The Promise Revealed and Realized

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Preacher: Ross Macdonald Scripture: Genesis 17:1-14

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Well, this morning we continue forward in this little detour we've had considering this next stage of covenant theology in chapter 17.
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Of course, that's been in view in our time in Genesis and we'll briefly consider some of the things that we have touched on in the past regarding Genesis 2 and 3.
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I'm cognizant of the fact that as our brother prayed, unbelievers in our midst so often when we're sharing the gospel with them, their eyes are glazed over.
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And here we are as believers in the gospel, many of us, and perhaps with all of this technical detail on covenant theology, your eyes are beginning to glaze over.
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I'm aware of that. I'm thankful for your perseverance. A few weeks ago I used the analogy of slowly descending from the steps into the pool, getting about waist deep, and then beginning to sort of head into the deep end, and all of a sudden your toes lose that sensation and you begin to tread water.
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Perhaps last week was about as far deep as we go. We're still in the deep end, turning around, making it back to where our toes can touch next week.
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And so keep that in mind. There is some light at the end of all of this. However, what we have been doing,
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I hope purposefully, will reap dividends as we continue forward, not only this morning but throughout the rest of our time in the book of Genesis.
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These things are pivotal. They're foundational. And I have been attempting to lay down some foundation in a way that we can keep circling back.
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You can keep hearing concepts and words and terms that will become more familiar as we press forward.
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And in some ways we're going to circle back a little bit today, but we're also laying a foundation for where we're going next week.
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And so we've been considering, in Genesis 17, this two -fold nature of the
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Abrahamic covenant. We talked about the duality, the dichotomous nature of the Abrahamic covenant.
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And we boiled that down last week to the categories of flesh and promise.
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This duality that really runs the whole course of redemptive history. And so we spent some considerable time in Galatians 4, verses 21 through 31.
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There we saw the whole thrust was Paul's establishment of a contrast between the dimension and the history according to the flesh and the dimension and history according to the promise.
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Both of these stemming out of Abraham and the Abrahamic covenant. So as the storyline of scripture proceeds, what we call redemptive history, we find these interwoven dimensions of the flesh and the promise.
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The fleshly dimension, of course, foreshadowed the promise. The fleshly dimension became in many ways the corridors of its fulfillment and sowed the seeds that would become its ultimate fruition.
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So both dimensions, a point we made last week, both dimensions of this interwoven, unfolding redemptive history work together in God's singular purpose from the beginning to save His people through the seed of promise.
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Now, one of the caveats that we made last week was if we separate these dimensions, we risk pulling apart the singular purpose of God.
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If we separate these dimensions, we risk pulling apart the singular purpose of God. And there are some theological traditions, we won't get into that today, that do indeed pull these dimensions apart and reap all sorts of consequences and errors.
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However, if we merge these dimensions, if we merge the flesh and the promise together in the
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Abrahamic covenant, we risk losing a contrast that God has established and that God demonstrates throughout redemptive history.
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So that's what we're going to be looking at a little bit this morning. If we merge the dimensions of the flesh and the promise in the
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Abrahamic covenant, we risk losing the contrast that God has established and demonstrated throughout redemptive history.
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When you do this, whether you're merging or separating, if you're not carefully distinguishing and delineating, then you're going to introduce distortions in your understanding of covenant theology and errors from it into your doctrine and practice.
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So next week we're going to consider a little bit more about that when we look at the sign of the
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Abrahamic covenant being circumcision and how that is often mishandled and mistreated in other theological traditions that are cousins to Reformed Baptist.
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So we're going to consider that and you'll understand how we're going to get there by the time we're done this morning.
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This morning we're going to lay the foundation for that. We want to consider how our theological tradition as Reformed Baptists, the thing that we've been, whether you knew it or not, tracing out in the past few weeks.
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We want to consider this, the framework. First, the larger framework of the Reformed confessional agreement.
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We're part of a broad stream of Reformed covenant theology and there's all sorts of overlap within that.
