New to CT - Help with Noahic Covenant?

[TaylorOtwell]

I'm relatively to new to the concept of Covenant Theology. Actually, I am new to most of all aspects of theology, as the Lord brought me to faith and repentance two years ago.

I am reading through O. Palmer Robertson's Christ of the Covenants, and I just finished the section on the Noahic covenant. I am having trouble understanding how this covenant functions in relation to the bigger picture of redemption. I would appreciate it if someone could explain the function of this covenant in fairly simple terms.

I guess I'm having trouble seeing how this covenant expands on the covenant made in the Garden that the Messiah would crush the head of the serpent. If the Lord had already made that promise, I'm thinking it would be assumed that the Lord would preserve mankind until this promise is fulfilled.

So, can someone help understand the significance of the Noahic covenant?

 

[Barnpreacher]

Taylor,

I appreciate your struggles with Covenant Theology. I have only within the last few years left dispensationalism behind, and affectionately embraced this wonderful understanding of Scripture that we call Covenant Theology.

I know there are many CT "giants" on this board that can answer the question a lot better than I can. I tend to think of the Noahic administration of the Covenant of Grace in terms of just that - grace. The people were very wicked and God destroyed them by judgment. But God also knew that if he were to keep bringing this judgment upon man then who could be saved? If thou Lord markest iniquities, then who can stand? So, God showed grace to man in essence by promising never to wipe them all out again. Although he could have continued to do so by means of a flood, fire etc. and have been very just in doing so. But ours is a gracious God. And so the judgment by which we are saved is actually not by flood and fire upon us, but by our Covenant Head the Lord Jesus Christ taking this judgment for us so that we may be saved. Had God continued to destroy man via judgment as he did by the universal flood then who would stand? I think the Noahic administration of the CoG is a wonderful picture of God's grace to man, and in essence it points to that Mediator whom God promised in Genesis 3:15 would come.

 

[TaylorOtwell]

Thanks for your response!

So, I'm going to try and kind of restate what you explained and see if I am understanding this correctly.

The Noahic covenant demonstrates the grace of God in that, though it would be just to wipe out men for their wickedness, His greater desire is to preserve and redeem mankind for His glory. Therefore, the Lord makes a covenant that He will not destroy mankind from off the earth, that in the fullness of time Immanuel will bear the wrath of God to make satisfaction for the sins of His people.

So, as Christ is the Seed who will crush the serpent, He is also the ark who bears the wrath of God that we may be saved.

Studying how our Lord has worked in His covenants throughout history is giving me a deeper reverence and awe for the greatness of our God!

 

[Barnpreacher]

Thanks for your response!

So, I'm going to try and kind of restate what you explained and see if I am understanding this correctly.

The Noahic covenant demonstrates the grace of God in that, though it would be just to wipe out men for their wickedness, His greater desire is to preserve and redeem mankind for His glory. Therefore, the Lord makes a covenant that He will not destroy mankind from off the earth, that in the fullness of time Immanuel will bear the wrath of God to make satisfaction for the sins of His people.

So, as Christ is the Seed who will crush the serpent, He is also the ark who bears the wrath of God that we may be saved.

Studying how our Lord has worked in His covenants throughout history is giving me a deeper reverence and awe for the greatness of our God!

Very well put, my young brother in Christ! Have you ever considered becoming a minister?

I know mine was a simple explanation, and you'll certainly get deeper and better ones before this thread is over. Then you and I can both glean from those responses together!

 

[Amazing Grace]

Therefore, the Lord makes a covenant that He will not destroy mankind from off the earth,

His promise is to never do it by water....

 

[TaylorOtwell]

Therefore, the Lord makes a covenant that He will not destroy mankind from off the earth,

His promise is to never do it by water....

Good point, thanks for pointing that out!

 

[AV1611]

Try GOD'S COVENANT WITH CREATION

I must confess I am not in agreement with O. Palmer Robertson's definition of a covenant as being a 'bond in blood'.

 

[R. Scott Clark]

Noah and Introduction to Covenant Theology

Hi and welcome to the PB,

There are resources on covenant theology here. I would especially encourage you to read this collection of quotations from older writers on CT. There is a brief history here and another here. My own views are summarized here. Pastor Mike Brown at Christ URC (Santee, CA) is doing an excellent series on covenant theology.

