A Reading List On Covenant Theology

A friend wrote asking for a list of books I’ve read touching Covenant theology. He thought given the current controversy on identifying the Israel of God (who Israel has become in NT theology) that it would be a profitable list. All of these books will make clear that OT Israel  was the cocoon that was shuffled off when it became the butterfly that is the Church, and so there are no further promises left to the Israel after the flesh.

So, I offer this list, as I randomly have recalled my reading over the decades;

1.) Cornelius Venema – Christ And Covenant Theology: Essays on Election, Republication

Deals with issues surrounding the rise of covenant theology in relation to R2K theology.

2.) Stephen Myers – God to Us: Covenant Theology in Scripture

Is intended as something of a primer in Reformed covenant theology

3.) O. Palmer Robertson – Christ of the Covenants

Traces Christ through the unfolding of the one covenant of grace.

4.) Charles D.Provan – The Church is Israel Now: The Transfer of Conditional Privilege

Demonstrating, from Scripture that it is Dispensationalists who practice replacement theology by replacing the Church with unbelieving Israel

5.)  David Howeldra – Jesus and Israel: One Covenant or Two?

Argues that the promises to OT Israel are fulfilled in Jesus Christ.

6.) O. T. Allis – Prophecy & The Church

Absolutely destroys Dispensationalism’s teaching that promises remain to physical Israel. Best book I’ve ever read unraveling Dispensationalism’s errant views of covenant theology.

7.) O Palmer Robertson – The Israel of God

Robertson examines the OT prophecies related to land, God’s people, the coming Kingdom and other topics and shows how Christ and his church fulfill those prophecies today.

8.) Francis Roberts – God’s Covenants: The Mystery and Marrow of the Bible

Five volumes. I’ve only made it through Vol. 1. Exhaustive explanation of the covenant of Grace as understood in the classical “Covenant of Works,” “Covenant of Grace” paradigm.

9.) Rowland Ward – God and Adam

A handy volume giving a birds eye view of various explanations of the mechanics of covenant theology. Very helpful.

10.) Geerhardus Vos – Biblical Theology: Old and New Testament

Vos was an absolute genius. I’ve read everything I have been able to find by him. You will not understand Covenant theology until you have read Vos. Unfortunately Vos was Amil so read discerningly on that score.

11.) G. K. Beale – A New Testament Biblical Theology: The Unfolding of the Old Testament in the New

Beale argues that every major concept of the New Testament is a development of a concept from the Old and is to be understood as a facet of the inauguration of the latter-day new creation and kingdom. The emphasis is on the continuity between OT and NT which only covenant theology can provide. Beale is another genius who has greatly helped me. Again … he is Amill.

12.) Jonathan Gerstner – Wrongly Dividing the Truth

An needed attack on Dispensationalism that presupposes Covenant theology.

13,) Geerhardus Vos, ‘The Doctrine of the Covenant in Reformed Theology’ in Richard B. Gaffin (ed.), Redemptive History and Biblical Interpretation: the Shorter Writings of Geerhardus Vos

14.) J. D. Hall & Joel Webbon – The Hyphenated Heresy: Judeo-Christianity

Though not strictly a book on covenant theology this book does demonstrate repeatedly that the Church is the inheritor of all the promises to Israel and is today the “Israel of God.”  Clearly teaches that OT physical Israel has been replaced (fulfilled) by the Church.

14.) See also the appropriate sections of Systematic Theologies

Robert Letham
Louis Berkhof
Charles H. Hodge
Herman Bavinck
Robert Reymond
Francis Turretin
R. L. Dabney
John Calvin (Institutes 2: 9-11)
Herman Hoeksema

HH offers a decidedly different view of the covenants seeing more continuity between the covenant of works and the covenant of grace than what might be termed “classical Reformed” theology. However, HH makes some interesting points that are worthy of consideration.

These are what I remember reading off the top of my head. If I recall more I will edit and add them at a later date.

The Return of Bojidar Marinov (Blowjidar Marxinov)

Bojidar comes back for a curtain call;

“McAtee’s ideology is not that we should love all but there is an order of love, his ideology that because we are commanded to love some, we are supposed to hate others.”