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And so I want to lay out some of the agreement and the overlap that unites us to our Reformed brethren.
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Second, we'll consider where as Reformed Baptists we have a very distinctive understanding.
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So next week we'll look at that distinctive understanding and all of the consequences that flow from it.
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So first point, first this larger unity, confessional covenantalism.
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The broad contours of covenant theology are largely shared. They're all different streams of Reformed theology that really, for our sake, flows out of the 17th century.
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This was sort of the high mark of its development immediately after the Reformation, stemming especially in the
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English Reformation is where we trace our heritage. And in the 17th century you have covenantal theology reflected in the foundational confessions of this wider
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English -speaking Reformed tradition. Sometimes you'll hear this referred to as federal theology.
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It's the same thing, covenant theology, federal theology from the Latin for covenant. So the
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Westminster Confession of Faith, the Savoy Declaration of Faith, and our confession as a church, the
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Second London Baptist Confession, these are the three major confessions of the larger
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English -speaking Reformed family. The Westminster Confession of Faith was published in 1646 to 1647, and then the
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Savoy Declaration of Faith, that was the Presbyterians largely. The Presbyterians use this confession still.
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The Savoy Declaration of Faith, 1658, this was the Congregationalists. So unlike the
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Presbyterians as far as church government, but like the
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Presbyterians in the fact that they baptize infants and view children of believers as children of the covenant, in parentheses we ask whatever covenant that is supposed to be, 1658, 1677 is when we get our 1689.
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1677, because the persecution was so hot, it couldn't be published and agreed over until 1689 when religious toleration came through William of Orange.
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So that's our little brief history. That's also in some ways why the Second London Baptist Confession has the greatest benefit of hindsight.
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We could look at all of the beauty and glory of the Westminster Confession and go, amen, amen, amen, and then look at the
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Savoy, which also copy and pasted the Westminster Confession and said, we're going to have to disagree with you on your doctrine of the church, and maybe change a few phrases here or there elsewhere, and the
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Baptist would say amen and amen, and then we said, but you Savoy, you Congregationalists, we don't really feel like you've properly understood children and baptism and how these things relate to the covenant of grace.
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And so this is where our Second London Baptist Confession of Faith arises. Now some of us,
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I know, are familiar with these things. Many of us have considered them in some detail on Sunday night studies over the past years.
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We will consider these things moving forward as a church. This is part of the main diet of our understanding as Reformed Baptists.
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For all of us, these things will become more clear as we reflect upon the
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Scriptures and learn more about our theological roots. So if you're feeling a little overwhelmed, don't be discouraged.
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Don't get distracted. These things will begin to fit together and you'll reap all sorts of blessings in your understanding of the
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Scriptures therein. Now, when we turn in our confession, what we call the 1689, to Chapter 7, which is called
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God's Covenant, we find this broad agreement among this
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Reformed tradition of the covenant of works. When we were in Genesis 2 and 3, we spent some time considering the covenant of works, the
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Adamic covenant. Adam was holy. He was created with original righteousness and God's command to him not to eat the fruit of the tree that was forbidden, as the
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Reformed confessions universally declare, was for him the means of gaining the reward of life.
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So the view was there was again this probationary period within Eden. If Adam was to keep the covenant of works that God established with him, contained in that command not to eat of the fruit of the tree that was forbidden, he would gain the reward of life.
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As we know, Adam sinned and in Adam all sinned. All of humanity was plunged through Adam as covenant head of humanity into the fall, into the condition and the curse of the fall.
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Now as we move from the first to the second paragraph in the seventh chapter of our confession, we find this covenant of works continuing to abide even after the fall.
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And that covenant of works, as it were, republicated at Mount Sinai.
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So this is our confession, chapter seven, paragraph two. This is a piece of it.
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Moreover, man having brought himself under the curse of the law by his fall.
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So this is a very specific language here. The condition of the covenant of works was not merely avoiding the fruit of a forbidden tree.
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It was in fact the absolute requirement of obedience to God's moral law.
