The Big Picture of God’s Promises
Covenant Theology 101 (#1)
Covenant Breakers and the Covenant Keeper.
Imagine a giant world map. I want you to find one tiny island for me. Are you ready? Ni‘ihau—in the Hawaiian islands. You squint, study the details, trace the lines, and maybe miss the big, bold letters printed across the whole map: Pacific Ocean.
Sometimes we do the same thing with our Bibles. We zoom in on words, phrases, verses, paragraphs, and chapters to figure out the doctrines; but we can miss the big picture written in large print across every page: God relates to us through covenants.
That word covenant might sound antiquated or complicated, but it’s actually the backbone of the Bible. The Hebrew word berîth appears more than 280 times in the Old Testament while the Greek diathēkē appears 33 times. Covenant is the way God reveals himself, relates to his people, and redeems and reconciles us back to himself.
“Covenant theology” isn’t something we impose on the Bible, but is simply the study of God’s promises and the relationships he forms through them. It’s about learning to read the Bible as one unified story of a God who makes and keeps his promises—a story that stretches from Genesis to Revelation, and even includes you.
The story of the biblical covenants (after the Fall) is about Covenant Breakers and the Covenant Keeper. Let me introduce you this story, in Covenant Theology 101.
The God Who Comes Down
The Bible simply yet powerfully begins with God—not us. “In the beginning, God” (Gen. 1:1). Before there was light or life, time or things, there was the infinite, eternal, and self-sufficient God. He didn’t create because he was lonely or lacking. He created because he is love—and love, by its very nature, overflows.
But here’s the problem: “The distance between God and the creature is so great that…they could never have any fruition [benefit] of him as their blessedness and reward, but by some voluntary condescension on God’s part” (Westminster Confession, 7.1). That’s just a fancy theological way of saying that God had to come down if we were ever to know him. And that’s exactly what he did. He came down not only to make us but to make himself known. And the way he chose to reveal himself—to relate to us—is through covenant.
The God Who Keeps His Word
A covenant is a formal relationship, a binding promise. When God enters into covenant, he isn’t negotiating between equals—he’s stooping down to bless, to give, to love. From Adam to Noah, Abraham to Moses, David to Christ, the story of Scripture unfolds as the story of a covenant-making and covenant-keeping God. Every covenant reveals something of his heart.
With Adam, God showed his benevolent life and holiness.
With Noah, his righteous wrath and preserving mercy.
With Abraham, his faithful promises and blessings.
With Moses, his righteous and just law and steadfast love.
With David, his sovereign kingship and enduring promise.
And in the new covenant, through his Son, Jesus Christ, God fulfills all previous covenants, revealing his very self in grace, love, and redemption.
Once Adam became a covenant breaker, all the subsequent particular covenant arrangements pointed to one grand relationship—the covenant of grace—where God is the covenant keeper who promises to be our God, and we, by his mercy, become his people. Every page of Scripture, every law and prophecy, every psalm and gospel story, fits within that framework.
The God Who Invites You In
For some of us, we think of Christianity as a list of rules because of a bad experience at church. For others, maybe we had a positive experience, but still, Christianity was more an emotional roller coaster.
But covenant theology says something far richer: Christianity is a relationship. Not a casual one, but a covenant relationship with the living God. It’s knowing and being known by him, loving and being loved by him.
This is what Jesus meant when he said, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood” (Luke 22:20; 1 Cor. 11:25). The cross is the climax of God’s covenant love—as the Covenant Keeper. There, the eternal Son of God bore the curse that covenant breakers like you and me deserve, so that he might invite unto relationship with him and become covenant keepers in Christ.
Covenant Breakers and the Covenant Keeper
Over the next ten posts, we’ll trace this story together—from the garden of Eden to the new creation. We’ll see how each covenant reveals more of who God is and what he’s doing in the world. My hope is that you’ll come away seeing the Bible not as a collection of disconnected stories, but as one beautiful, unfolding story about a faithful God who comes to the aid of his unfaithful people—about covenant breakers and the covenant keeper.
So, grab your Bible, open your heart and mind, and join me on this journey through the Covenant Theology 101. You’ll discover that the God who made all things is also the God who keeps his promises—and that those promises find their “Yes” and “Amen” in Jesus Christ (2 Cor. 1:20).