BLMc responds,

It is clear that we are to love those in Christ while hating those who oppose Christ. To have any other attitude is to deny the Reformed anti-thesis. However, Bojidar, sine you are not Reformed, you wouldn’t have any understanding concerning the Reformed Anti-thesis.

Bojidar writes,

The concept of “illegality” for certain people is exactly that: a judicial expression of hatred. No one declares a person “illegal” unless they hate that person. I may love my wife more than I love any other woman, but that doesn’t lead to asking the government to declare other women illegal. I love my children more than I love other people’s children, but I am not asking the government to declare other children illegal.

BLMc responds,

My dear Marxinov, “Illegality” means the state of not being legal. “Not being legal,” when applied to immigrants has certain implications such as not being allowed to occupy space wherein one does not have the authority to be present. It does not imply hate automatically. It merely means one’s dismissal from said space. So, as you can see, it is painfully obvious to those not diseased with afflictions that affect the ability to reason that “illegality is not a judicial expression of hatred.”

If I could I would have the government make laws that made other women who are wives of particular men to be illegal to men not their husbands in terms of sharing a bed, and the doing of that would not be hate to other women but would be love to wives. Certainly, you are not so dense that you can not see this.

I think here, I smell your controlling Libertarianism. You hate the idea that God has ordained particular nations, and peoples and prefer the New World Order where all colors bleed together as one.

Bojidar writes,

So this article is garbage. Contrary to the nonsense of this author, the moral logic behind “America First” is exactly hostility and hatred.

Bret responds,

You heard it here first folks. Blowjidar Marxinov believes the logic of “America First,” is exactly hostility and hatred. One can’t help but wonder if Blow would say that the logic of “Christ First,” is also exactly hostility and hatred? As a Libertarian Marxist, (See Max Stirner) Marxinov is convinced that it is not possible to have a unique love for one’s own people. All I can offer as evidence that I have no hatred for those not my own are my friendship with folks of other races, who, by the way, agree with Kinsim. They are my testimony that I have no inherent hate for other peoples. (Well, except possibly for Bulgarians. 😉 )

Blowidar Marxinov writes,

Otherwise there would be no declaration of someone “illegal” by the stroke of a pen, for the “crime” of trying to build a better life to themselves and their families. Ordered responsibility would simply involve rationing resources between helping different people. It would not involve spending resources to declare people “illegal” and then even more resources to hurt them.

BLMc responds,

Of course this is a denial of National particularism. Blow, cannot stand the idea of particular peoples, clans, and nations. Also notice, in Blow’s reasoning there is the thought of rationing resources. This is epic socialism. Biblical Christianity believes in making the economic pie bigger, so there is more for a particular people, living in a particular nation. It does not believe in rationing resources.

Blow, also misses the fact that God himself in Deuteronomy said that an expression of His judgment against a people is that the stranger and alien would climb higher than the native born. We are experiencing that here and Blow thinks that is just fine.

Blow speaks of resources used to hurt people and yet if the man could follow statistics he would learn that the people being hurt right now are not the stranger and the alien but the people being hurt right now most significantly is the straight young white male. But Blow, cares more about the stranger and the alien than he does the homeborn. That’s probably because Blowjidar himself is a stranger and alien to this nation.

Blow writes,

In conclusion, both McAtee and trumpism share the same religion: a religion of hatred against outsiders.

Bret response,

Blowijdar keeps saying this. I do not think hatred means what he thinks it means.

Blow writes,

They are not satisfied by just letting outsiders live. They have to vilify them, de-legalize them, hurt them, expel them, incarcerate them, put them in concentration camps, segregate them, and eventually murder them, all under the excuse of “we have a higher responsibility to our own.” It’s a religion of hatred and worship of power.

BLMc responds,

First, there is no necessity to de-legalize someone who is, by definition, illegal. Second, Blow is just a damnable liar when he says that I desire to see the stranger and alien murdered. But the man has always been unfamiliar with the truth.

Yes, it is usually the action of the sane to segregate those who are trying to harm your family. Given the fact that upwards to 80% of the illegal entering the West are young men in their thirties it is clear that this is an invasion force and not a “we’re just looking for jobs” force.

That does not mean hatred for those criminals who do not belong here. It means love and protection for one’s own wife, children, grandchildren, and people.