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And that moral law was written on the heart of Adam. And so in our understanding of covenant theology, there was a condition implied within the covenant of works.
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Because man in Adam broke that condition, man from the fall is under the curse of the law.
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We see this reflected in chapter 19 of the confession, paragraph two. The same law that was first written in the heart of man, this is at creation, continued to be a perfect rule of righteousness after the fall and was delivered by God upon Mount Sinai in Ten Commandments.
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This is what we mean by the republication. What was written on the heart as a perfect rule of righteousness was then engraved on stone.
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First it was in the heart of Adam and therefore on the conscience of all of humanity. But it was also engraved upon the stone at Mount Sinai.
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So this is uniformly understood by Reformed theology. The same law that was written on Adam's heart was delivered by God upon Mount Sinai.
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And therefore you see the predicament of fallen mankind. Though they are utterly incapable of obeying
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God's law because of the fall, they remain under the demand of the law and therefore under the curse of the law.
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And so it begs the question in chapter seven of the confession, how can a fallen man escape the curse of the covenant of works?
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When we move to the second paragraph, move further on, we find
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God's answer in terms of His singular purpose to redeem fallen man and to glorify
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His Son. So this is again from the beginning. Moreover, man having brought himself under the curse of the law by his fall, it pleased the
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Lord to make a covenant of grace. So you have a covenant of works with Adam in the beginning and the fall and immediately after the fall,
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God is pleased to make a covenant of grace wherein He freely offers unto sinners life and salvation by Jesus Christ, requiring of them faith in Him that they may be saved and promising to give unto all those that are ordained unto eternal life
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His Holy Spirit to make them willing and able to believe. So the only way to be free from the demand of the law as a covenant of works in which all of fallen humanity stands is to be taken out of that covenant by the
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Spirit of God through faith by grace into a covenant of grace to be justified by Christ.
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Ever since Genesis 3, the law, notice I'm saying specifically ever since Genesis 3, the law has been unable to justify fallen men and fallen women.
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Remember what we saw last week in Galatians 3, verse 21 and following, if there had been a law given which could have given life truly, righteousness would have been by the law, but the
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Scripture confined all under sin, right, this is the fall, so that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.
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That's what our confession is elaborating. God reveals this promise, the gospel promise, the promise of a covenant of grace immediately after the fall since fallen
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Adam and Eve and all of humanity in Him can only find the hope of eternal life through the promise.
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The promise revealed first to Adam and then by farther steps until it is ultimately realized, brought to fruition and established in the gospel.
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This brings us to our confession, paragraph 3. This covenant is revealed in the gospel.
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Side note here, you're going to have to pay close attention to that word reveal. It's really being used in a very significant way in our confession.
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This covenant is revealed in the gospel first of all to Adam in the promise of salvation by the seed of the woman and afterward by farther steps until the full discovery, in other words, the full revelation thereof is completed or sometimes you have concluded in the
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New Testament. Our Reformed heritage holds together the gospel and the covenant of grace.
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Now, this is true again of the broader family of Reformed covenant theology, but how we hold the gospel to the covenant of grace is very different from how our close brethren and friends, our
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Presbyterians and our Congregationalists in the Reformed heritage, how they hold these things together.
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But the point I'm making at the beginning here is what's shared. When we get to chapter 20 in our confession, which is on the law, it's essentially just a copy and paste job on the
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Savoy. We read this, the covenant of works being broken by sin.
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God was pleased to give forth the promise of Christ, the seed of the woman as the means of calling the elect and be getting in them faith and repentance.
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In this promise, the gospel as to the substance of it was revealed and is there in effectual for the conversion and salvation of sinners.
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In a nutshell, this is the shared confessional covenantalism. But this is also, as I mentioned, where we begin to part ways.
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And I might be firing shots across the bow here. This is sort of friendly fire. We love, we benefit from, and we bless the faithful Presbyterians and Congregationalists in our lives.
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I have as many Presbyterians on my bookshelves and on my sermon audio playlist as Baptists.
