In 1994, Meredith Kline wrote a poignant article in New Horizons, the magazine of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church, alerting us all to the dangers of abandoning the covenant of works, and in particular the harmful “continuum view” of Daniel Fuller. Fuller’s position has had significant influence on men such as John Piper. Rejecting the covenant of works is also common among Reformed Baptists who hold to "New Covenant Theology" such as John Reisinger, Jon Zeus, Randy Seiver, Fred Zaspel, and Gary Long. I have expressed appreciation for some of these men in other of my writings, but on this point, they are missing the heart of the gospel. This article is my attempt to resurface the issue of the centrality of the covenant of works to Calvinism and call into question anyone who is attempting to engage Reformed theology without it or the larger hermeneutic to which it belongs—Covenant Theology.
THE COVENANT OF WORKS
The covenant of works is, "The first covenant made with man…wherein life was promised to Adam; and in him to his posterity, upon condition of perfect and personal obedience." (1) The covenant of works was a covenant of probation. If Adam (the federal head of the human race) remained obedient for the time God allotted to him, eternal life would have been granted to him and progeny. The covenant of works was not intended to be a permanent, never-ending relationship. By its nature, it was designed to terminate, thus allowing Adam to graduate to eternal life without the fear of disobedience ever capturing his heart again. That was the reward. The probationary covenant was clearly confirmed by Congregationalist Jonathan Edwards as an integral part of God’s first covenant with man. He said:
“We are no more justified by the voice of the law or of him that judges according to it by a mere pardon of sin, than Adam, our first surety, was justified by the law at the first point of his existence, before he had fulfilled the obedience to the law, or had so much as any trial whether he would fulfill it or not.” (2)
Of course, the first Adam did not pass the works probation and was condemned to death with the entire human race. God in his grace, however, established a covenant of grace with Adam and humanity, through which He would send another federal head to fulfill the covenant of works and reverse the penalty of Adam’s disobedience for all who would believe. Jesus Christ, the Second Adam, came not only to bear the punishment for humanity’s violation of the covenant of works, but also to actually fulfill the covenant of works on behalf of the elect. Jesus’ obedience was active in obedience, and passive in death. The Holy Scriptures say, "For as by one man’s disobedience, many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous" (Romans 5:19). This is the redemptive-historical summary of what Jesus’ life accomplished—namely righteousness for many (lit."hoi polloi," "the many" referring to those given to Christ in the eternal covenant). This summary text positions both sides of federal imputation (Adam and Christ) in the obedience or lack thereof to the conditional promise of Genesis 2:17.
For any person to be granted eternal life, there must not only be the absence of de-merit (sin) but the presence of positive and perfect merit (righteousness). The covenant of works is the process God established to fulfill this requirement of righteousness. The covenant of works was not abandoned in favor of the covenant of grace. Rather the covenant of grace was given in order to fulfill the covenant of works. Jesus Christ, the promised Redeemer, would intrude humanity to personally fulfill the covenant of works himself, then pay the wrathful penalty for the first Adam’s violation of the covenant. God would then impute all of the Redeemer’s work to the elect. This is the gospel!
WHY THE COVENANT OF WORKS IS NECESSARY
To abandon belief in the covenant of works is to completely misunderstand the nature of Jesus’ work and the gospel itself. To eliminate the existence of the covenant of works is to minimize if not eliminate altogether the reality and necessity of the active obedience of Christ. Moreover, it is to minimize if not eliminate altogether one of the major transactions of imputation—namely the righteousness of Christ. In other words, if there was no covenant of works whose fulfillment was required in order to procure eternal life (Gen. 2:17, Gal. 3:12), then what use or benefit or necessity was the life (as opposed to death) of Christ? If there was not the pending necessity for perfect obedience in order to secure eternal life for mankind, then the life of Christ was a non-issue in the work of redemption. And if the life of Christ was a non-issue in redemption, then you have a doctrine of justification that is merely atonement-oriented, without the need for the imputation of positive righteousness. This was Wesley’s view and, systematically, is the view of anyone who discards of the covenant of works.
Further, the absence of a covenant of works forces man to be the object of justification, rather than Christ. Through his active obedience, Jesus merited justification, and God validated His justification through His resurrection (1 Tim. 3:16, Rom. 4:25). Therefore, it is not we who are justified, but Christ. We are justified only through our mystical union with Him. This is an aspect of justification almost totally overlooked in modern Reformed theologizing, due in large part to our outright neglect of the covenant of works. Jonathan Edwards spoke to the justification of Christ clearly in his day:
“Christ, our second surety, (in whose justification all who believe in him, and whose surety he is, are virtually justified,) was not justified until he had done the work the Father had appointed him, and kept the Father’s commandments through all trials; and then in his resurrection he was justified. When he that had been put to death in the flesh was quickened by the Spirit (1 Pet. 3:18), then he that was manifest in the flesh was justified in the spirit (1 Tim. 3:16).” (3)
Edwards also made a critical connection between Christ’s justification and faith. He maintained that faith is the instrument by which we receive Christ, not justification. Because Jesus is the one who merited justification through obedience to the covenant of works, all the gifts of redemption are bestowed directly on Him. Therefore our faith attaches us to Christ, and we receive, through imputation, all the benefits of His justification. Here are Edwards words on this faith-Christ relationship:
“Faith is not intended to be the instrument by which God justifies, but the instrument by which we receive justification; not the instrument by which the justifier acts in justifying, but by which the receiver of justification acts in accepting justification. But yet, it must be admitted, this is an obscure way of speaking, and there must certainly be some impropriety in calling faith an instrument by which we receive or accept justification; for the very persons who explain the matter this way speak of faith as being the reception or acceptance itself. And if so, how can it be the instrument of reception or acceptance? Certainly there is a difference between the act and the instrument. Besides, by their own descriptions of faith, Christ, the Mediator by whom, and His righteousness by which we are justified is more directly the object of this acceptance and justification, which is the benefit arising from it, more indirectly. Therefore if faith is an instrument it is more properly the instrument by which we receive Christ than the instrument by which we receive justification.” (4)
I cite Edwards here to demonstrate the critical connection between the covenant of works and justification. To eliminate the covenant of works for either the first or second Adam is not simply a neglect of a hermeneutic; it is a serious gospel violation. Without the covenant of works, we have no hope of possessing positive, meritorious obedience. And without positive, meritorious obedience (holiness), "no one will see the Lord" (Heb.12:14). This is the danger of Calvinism without the covenant of works.
