Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 3326
“For this is the Covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord; I will put My Laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts; and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to Me a people.” Hebrews 8:10.
THE Doctrine of the Divine Covenant lies at the root of all true theology. It has been said that he who well understands the distinction between the Covenant of Works and the Covenant of Grace is a master of divinity. I am persuaded that most of the mistakes which men make concerning the Doctrines of Scripture are based upon fundamental errors with regard to the Covenants of Law and of Grace. May God grant us now the power to instruct—and you the Grace to receive instruction on this vital subject.
The human race in the order of history, as far as this world is concerned, first stood in subjection to God under the Covenant of Works. Adam was the representative man. A certain Law was given him. If he kept it, he and all his posterity would be blessed as the result of obedience. If he broke it, he would incur the curse, himself, and entail it on all represented by him. That Covenant our first father broke. He fell—he failed to fulfill his obligations—and in his fall he involved us all, for we were all in his loins and he represented us before God. Our ruin, then, was complete before we were born! We were ruined by him who stood as our first representative. To be saved by the works of the Law is impossible, for under that Covenant we are already lost. If saved at all, it must be all quite a different plan, not on the plan of doing and being rewarded for it, for that has been tried—and the representative man upon whom it was tried has failed for us all. We have all failed in his failure! It is hopeless, therefore, to expect to win Divine favor by anything that we can do, or merit Divine blessing by way of reward!
But Divine Mercy has interposed and provided a plan of salvation from the Fall. That plan is another Covenant, a Covenant made with Christ Jesus, the Son of God, who is fitly called by the Apostle, “the Second Adam,” because He stood again as the Representative of man. Now, the Second Covenant, as far as Christ was concerned, was a Covenant of Works quite as much as the other! It was on this wise. Christ shall come into the world and perfectly obey the Divine Law. He shall also, inasmuch as the first Adam has broken the Law, suffer the penalty of sin. If He shall do both of these, then all whom He represents shall be blessed in His blessedness and saved because of His merit. You see, then, that until our Lord came into this world, it was a Covenant of Works towards Him. He had certain works to perform, upon condition of which certain blessings would be given to us. Our Lord has kept that Covenant! His part in it has been fulfilled to the last letter! There is no commandment which He has not honored. There is no penalty of the broken Law which He has not endured! He became a Servant and obedient, yes, obedient to death, even the death of the Cross. He has thus done what the first Adam could not accomplish and He has retrieved what the first Adam forfeited by his transgression. He has establishedthe Covenant, and now it ceases to be a Covenant of Works, for the works are all done!—
“Jesus did them, did them all, Long, long ago.”
And now what remains of the Covenant? God on His part has solemnly pledged Himself to give undeserved favor to as many as were represented in Christ Jesus. For as many as the Savior died for, there is stored up a boundless mass of blessing which shall be given to them—not through their works, but as the Sovereign gift of the Grace of God, according to His Covenant promise by which they shall be saved!
Behold, my Brothers and Sisters, the hope of the sons of man! The hope of their saving themselves is crushed, for they are already lost! The hope of their being saved by works is a fallacious one, for they cannot keep the Law—they have
already broken it! But there is a way of salvation opened on this wise—whoever believes in the Lord Jesus Christ— receives and partakes of the bliss which Christ has bought! All the blessings which belong to the Covenant of Grace through the work of Christ shall belong to every soul that believes in Jesus! Whoever works not, but believes on Him who justifies the ungodly, unto him shall the blessing of the new Covenant of Grace be undoubtedly given!
I hope that this explanation is plain enough. If Adam had kept the Law, we would have been blessed by his keeping it. He broke it and we have been cursed through him. Now the Second Adam, Christ Jesus, has kept the Law—we are, therefore, if Believers, represented in Christ and blessed with the results of the obedience of Jesus Christ to His Father’s will. He said of old, “Lo, I come to do Your will, O God! Your Law is My delight.” He has done that will and the blessings of Grace are now freely given to the sons of men!