p. 1 | THE ABRAHAMIC COVENANT by John C. Day

Publishing Committee · Rochester, N. Y. · Oct 25, 1853

THE ABRAHAMIC COVENANT.

By John C. Day

BY JOHN C. DAY.

AND if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise. Gal. iii, 29.

It will be my purpose to show that this promise has been, and still is the property of the church in all ages and under all dispensations, and will continue thus, until its consummation. The work of redemption is the great work of God by which from eternity he purposed to make known to the principalities and powers in heavenly places his manifold wisdom. This work, though composed of many parts, and continued from age to age, under different dispensations, is one; the church is one, and the covenant with the church is one.—Immediately after the apostasy in Paradise, the work of redemption commenced. The voice of the Lord God was heard walking in the garden in the cool of the day. Having summoned the guilty parents of our race before him, and examined them on the subject of the revolt, the Lord turned to the serpent and said unto him, "Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life: and I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel." Gen. iii, 14, 15.

This may with strictness be considered the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ. In this sentence, pronounced upon the serpent and his seed, was the first exhibition or revelation of the eternal counsel of peace, or covenant of redemption, between the Father and the Son, which is the unchangeable foundation and source of all the merciful dispensations to our fallen race. This curse upon Satan, contains the sum of all blessings which a merciful God bestows on sinful man. It is a prophecy and a promise, which have ever since been fulfilling, but have not yet received their entire accomplishment. It comprises the whole Gospel, and a prophetical history of the opposition with which it should meet, and the success with which it should be crowned in all ages and countries to the end of time. Indeed almost the whole history of the church and of the world through time and to eternity is comprehended in this single verse.

By the seed of the woman, with almost universal consent, we are here to understand, Christ, as prominent, and all his believing people as one with him, and members of the mystical body of which he is the head. Christ and his people, of all ages and nations, are the seed of the woman, in contradistinction to Satan and all who adhere to his cause, designated as the serpent and his seed. In this construction, all the principal commentators agree. In this early promise, Christ was presented as a covenant for the people; and upon the ground of this promise the church, commencing with the first human pair, was originally founded. With reference to this promise sacrifices were divinely instituted as types of the great atonement to be made once in the end of the world, and as sacred memorials of God's gracious and everlasting covenant. By faith in this promise, Abel offered unto God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain. By faith in this promise, the people of God, in the days of Enos, began to call upon, or, according to the margin, to call themselves by the name of the Lord; [Gen. iv, 26,] thus distinguishing themselves from the rest of the world by an open and solemn profession. By faith in this promise, from time to time, in some manner and form, renewed and confirmed, the church of God was continued from generation to generation, to the days of Noah, and thence to the days of Abraham.

From the beginning, until the Abrahamic dispensation, the church, so far as we can learn from the sacred oracles, was continued in the domestic or family state. The patriarch of a family was also the patriarch of that part or branch of the church, which the members of his family composed. But for wise and important purposes, the Lord, in due time, saw fit to bring his church into a more compact and regularly organized body, favored with a clearer dispensation of his covenant, and distinguished by a more special and visible seal. In pursuance of this great design, he called Abraham to go out from his country and his kindred, and his father's house, into a land which he would shew him; that in his family the church might be regularly formed, and that with him, as the heir of the world, and the constituted father of all them that believe, his everlasting covenant might be established.

From that memorable period, forward to the end of time, the church was to be considered one great family, composed of the children, either natural or adopted of Abraham; and accordingly, in Abraham as the constituted patriarch, all the families of the earth were to be blessed. At the time of Abraham's call, the promise, in thee, and thy seed, shall all the families of the earth be blest, was first made to him. This, as none, I believe, will deny, is the very same promise, or a promise of the same comprehensive import, with that given in Paradise, that the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent's head. Suffer me to review this for a moment. Is not the representation, here briefly given, correct and scriptural? Is not the work of redemption one, though in constant progression? Is not the church, though under different dispensations, throughout all ages, one? Was not the church primevally founded on the gracious promise of the Messiah, first given in Paradise? and did it not continue upon that foundation till the days of Abraham? Was not the promise to Abraham, in thee and in thy seed, shall all nations be blessed, though different in form, yet in substance the same with that given in Paradise, that the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent's head? and if so, then did not this same promise continue to be the foundation of the church under the Abrahamic dispensation as before, from the beginning, it had been? Was there not in the days of Abraham a great and important advance? Was not the church at that period advanced to a higher state under a clearer and more favorable dispensation? and is it then to be supposed that in this, its advanced state, it was removed from the foundation of a promise comprising the Messiah, and all the blessings of his kingdom, and placed upon the foundation of a promise, or promises, of a very different nature and comprising only temporal blessings? Certainly it is not to be supposed that after resting two thousand years, from Adam to Abraham, upon a promise including all the blessings of salvation, the church of God, thus advanced to a higher state, was placed, for two thousand years, from Abraham to Christ, on the foundation of merely temporal promises. Not so! Other foundation can no man lay for the church of God, in any period of the world, than that which is laid—even Christ.

