Covenant Theology
I hope it seems too convenient to you that men think and say they have a secret system of interpretation. They apply the unique lemon juice to the Bible and the invisible ink comes to the surface. God didn’t write that book. The one He wrote, we can understand as a child (2 Timothy 3:15). Scripture presents no peculiar scheme for deciphering what the Bible says.
Covenant Theology depends on speculation and human ingenuity to find a hidden meaning of scripture. The subjectivity of it allows someone to see something others don’t, giving the impression of an extraordinary insight for an exclusive few. You might read what they say they see in scripture and you don’t see it. It is not apparent. Only with their key to understanding, the developed system or code, can you grasp how they got there.
A literal interpretation, a true version of dispensationalism, is true. Covenant Theology is false. The Bible is not an opaque book that keeps you guessing. It isn’t fine having several spiritualized, very personal interpretations. Could we not just call them “private interpretations” (2 Peter 1:20-21), because they are so individualized?
Subjective and Strange
Someone could dedicate a whole book to the strange interpretations of Covenant Theology. You can read many of these in their advocates’ commentaries and hear them in their preaching. I was listening to a presentation a little while ago by well-known Covenant Theologian Kim Riddlebarger (I do love his last name). He said he was doing a series through the Old Testament book of Joshua, a book which he said was an obvious explanation of God’s future judgment of the world. Have you heard this kind of preaching?
The book of Joshua doesn’t address endtime judgment. The conquest of the land testifies to God’s will for His covenant people, Israel. God required the conquest. The refusal of a former generation manifested its unbelief. Joshua led toward faithful obedience of Israel to God’s directive.
I heard John MacArthur provide a brief critique of Covenant Theology, and he gave an example of a Westminster Seminary professor’s preaching. The man used Isaiah 9:6-7, the part about the government upon the Messiah’s shoulders, to say this was turning over the government of your own life to Jesus. He made a spiritual interpretation, not connecting it at all to the future, real kingdom of Jesus Christ. How would anyone think that passage meant future New Testament Christians and their relationship to the Lord?
Contrast with Literal Interpretation
If you pick up the Old Testament and start reading it, early on you get to a point of a real nation Israel. National, ethnic Israel dominates the Old Testament as a subject matter. Covenant Theology directs one to read church in a spiritualized way into Old Testament references of Israel.
God makes many promises to Israel. Will God fulfill the promises He made that are not yet fulfilled? Yes. If you never read the Old Testament, and you picked it up to read without having read the New Testament, you could understand what I’m saying here. This is dispensationalism.
Attraction of Covenant Theology
What for covenant theologians, the main opponents of a literal reading of scripture, makes their system to them so attractive? I see three reasons.
One, Covenant Theology says that it examines New Testament usage of the Old Testament as an interpretational model. Two, Covenant Theology accentuates continuity or unity of the Old and New Testaments. It finds this overt, extreme continuity with its interpretational grid. Three, Covenant Theology leans on caricatures, exaggerations, and extreme examples of dispensationalism.
Some proponents of dispensationalism provide negative fodder for Covenant Theologians. The latter use these bad examples from the system of dispensationalism and apply them to the whole. The extremes do not debunk a literal reading of scripture.
More to Come
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