THE DANGER OF MIXING GRACE AND WORKS
Even among those who affirm the covenant of works, there are some who yet see the covenant as one of grace, at least in part. For example, Presbyterian R.L. Dabney said.
“Nor would we attach any force to the argument, that if Christ made penal satisfaction for the sins of all, justice would forbid any to be punished....Christ's satisfaction is not a pecuniary equivalent, but only such a one as enables the Father, consistently with His attributes, to pardon, if in His Mercy He sees fit.... There would be no injustice to the man, if he remaining an unbeliever, his guilt were punished twice over, first in as Savior, and then in Him.” (5)
Dabney here maintains that at the end of the day, Christ’s work was not meritorious, obligating God to pardon and/or impute. God’s grace is still necessary, and he could decide not to forgive even after Christ fulfilled God’s righteous requirements. He combines works and grace into a hybrid foreign to Scripture.
Dabney’s confusion on this point is common among people who either deny the covenant of works totally (Fuller/Piper) or want to mix the covenant of works with elements of grace (Dabney and countless other Presbyterians). The outcome is the same: grace is necessary even in a conditional works-covenant.
This confusion is serious because grace and works cannot be mixed. Adam would have obtained his reward by works or by grace; there is no middle ground. Romans 11:6 says exactly this regarding election according to God's grace: "And if by grace, then it is no longer of works; otherwise grace is no longer grace." God either elects by grace or according to works, never by a combination. God rewards according to grace or works, not some mixture. If Adam was to be received into eternal life by grace, then the covenant with him was all of grace. But if it was of works, it was not in any sense by grace, or work is no longer work. Adam would have earned his entry into heaven, just as Paul says: "Now to him who works, the wages are not counted as grace but as debt." (Romans 4:4). There can be no talk here of grace, even of God graciously offering the covenant when he didn't have to, or of offering more reward than was necessary. Then the wages are debt only because God has chosen to obligate himself (in which sense even our reward in Christ must be counted as debt and there is no longer any distinction between the method of entry into life offered to Adam and to us.)
Mixing grace and works has become standard fare in Reformed theology these days. For all our talk about sola gratia, we have not guarded the exclusive nature of grace very well. In fact, through the influence of men who attempt Calvinism without Covenant, we have violated sola gratia. The Congregational Churches in the Savoy tradition stand against mixing grace and works and strive to preserve sola gratia for our children and our children’s children.
RECOVERING THE COVENANT OF WORKS
There is real danger in denying the covenant of works. One who denies the covenant of works, for example, cannot possibly talk biblically about justification. They will speak about the justification of people, not Christ. Nor can they talk straight about imputation. They will talk about God imputing the righteousness of Christ, but they cannot mean it. These are gospel matters that are not secondary.
Furthermore, a denial of covenant theology inevitably skews the way one reads and preaches the Bible. No longer is the Bible a history of the working out of God’s promised redeemer made to Adam (the hermeneutic of Jonathan Edwards), but a fragmented and confusing compilation of "different gospels." The very thing that Fuller and Piper argue for, Unity of the Bible, is the very thing they lack in their denial of covenant theology.
The New Covenant Theology of many of the Reformed Baptists strikes me as simply a way of rationalizing their rejection of infant baptism. They divide the Bible so harshly that the Old Testament has little to no bearing on New Testament believers. This is a convenient, yet tragically irresponsible, way of preserving their erroneous position on infant baptism through hermeneutics. And as I have surveyed the limitless literature written by those in the New Covenant Theology/Baptistic camp, this is exactly what I have found—entire systems developed to deny baptism to children.
I wish to remind the Reformed community that the single unifying element of Calvinism was and is the covenant. Not election, not justification, not TULIP, not amillenialism or postmillenialism, and not the regulative principle. Covenant theology is what frames the entire system, from start to finish. To deny it is to cease to be Reformed.
This is a call to both sides of the camp. For the covenantal side, this is a call for you to rediscover the treasure you have in covenant theology. Study it further; drink deep at its wells; and teach it to your children.
For those who are trying to be Calvinists without the covenant, including the covenant of works, this is a call to you to finish your Reformation journey. Stop standing at the boarder gazing into the city; come in and take your seat. All those inconsistencies that you have been trying to make sense of will make perfect sense in the context of the covenant. Most of all, you will finally sense the wonder of having Jesus’ fulfillment of the covenant of works credited to you, a covenant-breaker. Perhaps you’ve missed the forest for the trees. In your attempt to run from covenant theology, you’ve missed the Christ of the covenant and are even now unconverted. If you’ve heard Christ calling you in these pages, cast your anchor on Him. Then you’ll be able to say with J. Gresham Machen, "So thankful for the active obedience of Christ; No hope without it."
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Notes
1. Savoy Declaration, VII, II.
2. Jonathan Edwards, Justification By Faith Alone.
3. Jonathan Edwards, Discourses on Various Important Subjects.
4. Jonathan Edwards, Justification By Faith Alone.
5. R.L. Dabney, Systematic Theology, Lecture XLIII.4.
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