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Many of us cut our teeth on R .C. Sproul. And so this is, in some ways,
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I don't want it to be seen as I'm trying to distance myself from them as though they're irredeemably lost in error.
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That is not the case at all. We're so close compared to all other Christian traditions.
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We're the closest of friends. And yet, because we're the closest of friends, we happen to have the sharpest of disagreements.
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We're so aligned on so much that those areas where we're not have become very sharp. As many of you know,
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I'm, for probably 13 years now, I've been a part of New England Reform Fellowship, which is a fellowship of Presbyterian, Congregational, and Baptist churches.
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And yes, we all get together, and we all know where each other stands in our confessional commitments, and we all take potshots at each other, and it's a lot of fun.
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And there is this beauty of this fraternity. So please understand, behind all of the disagreement you'll hear this morning, there is this love and this very real disagreement with our beloved brothers.
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Part of this love is historically grounded. By the way, you know, you look at how close these confessions were coming out and how similar they are from the 1640s to the 1680s, which was a period, at least beginning in the late, you know, the 1660s, early 1660s to the 1680s.
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It was intense persecution. And the persecution under King Charles II really drove these nonconformists together.
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They were outside of the Anglican establishment, and therefore they were nonconformist dissidents, rebels, as it were.
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And so they had to forge this fellowship in unity together. They often rented the same facilities to preach out of.
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They held shared conferences together. So I say historically we've been the closest of friends.
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Persecution drove us together. But let's consider what flows out of this framework.
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Let's consider what makes us distinctively Reformed Baptists. What is interesting about the
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Baptists' paragraphs in chapter 7 is not what they say so much as what they don't say.
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Generally speaking, the Westminster Confession was the template.
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The Savoy modified that, and the Baptists modified the Savoy, generally speaking. There are a few times that a paragraph is not included, and it may not be for disagreement.
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It may be for flow or for style. Often that paragraph is reduced and summarized and included in one of the other paragraphs.
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So as an example of this, in chapter 7, there's six paragraphs in the
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Westminster Confession of Faith. There's only three in the Second London. However, most of those paragraphs is contained or reflected, if not in chapter 7, then elsewhere in the
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Confession. However, there are some places where the language is dropped, not because of style, not because of flow, not because of redundancy, but because of a very different understanding of doctrine.
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And that is the case with chapter 7. The Reformed Baptists treated the
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Covenant of Grace very differently than the Presbyterians. This may seem right now like we're splitting hairs.
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Why can't we be friends? What's the big deal? Aren't you counting angels dancing on the pinhead?
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Big things have small beginnings. And if you still think by the end of this morning that we're splitting hairs, you will not think that next week.
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The Presbyterians argued in their confession, chapter 7, this is the
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Westminster Confession of Faith, 7 .5. The covenant, this covenant, the
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Covenant of Grace, was differently administered in the time of the law and in the time of the gospel.
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So you understand here you have the division between the law and the gospel, the Old and the New Testaments, roughly speaking.
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They say the Covenant of Grace overarches this thing. The Covenant of Grace is active and established in both, and yet it's differently administered.
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It's established, but it's differently administered between the law and the gospel.
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But that's all part of the larger umbrella of the Covenant of Grace. Westminster Confession, 7 .6,
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these are not therefore two covenants of grace differing in substance, but one and the same covenant of grace under various dispensations.
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Okay, so one covenant of grace for the Presbyterians under different dispensations.
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There aren't two covenants of grace, certainly not. But they're saying there is one, and it's covering the law and the gospel.
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It has the same substance, but different dispensations. The Baptists specifically rejected this.
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This was not our understanding of the Covenant of Grace. As we see in the
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Westminster Confession, the Presbyterians claim that the Old and the New Covenants are two different dispensations or administrations of the same covenant of grace.
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So again, there are not therefore two covenants of grace differing in substance, but one and the same under various dispensations.
