The One and the Many: Devoted to the Universal and the Particulars

The basic elements of biblical covenants are: historical prologue, commands, prohibitions, blessings, and curses. For an introduction to covenant theology see, Michael Horton’s book “The God of Promise.”  For more advanced work, see M. Kline, Kingdom Prologue and Geerhardus Vos, Biblical Theology.  One covenant in the Bible is known as the covenant of works. This covenant is a pre-lapsarian pact made freely by God with Adam, who is the representative of all humanity, in which God promised Adam eternal blessness to him and all his prosperity on condition of perfect obedience to God’s commands.  The Bible also describes the story of human salvation upon the active and passive obedience of our Savior Jesus the Christ, who became the propitiation for our sin and is known as the covenant of grace.  This covenant is a post-lapsarian promise made freely to sinners in which God promises justification and eternal life to all who trust upon the work and merits of Christ.  God graciously gives this benefit through the illumination of the Holy Spirit and preaching of the gospel of Christ. God’s promises to his people are clearly seen in the beginning chapters of Genesis.  The first notion of covenant is sometimes cited in Genesis 3:15, where God promises a particular seed to put enmity between those of the serpent and those of the women.  Regardless if one calls this passage an actual covenant, it does not remove the notion that God promises to act in a form of redemption and this statement is nevertheless a Messianic prophecy and promise. See, Louis Berkof, Systematic Theology (Carlisle: The Banner of Truth, 2000), 293-294.  God’s promises can also be seen in his relations with Abraham to whom God promised that through his seed all the nations would be blessed.  See, also: Genesis 15:4,5,13-16, 18-21; 17:2-8, 18:10,14. Genesis 17:5-7 says, “No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations.  I will make you exceedingly fruitful, and I will make you into nations, and kings shall come from you.  And I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an every lasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring after you.”[1] In Genesis 26:3-5, The LORD appeared to Isaac and renews his covenant with him and his people.  This theme of God’s promise to his people is also seen in the Mosaic economy, in which God is continually faithful to his people.  Exodus 32:13 says, “Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, to whom you swore by your own self, and said to them, ‘I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have promised I will give to your offspring, and they shall inherit it forever.’  And the LORD relented from the disaster that he had spoken of bringing on his people.”