How do covenant and election relate to one another?
There are many issues of semantics that enter into this discussion and many issues of real substance, so we need to be careful. If we oversimplify, we can say that election relates to Gods eternal plan to save a people for himself. The number of the elect is fixed from eternity past and may not be increased or diminished. The covenant is Gods administration of salvation in space and time, the historical outworking of his eternal plan. We have then two basic perspectives, the decretal/eternal and the covenantal/historical, through which to view salvation. As the handout above shows, the Bible ordinarily (though not always) views election through the lens of the covenant. (For more on this, see Norm Shepherds book Call of Grace.) This is why covenant members can be addressed consistently as Gods eternally elect, even though some of those covenant members may apostatize and prove themselves to not be elected to eternal salvation.
To do full justice to the biblical teaching, we must distinguish covenant and election without separating them. Sometimes Scripture simply conflates the elect and the covenant body, such as in Eph. 1:3ff and 2 Thess. 2:13. Other times, Scripture distinguishes the elect from the covenant community, such as when the biblical writers warn that some within the covenant will fall away (Rom. 11, 1 Cor. 10). To follow the Biblical model, we must view our fellow church members as elect and regenerate and threaten them with the dangers of falling away. This is not contradictory because we admit we only have a creaturely knowledge of Gods decree. We can never, in this life, know with absolute certainty, who the elect are. So we have to make evaluations and declarations in terms of what has been revealed, namely the covenant (Dt. 29:29).
The key to keeping election and covenant together is to remember that the covenant is the visible, historical context in which the eternal decree of election comes to fruition.
What does it mean to look at election through the lens of the covenant? Or to look at special (individual) election through the lens of general (corporate) election?
In the Bible, election is always presented as good news as pure gospel for the covenant people of God. Yet, in many modern Calvinistic presentations, the doctrine takes on an ominous, threatening character. It raises the question, Am I elect?, a question anxious souls want to have answered. But we cannot peer into the eternal decrees of God to see his roll of chosen ones. Nor do we have spiritual X-ray vision (cardio-analytic abilities, as one theologian puts it) that allows us to gaze into the depths of our hearts to see if we are really regenerate. But here is a place where the Bible must be allowed to trump the deductions we might otherwise draw from premises provided by systematic theology. The inspired writers, after all, often speak of the covenant people of God as elect. And surely this knowledge of who is elect cannot be due simply to the fact that the Spirit is working in them as they write. Continually, the apostles address real words of comfort and assurance to visible churches often very troubled visible churches! and this is to serve as a model for pastors today. Our theology must allow us to speak the gospel in the first and second person, in a very personal and direct way. If Paul had been writing Eph. 1 as a modern Calvinist, he would had to have said, He chose some of us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame
But Pauls theology of election permits him to speak of the whole covenant community as elect in Christ, even when he knows some members of that congregation will apostatize (cf. Acts 20:28-30). We could also compare Pauls strong words of comfort to the elect in the Roman congregation in Rom. 8, with the strong warning given to those same people a few chapters later (11:17ff). I suggest viewing election through the lens of the covenant is one helpful way of conceptualizing what Paul is doing in texts such as these. Paul is treating the generally, or corporately, elect, as specially elect until and unless they prove otherwise. True, corporate election may not issue forth in final salvation, as the nation of Israel shows (cf. Dt. 7; Rom. 9-11). Apostasy is a real possibility for all covenant members, and is to be warned against. But corporate election is the context in which special election is worked out. There is indeed an election with an election (cf. Rom. 9:6), but for pastoral purposes, the two can and must be collapsed into one another. Thus, we are to regard all who are baptized and bear Christs name as Gods chosen ones. We can derive real assurance from our participation in the covenant community. Looking at election through the lens of the covenant brings election down to earth, so to speak. It makes election tangible.
What is the payoff of relating covenant and election as youve done?
We can truly derive comfort and encouragement from our covenant membership. God loves everyone in the covenant. Period. You dont have to wonder if God loves you or your baptized children. There is no reason to doubt Gods love for you. You can tell your fellow, struggling Christian, Youre forgiven! Christ paid for your sins! This is far more helpful than only being able to tell someone, Well, Christ died for his elect, and hopefully youre one of them! No, looking at election through the lens of the covenant, as Scripture does, allows us to really and truly apply the promises of Scripture to ourselves and our fellow covenant members. Election does not have to remain an abstraction; through the covenant, it is brought down to earth, so to speak. Of course, the other side to this is that now we are also obligated to warn one another in the covenant community of the dangers of falling away.
The cash value of this teaching is seen, then, pastorally, in that we can really function as priests to one another, applying Gods Word directly to each other in the covenant community. Pauls epistles, to take one example, are filled with first and second person language. Occasionally when he is dealing exclusively with predestination (the election perspective), such as in Rom. 8:28ff, he uses more abstract, less direct language. But generally, he speaks covenantally and personally, and imitating this pays great dividends pastorally. We learn to think of ourselves as Gods elect, with all the privileges and responsibilities this status brings.