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One substance. This is what the Reformed Baptists rejected. We do not view the
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Mosaic Covenant as an administration of the Covenant of Grace. In other words, where the
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Presbyterians want to see the Covenant of Grace administered in both the
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Mosaic and in the New Covenant, in both the Old and the New, the Baptists argued that the
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Covenant of Grace was revealed in Genesis 3 .15, and then progressively, by farther steps, that promise was brought closer to reality until it was manifest, established, brought into substance in the
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New Covenant. I can't tell if you're hanging on by your fingernails yet or not.
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We're going to keep circling back and reinforcing this. So this is what our confession says.
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Remember, it's rejected this idea of a covenant of grace that encompasses in substance the
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Old and the New Covenants, albeit differently administered. This is what our statement says, 2
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London Confession 7 .3. This covenant of grace is revealed. Note, it's not established.
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It's revealed in the Gospel. First of all, to Adam in the promise of salvation by the seat of the woman, and afterwards by farther steps.
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So the revelation comes by way of promise, first to Adam and the woman after the fall,
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Genesis 3 .15, and then it continues to be revealed by promise in farther steps until the full discovery was concluded, completed in the
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New Testament. So let's come full circle. What does this have to do with Genesis 17?
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Why are we talking about the Mosaic Covenant, the Old Covenant, and the covenant of grace? I thought we were talking about the
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Abrahamic Covenant. How in the world does this fit here? Well now we can go back to Galatians 3 and 4 and try to follow what makes us
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Reformed Baptists. Galatians 3, beginning in verse 16.
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Now, to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He does not say, and to seeds, as of many, but as of one, and to your seed, who is
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Christ. And this I say, that the law, which was 430 years later, cannot annul the covenant that was confirmed before by God in Christ, that it should make the promise of no effect.
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For if the inheritance is of the law, it is no longer of promise, but God gave it to Abraham by promise.
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Now both Presbyterians and Baptists were agreed that Paul's argument in Galatians 3 shows that Israel stumbled, tried to make a righteousness of their own, and Paul is addressing this
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Judaizing error in Galatia. Both agreed that God's promised inheritance was by grace, not by works, and that this grace was given to Abraham when
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God made a covenant with him. So that the law, the Sinai covenant, which came 430 years later, did not annul that promise, nor did law become a replacement method to gain the inheritance.
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So far, so good, we're all agreed. However, the
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Presbyterians took this passage as an example for their claim. Remember, the big claim here that we're rejecting is that the
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Abrahamic covenant is in substance the covenant of grace. We're rejecting that.
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They look at this and they say, ha ha, the Abrahamic covenant is the covenant of grace.
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And because they see the Abrahamic covenant as the covenant of grace, albeit under a different administration, they begin to press the details of this
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Abrahamic covenant into the details of the new covenant, right? Because there's only one substance, different administrations.
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But there's one substance, so what's true here is going to be true here. What's true in the law is going to be true in the gospel under these dispensations.
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In other words, they realized that God commanded not only
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Abraham and the promised seed to be circumcised, but everyone in Abraham's household, foreigners, the poor merchant that was passing by, everyone has to be circumcised.
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Whether Isaac or Ishmael, son or slave, all received the covenantal sign.
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And so the Presbyterians argued, since Abraham's fleshly seed was a part of the
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Abrahamic covenant and received the sign of the covenant, circumcision, the fleshly seed of believers in the new covenant are also part of that covenant and should receive the sign of baptism.
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This is the unity of the covenant of grace, they said. Same substance, different administrations.
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But don't you see? It's mixed. Abram, whether his children were of the flesh or of the spirit, they were part of that covenant externally, maybe not inwardly, and in the new covenant, believers' children, whether they're of the flesh or of the spirit, are part of the covenant, even if it's external.
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One covenant of grace, one substance, different administrations. So building on Genesis 17, the
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Presbyterians understood the covenant of grace is mixed in both the Old and in the
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New Testaments. Ishmael's and Isaac's are meant to be together in the covenant, both being proper members and recipients of what they call in their confession a sign and seal of the covenant.
