02.01. The Basis Of The Confession

THE BASIS OF THE CONFESSION 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 they seed after thee.

Genesis 17:7. The covenant is established on God’s unwavering and everlasting mercies. With the first covenant that was established before the fall, God came to man with the demand of obedience, and promised him eternal life and heavenly salvation only after fulfilling the law. That covenant reckoned with the will and work of man, in some respects it was in his own hand, and therefore it was unstable and could be broken. But the covenant of grace has its foundation and stability in God’s gracious counsel alone. It rests not in man and does not depend on his approval. It is eternal, unchangeable, constant as the Lord Himself. "Mountains shall depart and the hills be removed; but my kindness shall not depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed, saith the LORD that hath mercy on thee" (Isaiah 54:10). In this covenant God is first and last, the beginning and the end, the alpha and omega. In a beautiful way it maintains the absolute Sovereignty of God in the whole work of salvation. For from its beginning to its very end, there is nothing in it of man. Redemption is pre-eminently a Divine work, a work of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. All boasting is excluded; all the glory is the Lord’s, Who is Creator and also Re-creator of all things. That is why it is a covenant of grace, of pure grace. This covenant has its origin in the Divine virtue of grace. Its contents are gifts of grace; glorification of grace is its destiny. It is God Who established this well-ordered and eternal covenant. It is God Who accepts the (by sin from Him estranged) man; Who grants him all the blessings of the covenant; Who makes him walk in the way of the covenant and leads him by this covenant to heaven and salvation. The surety of this covenant is reason why in Scripture it is repeatedly introduced as a testament. It is not a mutual treaty or pact; it is not like an agreement between two persons, who after much deliberation sign the contract. But the covenant of grace is an institution, a merciful decree of the Lord, a gift in Christ. "And I appoint unto you a kingdom, as my Father hath appointed unto me" (Luke 22:29). As testament, as last and free arrangement, in the form of an inheritance, the Divine blessings of this covenant become ours, outside and without our will. It is the most precious gift, the most perfect gift, which descends on us ’from the Father of lights, with Whom is no variableness nor shadow of turning."

Let us have a look and see, what kind of goods they are, which make out the contents of this free and eternal covenant. Together they form a kingdom of spiritual and material, of heavenly and earthly, of eternal and temporal blessings. There is opened here for man a fullness of blessing, a fountain of salvation and a well-spring of life. One grace changes into another and in turn it is replaced by new grace. From Christ’s fullness we receive grace for grace. In the first place they are benefits, which are granted to man in this covenant. For before anything else Christ came to earth, to seek and save that which was lost. He did not come to reform society, as political leader of the nations, as artist or one worldly wise. Saviour was His name and office. He was thereunto anointed with the Spirit, by the Father, to preach the gospel to the poor; he was sent to heal the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, and set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord.

They are first of all spiritual blessings, whereby the congregation is blessed by the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Forgiveness and regeneration, faith and repentance, sanctification and perseverance, become the possession of believers in communion with Christ. Both -their conscience and being, their state and standing are renewed by the Spirit of Christ. Through the Spirit Who Jives in them they became other people; they are not from beneath, but from above; they are born of God, by Him adopted to children, and destined for the heavenly inheritance. The old is past, behold, all things have become new, But these spiritual and eternal blessings are coupled with earthly and temporal blessings. Heaven and earth, spirit and matter, soul and body are closely aligned, and absolute separation would not be possible. The glorious image of the future which is shown by the Old Testament prophets, does not only tell us that Israel will be a holy people, by the Lord from eternity betrothed, that He will cleanse from all impurity and give them a new heart, but also, that under the Prince of Peace, the house of David shall enjoy unknown prosperity and extra-ordinary fruitfulness of the earth. That is also how the New Testament joins spiritual and material blessings. It does emphasise the former. We must seek first the kingdom and its righteousness; and that kingdom becomes already part of those who believe the gospel of Christ, and turn to Christ with a true heart. For in the first place it is established in the heart, it is not meat and drink, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost.

Whoever looked for and found that kingdom as a pearl of great price, will receive all the other things on top of the former. These people do not need like the heathen, be anxious and ask the question, what shall we eat, or what shall we drink, or wherewith shall we be clothed? For our heavenly Father knows that we have need of these things. He, Who did not spare His own Son, shall with Him give us all things. The hairs of our head are all numbered. Bread shall be given him, his waters shall be sure.

Those who would follow Jesus must leave everything, but they will receive already in this life, fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, friends and fields, and in the age to come everlasting life. Godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come.