Blowjidar is giving us a religion that is a suicide cult. We must extirpate ourselves for the good of the stranger and the alien. Blow’s religion is the religion of Marxism … the religion that teaches egalitarianism. The religion that would have faulted God for having and blessing a particular people in the Old Testament. Blow has the religion that hates Christians who believe in the racial/familial dynamics inherent in covenant theology.

A Refutation Of Taking NAPARC Churches Seriously

“Many men calling themselves pastors and ministry leaders are rebels at heart. Some sidestep proper ordination and oversight by other leaders, setting up their own ministries devoid of any true accountability. Others refuse any type of correction when their teachings or actions call for it. In either situation, when attempts are made to address areas of concern in doctrine or life, instead of humbly receiving it, these men rail against correction, procedure, discipline, and the courts of the church. Further, they began attacking God‘s people and creating division. They have fallen under the spell of the evil ones’ lies and deception, under the witchcraft of rebellion.”

Barry York
President of Reformed Presbyterian Theological Seminary

Andy Webb then writes agreeing w/ York,

“The willingness of these men to dismiss the judgment of not just one denomination, but all of NAPARC, reminds me of a joke I once heard.”

Bret responds,

1.) There is no greater Institutional joke right now that is more funny than MAPARC (Marxist American Presbyterian And Reformed Churches).

2.) All accountability means anymore in NAPARC churches is the ability to shut men down who agree with the Church Fathers and Church history. Most if not all of NAPARC is now on record as opposing men like; J. Gresham Machen, R. L. Dabney, John Edwards Richards, and Morton H. Smith, and E. J. Young, etc. All of these men were race realists to one degree or another and all of them would be excommunicated in today’s NAPARC.

I mean … for Pete’s sake, am I really supposed to take seriously Reformed churches belonging to MAPARC who abominate their own founding fathers? Do you really expect anybody who knows how to read history and think for themselves to conclude that they have to be accountable to a bunch of doofuses who are ejecting clergy simply because those ejected clergy agree with the Church Fathers who themselves had the warrant of Scripture on their side?

3.) Face it, the only correction that has been coming down the pike from these NAPARC jokers is the correction against their founding fathers. Has MAPARC ever disciplined clergy for sending their children to government schools? Many NAPARC clergy are perfectly fine with side-B sodomites in their pulpits. NAPARC churches are known for either explicitly or implicitly allowing for female leadership. The only correction these jokers want to make is a the correction of the Biblical doctrine of Kinism.

4.) Finally, it is NAPARC clergy who have fallen under the sin of witchcraft (Rebellion). It is they who are rebelling against the Scripture and their Reformed Fathers. They are, exceptions notwithstanding, whitened sepulchers full of dead men’s bones. They are of their Father the Devil. Naturally, thus, they accuse faithful men who are no longer willing to put up with their sin of rebellion of being guilty of the sin of rebellion.

All of this is not going to work Barry and Andy. You might want to check out the Scripture that teaches about straining a gnat and swallowing a camel.

Putting The Idea of “Love Your Enemies” In A Larger Biblical Context

And Jehu the son of Hanani the seer went out to meet him, and said to king Jehoshaphat, Shouldest thou help the ungodly, and love them that hate the LORD? therefore is wrath upon thee from before the LORD. 

2 Chronicles 19:2

A little context here.

King Jehoshaphat is recorded in Scripture for his beginning faithfulness to God. At the beginning he is seen as a good King of Judah due to his efforts to extirpate the land of Judah of idolatry. Eventually, though Jehoshaphat makes political alliance with King Ahab of the Northern Kingdom. This tarnished the reputation of Jehoshaphat. Here in this passage God rebukes Jehoshaphat for his alliance with wicked King Ahab via Jehu.

The rebuke comes in the way of a rhetorical question;

“Should you help the wicked and love those who hate the LORD?

Note the question is one that isn’t intended to require a great deal of time to think on the proper answer. The question itself screams the obvious intended response of; “No, you should not help the wicked and love those who hate the Lord.”

King Ahab was guilty of vast wickedness including the wickedness of leading the Northern Kingdom into idolatry (I Kings. 16:30-33). Inasmuch as Jehoshaphat was leaguing with Ahab, Jehoshaphat was supporting  Abhab’s opposition to God. Jehoshaphat, had, in later Biblical language, become unequally yoked and God was so displeased His wrath came upon Jehoshaphat.

