What is a covenant according to the Bible?

A covenant is an agreement, pact or contract made between two parties in order to formally bind them to a commitment made at a particular time. In the affairs of men, some persons—familiar as they are with human nature—are predisposed to putting every possible transaction on a formal contractual basis in order to ensure subsequent legal recourse should a breach of the agreement occur. Others have a preference to undertake matters on the basis of a “gentlemen's agreement”—relying rather on the good will of the parties involved, often with disastrous consequences.

A covenant sets forth the terms on which two people can be in relation with each other. Scripture speaks of two great covenants between God and men, the old covenant and the new, the covenant of law and the covenant of grace. Both the old and the new covenants set forth the terms on which God can bless His earthly people. The great difference between the covenants is that under the terms of the first covenant the blessing depended upon man doing his part, whereas under the second covenant the blessing is secured by the unconditional promise of God. The mediatorial work of Christ lays a righteous basis for God to bless the believer in sovereign grace according to the terms of the new covenant.

In the book of Exodus we have the historical account of Israel formally entering into a covenant with God. Jehovah undertakes to bless the people if they will obey His voice and keep His covenant. The people on their side undertake to do their part, as we read, “All the people answered together, and said, All that the LORD has spoken we will do” (Ex. 19:5-8). Later, this covenant is renewed by the people and sealed with blood (Ex. 24:6-8).

Covenant in no way implies two parties, but the contrary, i.e., in divine things; a mediator does, but there is an object of the covenant, assurance of blessing, and the circumstances of this object may require the interposition of a mediator, righteously to obtain for, qualify, and sustain them. Christ is properly the object of the Abrahamic covenant, but then, for the Church to come in, being guilty, there must be a mediator with God for that; they are brought into the covenant through a mediator, but the covenant is not made with, or properly for them.

5 A covenant is a disposition of God, secured by His binding or obliging Himself; this - man being a sinner - must be by the meritorious death of the Covenanter. In the case of a man's covenant, it seems to me it was conventionally brought to the same point - the authority of God being interposed, and the covenanter bound in this by the same sanction, quod nota.

A covenant is a principle of relationship with God on the earth — conditions established by God under which man is to live with Him. The word may perhaps be used figuratively, or by accommodation. It is applied to details of the relationship of God with Israel, and so to Abraham (Gen. 15), and like cases; but, strictly speaking, there are but two covenants, in which God has dealt with man on earth, or will — the old and the new. The old was established at Sinai. The new covenant is made also with the two houses of Israel.

It is important to keep in mind that a covenant is a disposition of God, and that it is the terms upon which God sets a people in relationship with Himself upon earth. It could have no reference to a people called out of the world to heaven. Therefore there is no covenant made with the Assembly of God, though the great and leading principles of the new covenant have a very distinct bearing upon the blessings that are ours. There was a covenant made with Noah (Gen. 9:1-16), also with Abraham (Gen. 15), and with Israel at Sinai. The new covenant will be made in a coming day with the same people, Israel (Jer. 31:31-34). These two covenants, both of which are made with God’s earthly people, are the covenants referred to in Hebrews; and with these covenants we have most to do.

There are really but two covenants in Scripture ― the old covenant and the new. Still the word covenant is used in several places in connection with the Lord, when it is but the enunciation of certain relationships into which He was pleased to enter with man or the creature (Gen. 9:8-17, etc), or by which He should be approached by man, but without conditions. The context must decide the sense.

But now we come to the question of the old and new covenants: there is one thing always implied in the covenant of the law, and that was a condition. A covenant is an agreement between two parties upon certain conditions being fulfilled. A man promises to do certain things if the other person will fulfil his engagements. That is the covenant of the law. God promises to bless His people if they on their part will obey the law. Look, for instance, at this eleventh chapter of Jeremiah. I would suggest that you read it at your leisure. In the 2nd verse, "Hear ye the words of this covenant, and speak unto the men of Judah and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem" etc., (vers. 1-4); you will find throughout the entire chapter that it is a reminder of the first covenant, of God's promises to Israel in connection with it, and of their promises to fulfil His commandments. I need hardly refer you to the engagement which Israel entered into at Sinai, and how Moses took the blood of that covenant and sprinkled it upon the book where the laws were written, and upon the people, and upon everything, and called God and man to witness that the covenant had been sealed by blood; and we need look onward but a few steps in Israel's history, to the apostasy of the golden calf, to see how they broke the first conditions of blessing under that covenant.

