Q. 12. What special act of providence did God exercise towards man in the estate wherein he was created?

A. When God had created man, he entered into a covenant of life with him, upon condition of perfect obedience; forbidding him to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, upon pain of death.

Children, what is a covenant? We often refer to you as "covenant children." What does "covenant" mean? A covenant is a special sort of agreement, or contract. Let's say that you and your friends agree to go ice skating next Wednesday. Is that a covenant? No, that's just an agreement. If Anastasia doesn't show up, you'll be disappointed, but that's all. But let's say that you and your friends agree to go ice skating every Wednesday for the rest of your lives, and that your children will have to do this all their lives, and anyone who doesn't show up will have to pay $5 to the ones that do. That is more like a covenant--except that you don't have the authority to make that covenant. In a covenant, you bind yourself and all those under your authority to do something. So when we refer to you as covenant children, we are saying that you have been brought into a special relationship with God, not because of any decision that you made, but because your parents are in covenant with God, therefore, you are too--whether you like it or not! Maybe you remember when I baptized Sarah, Eli, Ethan and Thomas Brodrecht, I said to them that God never asked Isaac whether he wanted to be in the covenant. Because God made a covenant with Abraham, Isaac was a part of that covenant whether he wanted to or not.

You may say, but that's not fair! Shouldn't I get to decide whether I am in the covenant or not?! That's not the way that covenants work. Besides, if you are not in the covenant of grace with your parents, then you are under a different covenant. Romans 5 reminds us that in Adam all died. If you are not alive in Christ, then you are dead in Adam. And you didn't have any choice in that matter either! Adam sinned thousands of years ago--and yet that sin has brought all of us into a covenant with death.

It didn't start that way. God entered into a covenant of life with Adam. If Adam had obeyed, and walked in covenant with God, then all of his posterity, all of his descendants, would have lived forever in eternal blessedness.

Let's go back to Genesis 2 and look at this original covenant--the covenant of life. Sometimes we call it a covenant of works--but that's not the best way to phrase it. Certainly Adam was required to obey God perfectly, but that's not what the covenant was about. The covenant was about life. It was about Adam's inheritance as the son of God.

1. When did the covenant begin? Start with Genesis 1:26-28; 2:7-8. God formed Adam in his image, and breathed the breath of life into him. To be created in the image of God is to reflect him. Adam is said to be "after God's likeness." This language of likeness and image shows how Adam is created as a son of God. He is not a "natural" son, but an adoptive son. Only the eternal Son of God is a son of God by nature. The angels are created as God's servants, but God desired to have a different relationship to man. He wished to be our Father. Therefore he created us in his image. I have suggested in our evening series on Exodus and Deuteronomy that covenant is the expression of the relationship between the Father and the Son. Therefore it is also the expression of the relationship between God and man. So to say that God created Adam in his own image is to say that God made a covenant with Adam. Some have suggested that 2:7 relates the creation of man, and 2:16-17 relates the making of the covenant with man. But that would suggest that in the time in between creation and covenant-making, Adam was not in covenant with God. But the communication in 2:16-17 suggests that the covenant relationship is already present. Look at Genesis 2:15-17 God has planted a garden in Eden, and he has placed the man in the garden of Eden to tend it. Adam's covenant responsibilities are present before God speaks in 2:16-17. God's speech describes the covenant; it does not create it.

2. What are the terms of the covenant? Every covenant includes the obligations of both parties of the covenant. Likewise, it specifies the blessings and curses that will result from covenant faithfulness or covenant-breaking. In Genesis 2, we don't hear all the details. We hear about what man is supposed to do, and we hear about the curse that will come upon disobedience, but we do not hear about what God is supposed to do, or what blessing will result from obedience. I would suggest that this is because these things are inherent in the relationship. God is Adam's father. Therefore he will care for his son as a father should, and he will give his son an inheritance when he reaches maturity. Adam's tasks, then, are set up to train him for his inheritance. And the warnings are given to let Adam know that his inheritance is dependent upon whether or not he will continue to reflect his father's likeness. This is why the language of "covenant of works" is not quite as useful. The phrase "covenant of works" is acceptable, because it is true that Adam had to obey, but his works could not earn eternal life. By virtue of his creation in the image of God, in covenant with his Father, his inheritance was already promised. His works were required, but not as the meritorious cause of eternal life. Rather, they were required as the condition for remaining in covenant with God.