In the OT God’s wrath communicates steadfast opposition, divine displeasure, and corrective judgment against those who have been unfaithful to His covenant. This wrath has the intent, in the OT, to lead to repentance and eventual return to covenantal faithfulness. In this passage we find taught;

1.) That Jehoshaphat’s disobedience in helping the ungodly and loving them that hate the Lord was no small thing.

2.) That God chastens those He loves. God is correcting Jehoshaphat by declaring, through Jehu, His opposition (Wrath) to Jehoshaphat’s actions. The intent here is to recall Jehoshaphat to His first love.

Note though, that in all this that Jehoshaphat’s sin was in helping the wicked and loving those that hate the Lord.

Allow me to say that again;

Jehoshaphat’s sin was the sin of helping the wicked to succeed combined with loving those that hate the Lord.

I repeated this because it is my conviction that the modern Reformed / Evangelical church have misconstrued the command;

“To love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you and pray for those who spitefully use you.” (Matthew 5:44)

Clearly, whatever Matthew 5:44 means, it can’t contradict II Chronicles 19:2.

Also consider that it is not like II Chronicles 19:2 exists in an exegetical vacuum. Elsewhere in Scripture we are told;

Blessed is the man Who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, Nor stands in the path of sinners, Nor sits in the seat of the scornful;

Psalm 1:1

I look at the faithless with disgust, because they do not keep your commands.

Psalm 119:158

Do I not hate them, O LORD, who hate You? And do I not loathe those who rise up against You?

Psalm 139:1-2

Love must be free of hypocrisy. Detest what is evil; cling to what is good.

Romans 12:9

And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them.

Ephesians 5:11

It seems the only solution to this apparent contradiction is that we are to love our own personal enemies while not helping the wicked combined with hating those who hate the Lord Christ.

Now, one would hope that we would not have any personal enemies who are not also God’s enemies. However, if you have ever been a member of a church very long, you know that fellow members will sometimes be personal enemies of each other. Even in Scripture we see this. Paul and Barnabas have a falling out(sharp disagreement) regarding the usefulness of John Mark (Acts 15:26-41). In Philippians 4:2-3, the Apostle Paul addresses a conflict between two women, Euodia and Syntyche, urging them to agree in the Lord. In these situations the requirement is Matthew 5:44.

However, when it comes to the ungodly who hate the Lord we are to hate them and not help them in their prosecution of their wicked agendas. This is what II Chronicles 19:2 explicitly teaches.

The ironic truth here though is that by not helping the wicked who hate the Lord and by hating them that hate the Lord we are in point of fact loving them. It is not love to not oppose and not hate the wicked. If we show love to the wicked, in the way it is now defined in our amoral culture, we are communicating that we sanction their wickedness and hatred of God. Only by a decided opposition to the wicked, can we demonstrate love to those who hate the Lord.

The analogy here is found in correcting our children. When our children are disobedient we chasten them… we oppose them. We do not show our love to them by giving in to their opposition to us or by aiding their disobedience. We correct them, and by correcting them (opposing them) we are demonstrating our love for them.

The same is true of on the subject of helping to advance the agenda of those who hate the Lord. It should not be said that we, as Christians, are guilty of loving those who hate the Lord, unless that love is communicated by a steady opposition to the wicked.

Christians have to start re-thinking this subject because legion is the name of Christians who thinking they are doing a positive good by aiding and abetting (helping the wicked) those who illegal immigrants who have invaded our country. We see from this text in II Chronicles 19:2 that it raises the ire of the Lord to help the wicked and to love those who hate the Lord. If Christians do not begin to re-think this subject we will be slaves to Christ-haters in the land built by our Christ loving forebears.

Codicil

None of this is to communicate that when our Trannie next door neighbor, who teaches at the local library during Queer Time Story hour, is dreadfully ill that we should not bring him some chicken broth soup in order to help him in his sickness. I am not denying that we should rake the leaves of the elderly who never repented of sending their children to government schools. I am not denying here that Christians should do good to all men. I am merely arguing that “there is a time and a place for everything under the sun.”