For what purpose, it might be asked, was the great promise, comprising the Messiah, and all the blessings of his kingdom, renewed at the time of Abraham's call, if, under the dispensation then to take place, the church was not to be grounded upon it? Undoubtedly, as the church formed in Abraham's family, was but a continuation of the same church of God, which, two thousand years before commenced with the believing parents of our race, so it remained, though under a different economy, yet on the same foundation; and on the same foundation, though under different economies, the same church has remained to the present day, and will remain as long as the moon endureth.

With this view of the subject, it is very easy to see how believers in Christ are the children of Abraham; and as his children are blest with him as heirs of Jesus Christ, as it is by virtue of that covenant, by which the church was formed in his family, how can they be children and heirs by virtue of that covenant, unless the covenant and church formed by it be continued.

In order more fully to see that the covenant with Abraham was but one, and contained all the great and precious promises ever made to him, it may be useful to take a connected view of God's covenant transactions with that distinguished patriarch. Somewhat more than two thousand years after the creation, and about four hundred and twenty-six years after the flood, when the descendants of Noah had very generally apostatized from the true religion and devoted themselves to idolatry, the Lord said unto Abram, "Get thee out from thy country and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will shew thee; and I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee and will make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: and I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee:

and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed." Gen. xii, 1-3.

By faith Abraham obeyed and went out, not knowing whither he went, Heb. xi, 8. On his arrival at Moreh in the land of Canaan, the same year after his departure from Haran, the Lord appeared unto Abram and said, "Unto thy seed will I give this land: and there builded he an altar unto the Lord who appeared unto him." Gen. xii, 7. On the departure of Lot from between Bethel and Ai, where Abram sojourned three or four years after his arrival in Canaan, the Lord said to Abram, "Lift up now thine eyes and look from the place where thou art, northward, and southward, and eastward, and westward: for all the land which thou seest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed forever. And I will make thy seed as the dust of the earth." Gen. xiii, 14-16. Then Abram removed his tent from between Bethel and Ai, to the plain of Mamre, in Hebron and built there an altar unto the Lord.

About eight years after his arrival in Canaan on his return from his expedition against Chedorlaomer and his confederates, the word of the Lord came unto Abram in a vision, saying, "Fear not Abram: I am thy shield and thy exceeding great reward." In that same day after giving assurance of a son for his heir, and foretelling him the affliction of his posterity in Egypt, the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, "Unto thy seed have I given this land from the river of Egypt, unto the great river, the river Euphrates;" and this covenant was confirmed by the smoking furnace and the burning lamp passing between the parts of the slain beasts and birds. Gen. xv, 1-18.

After this solemn transaction it does not appear that the Lord spake again to Abram until about twenty-four years after his removal from Haran.—But when Abram was ninety and nine years old, the Lord appeared unto Abram and said unto him, "I am the Almighty God; walk before me and be thou perfect. And I will make a covenant between me and thee, and will multiply thee exceedingly:" And Abram fell on his face, and God talked with him saying, "As for me, behold my covenant is with thee and thou shalt be a father of many nations. Neither shall thy name any more be called Abram; but thy name shall be Abraham; for a father of many nations have I made thee. And I will make thee exceeding fruitful, and I will make nations of thee; and kings shall come out of thee. And I will establish my covenant between me and thee, and thy seed after thee, in their generations for an everlasting covenant; to be a God unto thee and to thy seed after thee. And I will give unto thee, and to thy seed after thee, the land wherein thou art a stranger, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession; and I will be their God." On this memorable occasion, the outward rite of circumcision was instituted as a token of the covenant. Gen. xvii. After this solemn transaction, but in the same year, the Lord appeared unto Abraham twice: once on the destruction of Sodom, [Gen. xviii, 1-29,] and afterwards on the occasion of Sarah’s proposal, after the birth of Isaac, to cast out the bond-woman and her son: on both which he graciously gave him a renewal of his promises.

