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While the word berith is often used of covenants among men, yet it always includes a religious
idea. A covenant is a pact or agreement between two or more parties. It may be, and among
men most generally is, an agreement to which parties, which can meet on a footing of equality,
voluntarily come after a careful stipulation of their mutual duties and privileges; but it may also
be of the nature of a disposition or arrangement imposed by a superior party on one that is
inferior and accepted by the latter. It is generally confirmed by a solemn ceremony as in the
presence of God, and thereby obtains an inviolable character. Each one of the parties binds
himself to the fulfilment of certain promises on the basis of stipulated conditions. Now we
should not say that we cannot properly speak of a covenant between God and man, because
the parties are too unequal, and therefore proceed on the assumption that the covenant of
grace is nothing but the promise of salvation in the form of a covenant. By doing that we would
fail to do justice to the covenant idea as it is revealed in Scripture. It is perfectly true that both
the covenant of works and (as the sequel will show) the covenant of grace are monopleuric in
origin, that they are of the nature of arrangements ordained and instituted by God, and that
God has the priority in both; but they are nevertheless covenants. God graciously
condescended to come down to the level of man, and to honor him by dealing with him more
or less on the footing of equality. He stipulates His demands and vouchsafes His promises, and
man assumes the duties thus imposed upon him voluntarily and thus inherits the blessings. In
the covenant of works man could meet the requirements of the covenant in virtue of his
natural endowments, but in the covenant of grace he is enabled to meet them only by the
regenerating and sanctifying influence of the Holy Spirit. God works in man both to will and to
do, graciously bestowing upon him all that He requires of him. It is called the covenant of grace,
because it is an unparalleled revelation of the grace of God, and because man receives all its
blessings as gifts of divine grace.
II. The Covenant of Redemption
A. SEPARATE DISCUSSION OF THIS DESIRABLE.
There are different representations respecting the parties in the covenant of grace. Some
consider them to be the triune God and man, either without qualification, or qualified in some
way, as “the sinner,” “the elect,” or “man in Christ”; others, God the Father, as representing the
Trinity, and Christ as representing the elect;[Westm. Larger Cat., Q. 31.] and still others, since
the days of Coccejus, distinguish two covenants, namely, the covenant of redemption (pactum
salutis) between the Father and the Son, and, as based on this, the covenant of grace between
the triune God and the elect, or the elect sinner. The second of these representations has a
certain advantage from a systematic point of view. It may claim the support of such passages as
Rom. 5:12-21 and I Cor. 15:21,22,47-49, and stresses the inseparable connection between the