November 2007 - Protestant Reformed Churches in America

Calvin’s Integrated Covenant Theology (2)
Some, while still working within the compact or agreement
framework, have sought to bring out, more than has been customary,
the idea that the covenant is a loving relationship of fellowship.
19
John Murray goes further; he argues that the traditional covenant-contract
theology “needs recasting.”
It would not be, however, in the interests of theological conservation
or theological progress for us to think that the covenant theology is in
all respects definitive and that there is no further need for correction,
modification, and expansion. Theology must always be undergoing
reformation. The human understanding is imperfect. However architectonic
may be the systematic constructions of any one generation
or group of generations, there always remains the need for correction
and reconstruction so that the structure may be brought into
closer approximation to the Scripture and the reproduction be a more
faithful transcript or reflection of the heavenly exemplar. It appears
to me that the covenant theology, notwithstanding the finesse of analysis
with which it was worked out and the grandeur of its articulated
systematization, needs recasting. 20
After surveying the views of various theologians who see the
covenant as an agreement with contracting parties, conditions, and
stipulations, Murray states,
There has been, however, a recognition on the part of more recent
students of covenant theology that the idea of pact or compact or
contract is not adequate or proper as the definition of berith and
diatheke and admirable service has been rendered by such scholars
in the analysis and formulation of the biblical concept. 21
19. E.g., David McKay, The Bond of Love: God’s Covenantal Relationship
with His Church (Great Britain: Christian Focus Publications,
2001). David McKay is a minister and professor in the Reformed Presbyterian
Church of Ireland.
20. John Murray, The Covenant of Grace (London: The Tyndale Press,
1954), pp. 4-5.
21. Murray then gives as examples works by Geerhardus Vos, Herman
Bavinck, G. Ch. Aalders, John Kelly, David Russell, and Herman N.
Ridderbos (Murray, The Covenant of Grace, p. 7, n. 15).
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