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Now the Baptist's response to this was, what, huh? Despite all of the shared overlap and friendly fellowship, the
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Baptist could not accept this understanding of the covenant of grace. They understood that God gave a promise of the covenant of grace to Abraham, just like He gave a promise of the covenant of grace to Adam.
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And the elaboration of this promise that He had given after the fall continues by farther steps until it is realized, concluded in the
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New Testament, the new covenant. And so we look at Galatians 3 .18
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and we can't ignore what is said. God gave it to Abraham by promise.
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The promise is what reveals the covenant of grace yet to be established. The significant development of the
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Reformed Baptist is that the covenant of grace was revealed to Abraham, but that the formal
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Abrahamic covenant was not the covenant of grace. Not even a different administration of it.
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In other words, the Presbyterians saw the Abrahamic covenant as an administration of the covenant of grace.
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The Baptists saw the Abrahamic covenant as a promise and further revelation of the covenant of grace, but not identical with it, not even administration of it.
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The Baptists saw that the Abrahamic covenant contained the promise, which they defined as the revelation of the covenant of grace.
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So notice, the promise of the covenant of grace is not the same thing as the covenant of grace.
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Now, to be fair to our Presbyterian brethren that we hold in high esteem, they rightly understood the dilemma of making
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Ishmael's members of the covenant of grace. It doesn't sound so good.
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Hard to have good PR on that one. They understood that if the covenant community is mixed, then not all members actually receive the benefit of God's grace.
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Even if they're in the same covenant and receive the same sign, only those who are truly
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God's, by His Spirit, those who are elect will actually receive the benefits of grace within the covenant of grace.
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And so how do you get past this dilemma? Well they make a distinction, the Presbyterians make a distinction between the substance of the covenant of grace and the administration of it.
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In other words, they say there's something external and formal, there's an administration, but the reality of that grace is only inward, it's only internal to those who are truly
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God's. That's true in the old and the new covenant, both are mixed according to their understanding of the covenant of grace.
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Truly they argued, only the elect receive all the benefits of God's gracious salvation.
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Only the elect, that is, for them, receive the substance of the covenant of grace, even if the administration of it was mixed, external and formal.
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And so for them, the Abrahamic covenant of course has physical fleshly offspring. Right next to spiritual promised offspring.
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And this is just part of how God designed the administration of His covenant of grace both then and now.
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Now again to this, the Baptist response was, for the
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Baptists, the distinction was not between substance and administration in the covenant of grace, because as we've said in the first place, the
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Abrahamic covenant is not the covenant of grace, it rather just contains the promise of it.
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And so where do the Baptists place their distinction? Between the promise revealed and the promise realized.
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The promise revealed from the fall by farther steps afterward until it is realized.
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For the Baptists, the redemptive historical unity of the covenant of grace was not by different administrations or mixed recipients across the
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Testaments. For the Baptists, the unity of the covenant of grace was in being revealed from the very beginning until it came to fruition in the new covenant in Christ's blood.
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So let me put it this way, I keep trying to circle back. A Presbyterian would say, not all the members of the
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Abrahamic covenant received the benefit of the covenant of grace, because there is a difference between its substance and its administration.
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A Reformed Baptist would say, not all the members of the Abrahamic covenant received the benefit of the covenant of grace, because not all the members of the
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Abrahamic covenant were part of the covenant of grace. The way we divide this duality is profoundly different, and that's why we don't splash water on Nathaniel's head, that's why, and we'll talk more about that next week.
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So third and last, more detail, how do we rightly divide this duality?
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As we've said, both Reformed Baptists and Presbyterians understood that there is a dichotomy in the
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Abrahamic covenant, but as we've seen, the way they divide this dichotomy is completely different.
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The way we approach the covenant of grace is completely different. Presbyterians considered this duality within the single covenant, so the physical, the fleshly reality, what's external and earthly, is for them merged with the spiritual, promised reality, what is internal and celestial.
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The covenant of grace for Presbyterians always had a mixed external administration, but a pure internal substance, doesn't matter if you're in the
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Old or the New Testament. They recognized that Abraham's seed was fleshly and spiritual.