All these benefits of the covenant are put together in the one great promise, that God will be our God and the God of our seed. With this promise commences the proclamation of salvation, when God looks for man after the fall, breaks his friendship with Satan, making him his enemy instead, and takes him up again in communion with Himself. It is the most prominent aspect of the covenant that was established with Abraham. It has a place above the law that was given to Israel, and is sum and substance of the dispensation of the covenant of grace in the days of the Old Testament. In the midst of misery God’s people find blessedness and comfort; Whom do they have in heaven besides God? and there is nothing on earth they desire beside Him. He is the strength of their heart and their portion forever. When Israel forsakes the Lord their God, is this their comfort, that in spite of this the Lord will remain their God, gathers them again from exile and on the end of days establishes a new covenant, in which they will be His people and He will be their God. And this promise passes over into the New Testament. It is fulfilled in Christ Who in the greatest temptation, in the agony of Gethsemane, in the suffering on the cross, remained standing, because God was His God and He His much beloved Son. It is fulfilled in the congregation that came in Israel’s place and glorying in Emmanuel, God with us, became His people. It shall be fully realised, when the new Jerusalem shall descend from God in heaven, when His tabernacle will be with man, and He shall dwell among His people. Is there greater gift than the Lord Himself? What can He give more than Himself, Himself with all His virtues and attributes, with His grace and wisdom, with His righteousness and omnipotence, with His un-changeableness and faithfulness? For when God is for us, who can be against us? Whatever may happen, He is and remains ours, in misery and death, in living and dying, for time and eternity. For He is not a God of the dead, but of the living. Blessed is the people whose God is the Lord! This promise is so much richer, while God therein commits Himself, to be not only our God, but also the God of our seed. It would be great already if God granted communion with some people, who were not related; when in a arbitrary way He would, not taking in account generations, take His elect regardless of all historic coherence of flesh and blood. But that is not how the lord works. He establishes an organic covenant with humanity, with Christ as its Head, first with Adam then with Abraham who is the father of all believers. With His grace He follows the line of generations. in re-creation he joins creation. He executes election in the way of the covenant, He moves as Father of all mercies in the way, to which as Father of all things, He Himself set His signature. That is why the covenant of grace is eternal in the sense, that in history it continues from generation to generation and is never cut off. Grace is like a stream which commences after the fall, digs a bed for itself in the history of humanity and discharges in eternity. As covenant it may run through several dispensations and appear in different forms, through God’s almighty power it has become an element in this world, which cannot be eradicated, and an indestructible good for humanity.

Precisely because it is a covenant it bears this indestructible character. For in all covenants there are contained two parts. First the Lord God gives Himself to us; but then we are admonished of God and obliged to new obedience, namely, that we cleave to this one God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit; that we trust in Him, and love Him with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind, and with all our strength, that we forsake the world, crucify our old nature, and walk in a godly life" (Form for Baptism), When God gives Himself to us, He will that we too shall give ourselves to Him, wholly, undivided, unconditionally with our soul and body, our talents and strength, our money and possessions, with our children and children’s children. Before everything with our children, who are the Lord’s inheritance and His most cherished earthly blessing. They must be God’s, because we are of Him.

Yet, in the covenant He is first and demands us and our children for His service; He glorifies to us and to our children the riches of His grace. He is first, when He calls Adam and Noah, Abraham and Israel into His fellowship, but He remains this also, when He takes their children with them in His covenant. I will be your God, and the God of your seed after you - is the promise, wherewith He commits Himself to the elect in their generations. And before our children did good or evil, He it was, Who as the Sovereign, said, "I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion" (Romans 9:15). Our children do not enter the covenant, because we dedicate them to the Lord. Much less, because by any virtue or merit they made themselves worthy. They are in the covenant by virtue of God’s promise. They are in the covenant from the time of their birth, not by nature, but by grace, while God has committed Himself to be the God of believers and their seed. The same law that rules in the spiritual realm, rules in the natural realm. All of us received a natural life that through our parents we received from God, the Almighty Creator of heaven and earth. It is not by our merits that we possess life. We did not give it to ourselves, did not merit it, we even forfeited it by our guilt. It is God’s gift in a complete sense, not of His particular grace, but of His common grace. We receive it by conception and birth, whereby we are altogether passive. Outside of our awareness and will we are placed in a world, that is filled with rich goods, and we enter into the mighty inheritance of former generations. We stand on their shoulders and enjoy what they brought together in the sweat of their brow. In much greater measure this is true of the spiritual goods of the covenant. For it is not so that for a long time we wander about outside of the covenant, until at a later date, by faith and repentance we enter the covenant by our own will. For faith and repentance are no conditions outside and to the covenant of grace, but they are blessings of the covenant, assuming communion with Christ and opening the door to the joy of His blessings.

All these blessings, of forgiveness and renewal, sanctification and glory, come to us only from the Mediator, Who bought them for the price of His blood. They cannot be ours, unless we have an interest in His Person. The mystical union with Christ precedes all blessings, and first reveals itself in faith and repentance. As natural life is granted us in birth and after that turns to acts of understanding, so spiritual life becomes our possession by regeneration, and after that will bear the fruits of faith and repentance.

Again, it is not possible to have communion with Christ, but by the Father Who gave us Christ. The offer and gift of Christ precedes all His benefits. It is God, Who in Christ, gives Himself to us and in communion with Him, successively imparts to us all the blessings of the covenant and complete salvation.

Baptism is the sign and seal of this unspeakable gift of God’s grace. For it is certain that someone who is baptised in truth, with Christ’s blood and Spirit, of the uncleanness of the soul, that is cleansed from all sin, as the body is outwardly cleansed by water.

Baptism is a baptism in the name of God Triune.

’When we are baptised in the name of the Father, God the Father witnesses and seals unto us that He makes an eternal covenant of grace with us and adopts us for His children and heirs, and therefore will provide us with every good thing and avert all evil or turn it to our profit. And when we are baptised into the name of the Son, the Son seals unto us that He washes us in His blood from all our sins, incorporating us into the fellowship of His death and resurrection, so that we are freed from our sins and accounted righteous before God.

"Likewise, when we are baptised into the name of the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit assures us by this holy sacrament that He will dwell in us, and sanctify us to be members of Christ, imparting to us that which we have in Christ, namely, the washing away of our sins and the daily renewing of our lives, till we shall finally be presented without spot among the assembly of the elect in life eternal." (Form for Baptism).

Baptism is our witness, that God will be our God forever, being a merciful Father, For He has commanded to baptise all those, who are His, in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost. In baptism the Lord gives us visible evidence, that in Christ He gives Himself and adopts us to His children. That adoption is the basis of our confession.