We will spend the next few weeks looking at the results of Adam's failure, and especially at how our Lord Jesus Christ succeeded where Adam failed; but for now I'd like to call your attention to two more things:

3. The signs of the covenant. In verse 9 God had placed two trees in the midst of the garden: the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Now God places Adam in the garden, for him to tend it. As the Father has created the garden, so now the son is to tend it as the gardener. And God commands Adam "You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die." Adam may eat of every tree--including the tree of life--but he may not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. This means that the tree of life is not a magical tree. Some people have thought that one bite of that fruit would cause a man to live forever. But that is not the picture in Genesis 2. Rather, the tree of life is a sacramental tree. It is a means of grace that continues to give life as long as man continues to eat of it. That is why access to the tree must be cut off in Genesis 3, after the fall. If man continues to eat of the tree of life after he sins, he will indeed continue to live-but now he would live in a state of death, under the wrath and curse of God. (The verbs in 3:22 may suggest an ongoing action of taking and eating.) This is why we fence the Lord's Table. The Lord's Supper is indeed spiritual food and drink. It is a means of grace for those who believe. That is why the profane and scandalous must be kept away, because spiritual food can only bring greater judgment on those who do not believe. Therefore, while Adam may well have partaken of the tree of life during his time in the garden, his access to it was cut off after his sin. (Indeed, some have suggested that the long life of the ancient patriarchs may have been due to the residual effects of Adam's eating of the tree of life in the garden.) By listening to a false voice, the voice of the serpent, and partaking of a false covenant meal, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil Adam turned from the true and living God, and turned from his glorious inheritance, to embrace a covenant of death, and an inheritance of sin and misery.

Finally, let us look at 

4. The universality of the covenant. This covenant of works--or covenant of life--encompasses all of Adam's descendants. But all who are in Adam are born as covenant-breakers. We'll look next week at the doctrine of original sin. But all who are in Adam are bound by the same covenant that he failed to keep. And a broken covenant of life, is nothing but a covenant of death. James 2:10 speaks of the universality of the covenant when he says, "For whoever keeps the whole law, but fails in one point, has become accountable for all of it." Adam broke the covenant in only one place, but to break the covenant in one place is still to break the covenant. This is why the Messiah had to be born of a Virgin. If a son of Adam was his father, then he too would receive the taint of original sin. Rome is too egalitarian on this point. They assume that if a normal daughter of Adam was Christ's mother, then he would be tainted by sin, so they have to create the fiction of Mary's immaculate conception. But the true answer is that the covenant is passed through the father's seed. And since God is Jesus' father, therefore the eternal covenant between the Father and the Son overcame the broken covenant between God and Adam, which meant that Jesus was born as the first true covenant child in human history. We sometimes forget that the covenant of grace is the solution of the broken covenant of life. In one sense, as Francis Turretin says, there is only one covenant. Jesus succeeds where Adam fails. Jesus kept the covenant of life. He not only obeyed God as the Son seeking his inheritance, but he also canceled the debt that we owed. Adam could never have been said to merit eternal life by his obedience, and so Jesus did not earn eternal life for himself by his obedience. Jesus receives eternal life from the Father because that is the inheritance promised to the faithful Son. But what about us? We have earned death (for the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.). By his faithful obedience to the Father in his death and resurrection, Jesus has paid the price for our demerit, and purchased us for God. Therefore it is right to say that we have eternal life only by the merits of Christ. As Venantius Fortunatus said in the sixth century: "Through his merit we inherit light and peace and happiness." And again "Praise the Spirit; through Christ's merit he doth us salvation bring."

So in the end, there is only one covenant: the covenant of life. Adam broke that covenant, dragging all who are in Adam into sin and death. Christ kept that covenant, raising all who are in Christ into life and righteousness. Either you are a covenant breaker in Adam, or you are a covenant keeper in Christ. And as we'll see in a couple weeks, the only way you can be a covenant keeper in Christ is if you belong to the covenant of grace.

[Conclude with "Rock of Ages"]

Copyright © 2003 Peter J. Wallace