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In other words, Presbyterians argued that Abraham only ever had one posterity made up of mixed members within a covenant of grace, and therefore, they would say,
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Reformed Baptists are wrong to try to separate this mixture into two posterities, to try to pull apart what was mixed.
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But for the Baptists, the response was, huh? This is a vital point.
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If Scripture, as we considered it even last week, testifies that Abraham does indeed have two distinct seeds, then the
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Reformed Baptists are right not to find any ishmaels in the covenant of grace. The Reformed Baptists are right not to merge what is fleshly and physical with what is spiritual and ultimate.
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The Presbyterians' emphasis on a mixed covenant of grace stemming out of the Abrahamic covenant is what the
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Baptists rejected. They could not see a biblical warrant for holding Abraham's mixed posterity together when
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Scripture so forcefully contrasts the children of the flesh from the children of the promise.
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And therefore, the Reformed Baptists separated what was fleshly from what was promised. They saw two posterities in Abraham, two inheritances in Abraham, where the
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Presbyterians saw one administration of a covenant of grace. The Reformed Baptists saw two covenants.
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Now that should sound very familiar to us from last week. Remember, the
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Reformed Baptists don't see one administration of a mixture within fleshly and promised ones all together under this umbrella of the covenant of grace, no.
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They say there are two posterities, two inheritances, two covenants. Galatians 4, we go back there again, hopefully now with new eyes, for it is written that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondwoman, the other by a free woman, but he who was of the bondwoman was born according to the flesh.
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And he of the free woman through promise, which things are symbolic, for these are the two covenants, you see, not the one, not one substance, two covenants, two posterities.
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The one from Mount Sinai, which gives birth to bondage, which is Hagar, for this Hagar is
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Mount Sinai in Arabia and corresponds to Jerusalem, which now is and is in bondage with her children, but the
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Jerusalem above is free, which is mother of a soul. We have here one of the fundamental differences with the
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Presbyterian understanding of the Abrahamic covenant, merging together the fleshly with the spiritual.
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Now of course, it's not always easy to distinguish between what is physical and immediate and what is anti -typical or ultimate.
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These things are interwoven in Scripture. Nehemiah Cox, for example, one of the great early
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Reformed Baptists and very pivotal in the publication of the 1689 Confession, he wrote this,
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I've endeavored to discuss the promises given to Abraham, first those that belong to his spiritual seed and then those that pertain to his carnal seed.
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He's saying I'm trying to, I'm a Baptist, I don't merge these things together, all sorts of problems there,
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I have to try to distinguish them, but he's admitting this isn't always easy. These promises, despite their different nature and importance, are frequently found intermixed in the same transaction of God with Abraham, as they are in the sacred history presented to us, interwoven with one another.
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That's manifestly true. If it weren't for the guidance of the apostles, we would have a much more difficult time in delineating these things, but we look to the promises of the new covenant that they apply to those who have been bought by the blood of Christ and transformed by the
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Spirit, and we can understand that, yeah, these things are interwoven. It seems like Jeremiah 31 is very specific in its context, and yet that's not how the apostles necessarily treat it.
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So that much is true. It's not easy, but Scripture itself gives us no warrant to merge these things together.
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Scripture itself forces us to make the distinction. Galatians 4 demonstrates that there is a formal distinction between the two posterities of Abraham.
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These are two covenants, and so where do we divide the covenant of works and the covenant of grace?
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In light of this passage in Galatians 4, Reformed Baptists considered the duality of the Abrahamic covenant, symbolically these two covenants, the old and the new covenant.
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Hagar, as we saw last week, corresponding to the old covenant, which now we understand is the covenant of works, established with the physical seed of Abraham.
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Sarai, spoken of as the Jerusalem above, corresponded to the new covenant, the covenant of grace, revealed by promise to Abraham by farther steps throughout the rest of Scripture until it was realized in the seed of Abraham, who is
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Christ. And so we cannot open up the covenant of grace as a massive, testament -spanning umbrella that embraces every
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Ishmael and Isaac, every Hagar and Sarai. That is a distortion of what the covenant of grace really is.