Bahnsen Picks Apart Thomism

“Disagreeing with the natural man’s interpretation of himself as the ultimate reference point, the reformed apologist must seek his point of contact with the natural man, and that which is beneath the threshold of his working consciousness, and the sense of deity which he seeks to suppress. And to do this, the reformed apologist must also seek a point of contact with the systems constructed by the natural man. But this point of contact must be in the nature of a head-on collision.”

Dr. Greg Bahnsen
Always Ready: Directions for Defending the Faith

1.) This succinctly explains why the Thomistic Natural Law fanboys and the Presuppositional Fanboys are never going to get along. The Thomistic chaps never challenge the natural man’s interpretation of himself as the ultimate reference point for what is and what is not true. Thomism leaves the natural man in his self relaxed repose continuing to think of himself as he who is the determiner of truth instead of realizing that the natural man must be converted so that he only sees himself as a reinterpreter of God’s interpretation of truth. This goes back to the maxim that man must be converted so that he can say with the Psalmist, “In thy light we see light.” The Thomist leaves the natural man in a place where even after a putative conversion he says instead, “In my light I see light.” Thomism leaves the natural man as an “I” that has not yet seen itself in submission in a “I-Thou” relationship to God. Conversion, must mean that the natural man is not the ultimate reference point in terms of determining the nature of reality. He must own God as His ultimate reference point. The Natural Laws chaps fail miserably in this regard and so must be challenged.

2.) The Natural Man does not want what is beneath the working threshold of his consciousness to be challenged. When the Christian apologist does this the Natural Man recoils because it necessarily means that his worldview furniture is going to be busted up. The Natural Man like his Worldview living room arrangements and he resents when the presuppositional apologists shows up to tear up the furniture of his self-centered thinking.  I suspect this accounts as a large reason why the Thomists yet today in the Reformed world are so aggravated by the presuppositionalists. We stand as a rebuke to their man-centered thinking.

3.) Van Til used to say that any God reasoned to via the means of natural theology was not the God of the Bible. In the same way, any God reasoned to by the Natural Man as not yet removed from his place of “the ultimate reference point” is not the God of the Bible. Now, I am willing to concede that a babe in Christ may indeed be converted without understanding this but someone who grows in Christ will at some point have to give themselves up as the ultimate reference point of reality and be consistent with their conversion. Many Thomists have yet to surrender this.

4.) Note Bahnsen’s reference to evangelism as worldview collision. This is in marked contrast to decades of Evangelicals being taught that Evangelism has to be a bridge building process where we approach the dead in sins sinner and say things like; “Now, see here, you believe in good and bad and I believe in good and bad and so we have this in common. Now all you need to do is to add Jesus and you will be converted.” Bahnsen, following Van Til here, says 1000 times “NO.” Evangelism is not a bridge building exercise. Evangelism is a head on collision and it is a head on collision because of the radically opposed starting points. It is a head on collision because the Natural Man starts with himself as his ultimate reference point while the Biblical Christian starts with God as his ultimate reference point. The differences cannot be anymore stark. The Natural Man proceeds from the authority of self. The Christian proceeds from the authority of not-self (God). Since that is so all that is possible is collision if each participant in the discussion is to be true to his or her starting point.

5.) This means that the discussion can only proceed along hypothetical lines. The Christ believer enters into the worldview of the Christ-hater for the sake of argument but only with the purpose of soon exposing the contradiction in their thinking. For example; “I see you say you believe in good and bad. That is very good. But tell me, what is the foundation or standard for your categories of ‘good,’ and ‘bad,’ except for your own authority if you do not believe in a transcendent ultimate reference point (God) beyond yourself? I may very well agree with you about what you label as good and bad I can account for my labeling of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ by appealing to God’s authority but your appeal to this idea of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ is only on the basis of your own say so. So, I must ask you, what makes your say so about ‘good’ and ‘bad’ categories any more authoritative than the Marquis de Sade’s authority of what constituted ‘good’ and ‘bad?’ Don’t you see my friend, you need a firmer foundation than your own determination. Only God in Christ can give you that firmer foundation and only by owning your sin of, to this point, being your own God in your life (your own ultimate reference point) can you be delivered from your captivity to this sin and so be free for the first time to have a true authority of ‘good,’ and ‘bad.'”

My friend, John Leonetti recently did a brief youtube citing this quote with an arresting illustration of worldview collision. It’s only 3 minutes long. You should have yourself a giggle at John’s illustration.