About twenty-six years after this formal establishment of the church in Abraham’s family, as the last special trial of his faith and obedience, the Lord was pleased to command Abraham to take his son, then about twenty-five years of age, and offer him up as a burnt-offering on one of the mountains of Moriah. On this occasion, after Abraham had given proof of his entire devotion to the divine will, the angel of the Lord called to him out of heaven and said, "By myself have I sworn saith the Lord; for because thou hast done this thing and hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, that in blessing, I will bless thee, and in multiplying, I will multiply thee as the stars of heaven and as the sand which is upon the seashore; and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies, and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blest, because thou hast obeyed my voice." Gen. xxii, 17; 18. What was the design of this last extraordinary confirmation? The

Apostle to the Hebrews, furnishes the answer: "Wherein God, willing more abundantly to shew unto the heirs of promise the immutability of his counsel, confirmed it by an oath, that by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us." The promises first made to Abraham four hundred and thirty years before the law dispensation, [Gal. iii, 17,] were from time to time renewed until about twenty-four years after they were first given, then they were solemnly ratified and sealed in the form of a covenant, just as proposals first made to-day, may be renewed at several different times during any given period, and at length may be ratified and sealed in the form of a civil contract.

After the death of Abraham, the Lord appeared on a special occasion unto Isaac, and said, "Sojourn in this land and I will be with thee, and will bless thee; for unto thee and unto thy seed will I give all these countries, and I will perform the oath which I sware unto Abraham; and I will make thy seed to multiply as the stars of heaven, and I will give unto thy seed all these countries, and in thy seed shall the nations of the earth be blest, because that Abraham obeyed my voice, and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws." Gen. xxvi, 2-5.

You will observe, that as Abraham in the covenant of the church was expressly required to walk before God, and be perfect, as a condition of the promised blessings; so the Lord expressly assures Isaac, the heir of the promises, that because Abraham had obeyed, the promised blessings should be conferred. By this we may learn in what it consisted to walk before God and be perfect; for the Lord said to Isaac, because Abraham obeyed my voice and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes and my laws. But let us examine these promises a little farther. The apostle Paul, in Rom. iv, while speaking of Abraham says: "And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had, yet being uncircumcised; that he might be, [that is, might be solemnly constituted,] the father of all them that believe, though they be not circumcised, that righteousness might be imputed unto them also; or that they might be blest in him."

Here the Apostle in this passage doubtless has direct reference to the establishment of the church in Abraham’s family: for he tells us that on that memorable occasion, Abraham received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had, yet being uncircumcised; does this not clearly teach that Abraham received the seal, that thus he might be formally constituted the father of believers of all nations, and does he not say or clearly teach that all this was done, that unto believers of all nations and ages, as the patriarch’s constituted seed, righteousness, even the righteousness of faith, might be imputed. But if at the time the church was established in his family, the patriarch was thus solemnly constituted the father of believers of all nations, that unto them, as his constituted seed and heirs, the righteousness of faith might be imputed, I ask then, finally, was not the promise, in thee and thy seed shall all nations be blest, essentially included in that covenant by which the church was then established, and to which the sign of circumcision was affixed as a sacred seal?—This again must be admitted as clear and direct proof of the perpetuity of this covenant.