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We cannot merge what is presented in stark contrast. Nehemiah Cox again, and we're coming to a close.
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Hagar was a type of Mount Sinai, and the legal covenant established there.
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Ishmael was a type of the carnal seed of Abraham, the fleshly seed, under that covenant.
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Sarah was a type of the New Jerusalem, the gospel church founded on the covenant of grace.
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Isaac was a type of the true members of that church who are born of the Spirit, being converted by the power of the
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Holy Spirit for the fulfilling of the promise of the Father to Jesus Christ the
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Mediator. If you were to keep going in chapter 7, this might be information overload, but you realize that this covenantal transaction begins in eternity between the
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Father and the Son. The ejection of Hagar and Ishmael was to prefigure the annulment, the abrogation of the
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Sinaitic covenant and the dissolving of the Jewish church state so that the inheritance of spiritual blessing might be clearly passed down to the children of God by faith in Jesus Christ.
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I don't know if it still seems like we're splitting hairs, but when we talk about circumcision and baptism and how to define
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God's people and what a church really is, I think you'll understand why these are so important. As we close,
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I want you to keep in mind the Baptist rejection of a mixed covenant of grace.
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I want you to remember that we maintain a contrast because Scripture calls us to do so.
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And now I just want to read through a few verses to close, verses that we've recited now three weeks in a row,
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I believe, but I hope each week they've come with more force and more clarity.
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They are not all Israel who are of Israel, nor are they all children because they are the seed of Abraham.
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But in Isaac your seed shall be called, that is, those who are the children of the flesh.
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These are not the children of God. The children of the promise are counted as the seed.
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Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are children of promise. Therefore, know that only those who are of faith are sons of Abraham.
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Only those who are of faith are sons of Abraham. And if you are
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Christ's, then you are Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise.
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Let's pray. Father, we marvel at Your plan,
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Your purpose from the very beginning. We see, Lord, how
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You give us that great promise, that revelation of this gospel that will be wrought in a covenant of grace immediately after the covenant of works is broken.
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And Lord, we recognize that though Adam and all of us in him broke that covenant, it continued to abide and it pressed its curse upon us all.
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That in the fullness of time, Christ came. And He kept the condition of that covenant of works perfectly, with perfect righteousness and holiness.
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And yet He took upon Himself the curse due for our sin, for our covenant breaking.
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And therefore, Lord, what is the covenant of grace in His blood to us, but the covenant of works to Him?
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Thank You, Lord, that this was Your design, that this was Your purpose from the very beginning in eternity past.
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Thank You, Lord, that You have so designed us to see this great truth running from the very beginning of the
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Scriptures to the very end. That there is not this mixture within Your design or Your covenant of grace.
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It is pure as Christ is pure. Christ indeed is the covenant of grace. We bless
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You for Him, Lord. Lord, I pray what has yet to be understood would become clear.
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I pray these things that were difficult to grasp or to keep in order might be unraveled, might be fruitful in our minds and in our hearts,
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Lord. Let us recognize the importance of these doctrines, not only to understand the
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Scriptures better, but Lord, to have a right practice, to have a right confession, to walk rightly before You, to rightly define who belongs to You and who does not, who rightly receives the sign of the new covenant and who does not.
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Lord, help us as we wade through these things. We pray that You would impress Your Scriptures and illuminate them to us.
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We pray, Lord, that as Reformed Baptists, we would be more consistent with our confession. God forbid,
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Lord, we can be lax, we can be unspiritual and fleshly, Lord, so often despite having greater clarity, we can practice with fuzziness and haziness.
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Help us, Lord. Help us to be more devoted, more earnest, more zealous.
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Let us understand the great promise that we've received in its fullness in Christ.
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That great mystery of the Gospel, which was hidden in the past and yet now is revealed in Him, who is the yes and the amen of all of Your promises.