostatic Union. The rejection of Messiah as the King of Israel during the First Advent plus His strategic victory on the cross set aside all the covenants.
3. The baptism of the Spirit makes every Jew and every Gentile equal as members of the royal family of God. The new spiritual species is the basis for the utilization of 100% available divine power.
4. Both Jews and Gentiles failed with covenants from God, so that in the Church Age there is no covenants. Instead, we have the baptism of the Spirit and the unique factors of the great power experiment of the Church Age. We have something far greater than covenants.
K. Biblical Covenants Versus Reform Theology Covenants.
1. The covenant theory of reform theology is not in any way related to the Biblical covenants in this study.
2. Biblical covenants are generally directed to Israel, never to the Church.
3. But the covenant theory does not distinguish between Israel and the Church.
4. The covenant theory of reform theology is a system of interpretation in using a covenant for a theological system, not for a Biblical system. (Not all theologies are Biblical.)
5. Nowhere in the Bible is the term covenant applied to the idea that there is a system of interpretation which considers that all God’s purposes are worked out on the basis of the three covenants of covenant theology.
a. The Covenant of Redemption was allegedly a prehistoric agreement between God the Father and God the Son in which each agreed to do certain things, along with the Holy Spirit in the end.
b. The Covenant of Works was allegedly made by God with Adam in the garden of Eden when man was in a state of perfection or innocence.
c. The Covenant of Grace is the way God deals with man after the Fall of man. This includes the entire period of human history, from the fall of man until the end of time.
6. Hence, no dispensational distinctions are made at all. This is where all the foul-ups come from; e.g., post-millennialism, etc. This system has resulted in terrible legalism right down to this day.
7. The presupposition of a bargain between the members of the Godhead, especially between God the Father and God the Son in eternity past, so that they entered into a covenant of redemption is not provable from Biblical theology. Furthermore, the idea of a covenant or bargain between God the Father and God the Son is blasphemous and unthinkable, as if they did not trust each other or were lacking in eternal and infinite virtue. “We will sign this pact; you do your part and I’ll do my part.” Yet see how close it is to the truth. It is true that the Father sent the Son. But the Father did it from His love - not a part of a covenant, but a part of His problem-solving devices which are infinite and eternal in nature. (Recall the three categories of divine Love.) Jn 3:16 doesn’t teach a covenant at all. Jesus Christ came into the world and went to the cross under problem-solving devices in His humanity inside the prototype divine dynasphere, the precedent for our function in our operational divine dynasphere.
8. The covenant theory assumes that God made a covenant with Adam in the Garden, called the Covenant of Works. In this covenant, God put Adam under probation, offering eternal life to Adam if he passed the test and didn’t eat from the tree. The Bible doesn’t say that. It is philosophical, heretical speculation. This theory also says that Adam was threatened with death if he failed the test. This theory rejects the omniscience of God as always knowing that man would violation the divine prohibition and enter into the state of real spiritual death.
9. The covenant theory further assumes that under the Covenant of Grace, God made a covenant with the elect. In this covenant, God freely offers life and salvation to sinners by means of personal faith in Jesus Christ. This is their one correct view, recognizing that for all time, salvation is always the same: by grace through faith in Christ as the only way of eternal life. But by failing to distinguish between dispensations, they foul up everything else applying to after salvation. They add works and call it the Christian life.
10. This theory says that God promises to give His Holy Spirit to those who are ordained to eternal life, to make them willing and able to believe in Christ. This is the Calvinistic view of efficacious grace. This does injustice to the doctrine of pneumatology.
11. While the Covenant of Grace is generally correct regarding the saving work of Christ and faith in Him for salvation, it does not answer the question: “After salvation - what?”
12. Kaiper was a great theologian and prime minister in Holland. In all his fantastic writings, only the salvation portions are accurate. Typical of covenant theology, he writes very little about the Holy Spirit. This theology does not distinguish between the ministry of God the Holy Spirit to Israel and His ministry to the Church, which is unlimited, and that in the Tribulation and Millennium. No wonder the Christian life is not understood, making no distinctions like this. Never before have believers been indwelt by the Holy Spirit, not had a divine dynasphere. Only in this dispensation does the Holy Spirit give spiritual gifts.
13. The Covenant of Grace does not distinguish between dispensations but lumps everything together and therefore obscures the protocol plan of God for the Church Age. It makes no dispensational distinction and has no understanding of the mystery doctrine, saying there was no mystery doctrine to those in the Old Testament.
14. There is no distinction between Israel and the Church. There is no understanding of the First Advent and the Incarnation as a separate dispensation.
15. Covenant theologians are therefore forced to the erroneous conclusion that the basic Christian way of life is keeping the Mosaic Law, a part of the Grace Covenant, and generally accepts this untenable position as God’s plan for us today.
16. Terrible confusion results in which covenant theology, therefore, cannot interpret a great portion of the Gospels, including the Sermon on the Mount, the Upper Room Discourse, the Olivet Discourse.
17. Furthermore, tithing, Sabbath observance, etc. are included in the Christian life, and are in opposition to the concept of the mystery doctrine.
18. Most covenant theologians are amillennial; a few are postmillennial. They are confused about the ministry of the Holy Spirit. They have a tendency to make human works and so-called Christian service a part of the Christian way of life.
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