For an alternative to Robertson you should read (slowly) Mike Horton's God of Promise. There are aspects of Reformed covenant theology (not all covenant theologies are Reformed, e.g. "New Covenant" theology or the Federal Vision -see below) that Robertson ignores or rejects such as the "covenant of redemption" between the Father, the Son, and (implicitly) the Holy Spirit whereby the Son volunteered to become our substitute and redeemer, which covenant he fulfilled in his active suffering all his life and especially in his death (Heidelberg Catechism #37).

You'll soon run into the Federal Vision nonsense, if you haven't already. See the stuff here. This volume is intended to be an introduction to and re-statement of classic covenant theology. Here's a book on one of the fathers of Reformed covenant theology.

On Noah:

1. The first Noahic covenant (Genesis 6:17-19) was particular and an administration of the covenant of grace.
2. The second Noahic covenant (Genesis 9:8-17) was a universal non-soteric covenant promising the restraint of judgment until the last day.

It's helpful if we distinguish between the two covenants made with Noah. They have distinct features and objects. The first covenant with Noah is saving and limited to elect. The second covenant is common and promises the restraint of judgment (Matt 24:37; Heb 11:7; 1 Pet 3:20; 2 Pet 2:5) but it doesn't promise salvation. For all who believe the ark becomes a picture of our salvation by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ (the ark) alone. It also pictures God's patience, as it were, in effecting the salvation of his elect and the concomitant restraint of evil in the world and providential preservation of it until he effects the deliverance of his people.

It's true, as Mr Murray pointed out, that Gen 6 is the first (formal) occurance of covenant (Berith) in Scripture, but historically Reformed theologians have noted that the substance or essence or stuff of a covenant exists in Gen 2, in the covenant of works between God and Adam (WCF 7; 19).

Neither Paul nor Reformed theology used the Noahic covenants as the paradigmatic covenants in Scripture. Following Paul (Rom 4; Gal 3), Reformed theology used Abraham (Gen 12, 15, 17) as the paradigm for the covenant of grace. They (usually) saw not only a covenant of works before the fall (aka a covenant of life, nature, and law) but also a sort of covenant of works with Moses and Israel relative to their national status (Deut 5; Exod 20).

There are lots of excellent classical texts in Reformed covenant theology. Herman Witsius, Economy of the Covenants is a great place to begin. Many of the approaches to covenant theology in the modern period (esp. in the 20th century) were unsound and incomplete in one way or another and should not be read as "the" covenant theology.

Covenant theology isn't complicated. The overview is that there are three distinct, but related, covenants revealed in Scripture:

The covenant of redemption, from eternity, between the Father, Son, and (implicitly) the Holy Spirit to accomplish the redemption of Christ's people and to apply that redemption to them.

The covenant of works was instituted before the fall, whereby Adam was to act as the representative of all humanity (Rom 5), obey the law, and enter into glory. He sinned and failed that to keep that covenant.

The covenant of grace is that free promise of God to sinners whereby he promises to provide a substitute, a second Adam who will keep the covenant of works for his people and he promises to redeem his people through faith alone in the one Mediator Jesus.

The history of redemption is the history of the outworking of the covenants of redemption and grace. Christ, the Second Adam, fulfilled both the covenant of redemption and the covenant of works for us and is the ground of the covenant of grace between God and the elect.

The covenant of grace is one through all the history of redemption but administered to all those who profess faith and to all their children (Gen 17; Acts 2:39). Before Christ, the typological sign/seal of initiation into the covenant people was circumcision (Col 2:11-12; Rom 4) and the new covenant sign/seal of initiation is baptism. Participation in the administration of the covenant of grace is no guarantee of election or salvation. Only the elect will come to faith but all of the elect shall come faith (Rom 9) and be justified by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone (Rom 2-8; Gal 2). It was this way under Noah, Abraham, Moses, and it is this way under Christ. The Christians under the types and shadows (Heb 2, 7-10) looked forward to the fulfillment and we look back to it.

There are two great principles at work in Reformed covenant theology, works and grace or law and gospel (Rom 11). The covenant of redemption is law for the Son and grace for us. The covenant of works is law and the covenant of grace is gospel.