There is also an advantage exegetically, in that we can remain more faithful to Scripture as a whole and not merely select portions of it. If our theological system does not allow us to use the biblical language itself (e.g., Jude 5, Mt. 18), then something is wrong. There is certainly something odd about sola Scriptura Protestants sacralizing extra-biblical formulations, even to the point of exalting them above Scriptures own formulations.
Finally, there is a payoff in terms of catholicity: as we have seen, this is the traditional Augustinian (and Calvinian) way of dealing with these things. We are being faithful to our reformational and pre-reformational roots.
What is a non-elect covenant member?
God has decreed from the foundation of the world all that comes to pass, including who would be saved and lost for all eternity. Included in his decree, however, is that some persons, not destined for final salvation, would be drawn to Christ and to his people for a time. These people, for a season, enjoy real blessings, purchased for them by Christs cross and applied to them by the Holy Spirit through Word and Sacrament. (Reformed theologian John Murray makes it clear that whatever blessings reprobate experience in this life flow from Christs work and the Spirits work.) They may be said to be reconciled to God, adopted, granted new life, etc. But in the end, they fail to persevere, and because they fall away, they go to hell. Why would God do this? Its a mystery! Why would God allow sin to enter his creation in the first place? Why did he allow Adam to fall? Perhaps God allows some in the covenant to fall away so that those who do persevere will know that they only did so by the grace of God. Whatever the case, the teaching of Scripture is clear: some whom he adopts into covenant relation, he later hardens (Rom. 9:4, 18, 11:1ff).
Are you saying there is NO difference at all between the covenant member who will persevere to the end and the covenant member who will apostatize?
No. God certainly knows (and decreed) the difference, and systematic theologians should make this difference a part of their theology. But from our creaturely, covenantal point of view (which we should not apologize for!), there is no perceptible difference (e.g., Saul and David look alike in the early phases of their careers; Judas looked like the other disciples for a time). No appeal to the decree can be allowed to soften or undercut this covenantal perspective on our salvation. It is only as history is lived, as Gods plan unfolds, that we come to know who will persevere and who wont. In the meantime, we are to do what was described in the handout above and demonstrated throughout Pauls epistles treat all covenant members as elect, but also warn them of the dangers of apostasy.
The language of the Bible forces us to acknowledge a great deal of mystery here. For example, the same terminology that describes the Spirit coming (literally, rushing) upon Saul in 1 Sam. 10:6 is used when the Spirit comes upon David (1 Sam. 16:13), Gideon (Jdg. 6:34), Jephthah (Jdg. 11:29), and Samson (Jdg. 14:6, 9; 15:14). But in four of these five cases (David, Gideon, Jephthah, and Samson), the man in question was clearly regenerated and saved by the Spirits work (cf. Heb. 11:32). This means that at the outset of Sauls career, the biblical narrative itself draws no distinction between his initial experience of the Spirit and the experience of those who would enter into final salvation. Sauls apostasy was not due to any lack in Gods grace given to him, but was his own fault. While God no doubt predestined Sauls apostasy (since he foreordains all that comes to pass), God was not the Author of Sauls apostasy (cf. WCF 3.1). Saul received the same initial covenantal grace that David, Gideon, and other saved men received, though God withheld from him continuance in that grace. At the same time, his failure to persevere was due to his own rebellion. Herein lies the great mystery of Gods sovereignty and human responsibility (cf. WCF 3.1, 8).
While we as Calvinists like to make a sharp distinction between genuine regeneration and the common operations of the Spirit, we should be willing to recognize that this distinction does not enter into many biblical passages. Instead, we need to be willing to speak of the undifferentiated grace of God (or the generic, unspecified grace of God). For example, in Heb. 6:4-5, some Reformed theologians try to draw subtle distinctions, showing highly refined psychological differences between the blessings listed, which do not secure eternal salvation, and true regeneration, which does issue forth in final salvation. But it is highly unlikely the writer had such distinctions in view, for at least two reasons. For one thing, it is by no means certain that those who have received the blessings listed in 6:4-5 will fall away. The writer merely holds it out as a possibility, a danger they must beware of. In fact, he expects these people to persevere (6:9).
But if the blessings catalogued are less than regeneration, and these people might persevere after all, we are put in the awkward position of saying that non-regenerate persons persevered to the end (cf. 2 Cor. 6:1)! Second, the illustration immediately following the warning, in 6:7-8, indicates these people have received some kind of new life. Otherwise the plant metaphor makes no sense. The question raised does not concern the nature of grace received in the past (real regeneration vs. merely common operations of the Spirit), but whether or not the one who has received grace will persevere into the future. Thus, the solution to Heb. 6 is not developing two different psychologies of conversion, one for the truly regenerate and one for the future apostate, and then introspecting to see which kind of grace one has received. Rather, the solution is to turn away from ourselves, and keep our eyes fixed on Jesus, the Author and Finisher of our faith (Heb. 12:1ff). This is the secret to persevering (and to assurance).