It could hardly be said that the old covenant of law was established upon promises at all, though there were certain promises connected with it. It was established rather upon a bargain, in which Israel undertook in all things to obey, and God guaranteed certain blessings conditional upon their obedience. The bargain was hardly concluded before it was broken by Israel making the golden calf. The fact that the new covenant is established upon promises, that those promises are God's, and that they are better than anything proposed under the law, at once differentiates it sharply from the old. To gain some idea of these better promises you must read the latter part of our chapter, which is quoted from the passage in Jeremiah 31 — where the new covenant itself is promised — verses 31 to 34. God's "I will," is the characteristic feature of it. All is a question of what God is going to do, and of what consequently Israel is going to be and have.

In the opening verses of the chapter now before us, the Lord recapitulates His actings toward Israel in the following touching and beautiful language: "Thus shalt thou say to the house of Jacob, and tell the children of Israel: Ye have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagles' wings, and brought you to myself. Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure to me above all people: for all the earth is mine. And ye shall be to me a kingdom of priests and an holy nation." (Ver. 3-6) Observe, it is "my voice" and "my covenant." What was the utterance of that "voice?" and what did that "covenant" involve? Had Jehovah's voice made itself heard for the purpose of laying down the rules and regulations of a severe and unbending law-giver? By no means. It had spoken to demand freedom for the captivity — provide a refuge from the sword of the destroyer — to make a way for the ransomed to pass over — to bring down bread from heaven, to draw forth water out of the flinty rock. Such had been the gracious and intelligible utterances of Jehovah's "voice," up to the moment at which "Israel camped before the mount."

And as to His "covenant," it was one of unmingled grace. It proposed no condition — it made no demands — it put no yoke on the neck — no burden on the shoulder. When "the God of glory appeared to Abraham," in Ur of the Chaldees, He certainly did not address him in such words as, "thou shalt do this," and "thou shalt not do that." Ah! no; such language was not according to the heart of God. It suits Him far better to place "a fair mitre" upon a sinner's head, than to "put a yoke upon his neck." His word to Abraham was, "I WILL GIVE." The land of Canaan was not to be purchased by man's doings, but to be given by God's grace. Thus it stood; and, in the opening of the book of Exodus, we see God coming down in grace to make good His promise to Abraham's seed. The condition in which He found that seed made no difference, inasmuch as the blood of the lamb furnished Him with a perfectly righteous ground on which to make good His promise. He evidently had not promised the land of Canaan to Abraham's seed on the ground of ought that He foresaw in them, for this would have totally destroyed the real nature of a promise. It would have made it a compact and not a promise; "but God gave it to Abraham by promise," and not by compact. (Read Gal. 3)

“The point in Romans 8 is not only having the Spirit. I think from this point of view the affections developed by the Spirit are covenant affections. We have to distinguish between covenant affections and family affections. I think covenant relationships involve that we are equal to the obligations of the contract entered into.” (A. pp. 4 & 5).

This alludes to Romans 8:4. The believer walking in the Spirit fulfils those things the law righteously required of man. This is spoken of as “a covenant,” and these righteous requirements are alluded to as “the obligations of the contract entered into.” This far-fetched idea is derived from an attempt to make the giving of the law in Exodus a type of the believer taking up certain obligations before God as a fruit of being redeemed; and of this “type” Romans 8:4 is supposed to be the “anti- type.” This once accepted, you advance to the transference of the word “covenant” from the “type” to the “antitype;” you transmute the word “covenant” into a “contract,” and further you proceed to contemplate “covenant affections” and “family affections,” and to differentiate between them; and in result instead of a pyramid of truth broad-based on the Scriptures of Truth, you have a pyramid of fancy, precariously poised upon a very slender apex. But not only have you thus travelled into regions of fanciful and extravagant ideas, but of very serious and fundamental error. What is this contract as to which the New Testament is silent? A covenant involves two parties, as Galatians 3 tells us. A contract involves penalties for its breach. 2 Corinthians 3:6-18 sweeps away all these unsteady theories. Obligations there are, resting upon the believer as the result of grace bestowed, yet even so they do not stand upon a legal or covenant basis. Christianity is not a system of obligation ending in death and condemnation, but the positive ministration of righteousness and of the Spirit.