But there is another consideration, too important to be omitted in this argument. Abraham was not only an individual believer, but as it already appears, he was divinely constituted the patriarch and representative of the church. Was the promise, then, “in thee and thy seed, shall all nations be blest,” merely personal, or was it of a public nature? Did it belong to Abraham only, as a favored individual, or did it belong to him in his public capacity as the patriarch and representative of the church; and consequently to the church of which he was the patriarch and representative? This promise, it is acknowledged on all hands, comprises the Messiah, and all the blessings of his kingdom. It was in substance the very same promise with that given in Paradise, that the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent’s head, and on which the church while in the family state, for two thousand years, had rested. It was in fact, the gospel as appealed to Abraham, in those early times, and which afterwards, at sundry times and in divers manners, was more clearly unfolded. I ask, then, again, did this great promise belong to Abraham as a favored individual, only, or did it belong to him in his public capacity also; and consequently to the church of which he was the constituted patriarch and representative. Unquestionably, it belonged to him in his public capacity, and to that church to which pertained the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants and the giving of the law, and the service of God and the promises. Rom. ix, 4. Yes, this promise always belonged to the church of God; and, therefore, was always included in the covenant by which the church was formed. Accordingly, as a covenant promise, it was expressly renewed to Isaac and to Jacob, and in after ages its renewal was often repeated to the Abrahamic church with increasing clearness and fullness. On the whole, the promises, "a Father of many nations have I made thee"—and "in thee and thy seed shall all the nations be blessed," are clearly correlative promises, and, as such, the one implies the other; for when the patriarch’s name was changed from Abram to Abraham, and he was divinely constituted the father of believers of all nations and ages, believers of all nations and ages were by the same act, correlatively constituted his children and heirs; and it is by thus being his children and heirs that any are really blest in him.—And now as the covenant made with Abraham and his seed was the constitution of the church formed in his family, the covenant and church were undoubtedly intended to be commensurate in their duration. If the covenant was intended to be temporary, the church was to be temporary; but if the covenant was intended to be perpetual, the church was also to be perpetual. The Lord renewed this covenant unto Jacob at Bethel. On his way from Beersheba to Haran the Lord appeared unto him and said, "I am the Lord God of Abraham, thy father, and the God of Isaac, the land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it and to thy seed after thee, and thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the West, and to the East, and to the North, and to the South, and in thee, and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blest." In this renewal of the covenant with Jacob, almost one hundred and forty years after it was sealed to Abraham, the great promise in question was explicitly concluded. Gen. xxviii, 13, 14. When blessing his son, just before his decease, Jacob, by the spirit of prophecy, said, "The sceptre shall not depart from Judah nor a Law-giver from between his feet until Shiloh come, and unto him shall the gathering of the people be." Gen. xxix, 10. "All the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the Lord; and all the kindreds of the nations shall worship before thee," said David by the same prophetic spirit. Ps. xxii, 27, 28. "In that day said the Lord by the prophet, there shall be a root of Jesse which shall stand for an ensign of the people: to it shall the Gentiles seek; and his rest shall be glorious." Isa. xi, 10. "It is a light thing that thou shouldest be my servant, to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel. I will also give thee for a light to the Gentiles that thou mayest be my salvation to the ends of the earth." Isa. xlix, 6. "Arise, shine! for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee, and the Gentiles shall come to thy light and kings to the brightness of thy rising. Thy gates shall be open continually; they shall not be shut day nor night; that men may bring unto thee the forces of the Gentiles, and that their kings may be brought."—Isa. lx, 1, 11.

These, with numerous other passages of the same import, with the assurance first given in Paradise, that the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent’s head, and with the gracious promise to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob, in thee and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blest—these, are all the same gospel, more clearly and

fully unfolded as from age to age the work of redemption proceeds, and the church was advanced. But these were all addressed to the church divinely formed in the family of Abraham, to the ancient Zion of the Holy one of Israel, and were therefore essentially included in the covenant by which the church was established. Accordingly Zacharias in the grateful effusion of his heart in view of the birth of the long expected Messiah, says, "Blessed be the Lord God of Israel; for he hath visited and redeemed his people, and hath raised up an horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David: as he spake by the mouth of his holy prophets, which have been since the world began: to perform the mercy promised to our fathers, and to remember his holy covenant: the oath which he sware to our father Abraham." Luke i, 69-73.—In this passage again we have clear and decisive proof that all the acts of mercy to be performed by the coming of the Messiah had been promised to the fathers, and had been spoken of to the church by the holy prophets from the beginning of the world, and were comprised in the holy covenant sealed to Abraham and his seed, and confirmed by an oath.

I will here only add the direct testimony of the apostle Peter, after the ascension of the Saviour, addressing himself to the Jews assembled at the beautiful gate of the Temple he took occasion to say, "Ye are the children of the Prophets and of the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying unto Abraham, And in thy seed shall all the kindreds of the earth be blessed." Acts iii, 25. Now I ask, in conclusion, if the gospel church is not uniformly represented as being the same church, or a continuation of the same, which was formed in Abraham's family. In what respect then did the constitution of the church under the ancient dispensation differ from the present? Obviously, in no essential respect. In regard to external rites and appendages, indeed, a difference is manifest; but external rites and appendages are neither the church itself, nor the constitution of the church; and as the ancient members of the church were required by the constitution to walk before God and be perfect, so are the present; and as the true members of the church anciently had the all-sufficient Jehovah for their God, and held a part in all the immunities and blessings of his people, the same also, to this day, are the peculiar privileges and rights of the true members of the church. Rock Bottom, Mass., Oct 2d, 1853.