Covenant of Works: Looking back over many years of dabbling in reformed & calvinistic theology, I realize that while it taught me many helpful things, it also trained me to accept certain ideas without pausing to weigh them in the light of God’s Word. And in reading the writings of assorted theologians, even those ‘sound’ in the gospel, I suspect I’m not alone, especially when it comes to the notion of what is called the “covenant of works.” For those familiar with the world of reformed thought, the term sounds as if it has always belonged to the biblical landscape, until you go looking for it in the Bible. You won’t find it. Yet despite its absence from Scripture, it has been lodged in reformed thinking for centuries, not because the Bible teaches it, but because it is built into the confessional scaffolding they refuse to revise. After all, they have the Westminster Confession of Faith, the Belgic Confession, and the Heidelberg Catechism to back them up. Then there’s the prince of the Puritans himself, John Owen, who wove it deeply into his covenant theology, along with names like Thomas Boston and Herman Witsius, &c., even within the past 50 years, you’ll find well-known figures like A.W. Pink, John Murray, Joel Beeke, (for myself, a local and modern puritan scholar who fully embraces it,) R.C. Sproul, and John MacArthur, &c., all of whom have voiced their allegiance to this man-made framework, treating it as though it unlocks the mystery of redemption. Even lesser-known names, like Don Fortner, bought into this, and I only single him out because he outlined it plainly in his Bible Doctrine book, whereas others are perhaps far more covert or undetermined in their views. It just shows how deeply this idea is rooted in the systems of men, reinforced by respected confessions and the writings of good men who, for all their strengths, often pass along traditional interpretations in a way that makes them hard to question when measured by the plain truth of scripture.
This teaching has been so deeply woven into the fabric of reformed theology (it’s one of its load-bearing beams) that I suspect it remains as common today as it was 40 years ago when I first encountered it. As I noted, its grip remains firm not because of the witness of scripture but the cement of creeds and confessions, long regarded as beyond revision, and guarded like family heirlooms which are never to be altered. So, what exactly is this so-called “covenant of works”? According to the Westminster Confession of Faith, “God gave to Adam a law, as a covenant of works, by which he bound him and all his posterity to personal, entire, exact, and perpetual obedience, promised life upon the fulfilling, and threatened death upon the breach of it, and endued him with power and ability to keep it.” In short, the confession teaches that God entered into a covenant with Adam, binding him and all humanity to perfect, personal, and unending obedience, promising life if he obeyed and death if he disobeyed, supposedly giving him the ability to fulfill those terms. This wasn’t just an abstract theological idea or doctrinal formula, it was part of a whole framework that had been taking shape for some time. It grew out of what came to be known as federal theology, which viewed all of God’s dealings with mankind through two main covenants, one with Adam before the fall, and another with the elect after the fall. For all its tidy logic, it diverts the eye from the one covenant of redemption in Christ.
From the limited research I’ve done, the earliest appearances of the term seem to trace back to Zacharias Ursinus, (chief architect of the Heidelberg Catechism,) and William Perkins, (the “father” of English Puritanism,) and by the mid-17th century, it had been fully enshrined in the Westminster Confession of Faith. Interesting enough is the fact that Calvin himself never spoke of a covenant of works, though some later theologians tried to read it back into his thought. The term itself is a man-made invention, and the idea behind it, that eternal life could be earned by man’s works, is an insult to the gospel. Scripture is clear, “God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son.” I John 5:11. All of God’s dealings with man have always been in Christ, even before sin entered into the world. To think life could come any other way is not only untrue, but a rejection of the very heart of the gospel. Colossians 1:16-17. The covenant of works assumes that Adam stood in a probation period where life could be earned as a wage for obedience. But Scripture never frames God’s commands as a ladder to eternal life; rather, they reveal His will and, when broken, our need for His grace. Romans 3:20. There has never been an age when man’s standing before God rested on his own ability, nor a moment when Christ was not the ground of our life and righteousness.
So if you strip away the theological whitewash, doesn’t this “covenant of works” share the same root as Arminianism, each insisting, in one form or another, that life is within man’s reach if only he will exert himself enough to meet the conditions? Both systems begin by granting man a power he simply does not possess, as though divine wrath could be turned away by human effort rather than by the atoning sacrifice of the Lamb of God. Romans 5:9. One dresses it in the language of ‘pre-fall’ obedience, the other in ‘post-fall’ decision, but both leave man standing guilty before God, with nothing to cover his shame. Romans 3:19. In the end, neither system exalts God’s eternal purpose in Christ, because neither begins where God begins, with a salvation grounded in eternity past, consummated in history, and perfected in the person and work of Christ. II Timothy 1:9-10. And when that starting point is abandoned, the result is inevitable, man’s utter ruin in Adam is misrepresented, and the ground of our hope is subtly shifted from the finished work of Christ to the imagined potential of the sinner.
Whether polished in theological language or spoken in the simple terms of free-will religion, it remains the serpent’s old deception, Genesis 3:5, that man can attain to God by doing something. Romans 3:20. Though the details differ, both rest on the idea that man possesses, either before or after the ‘fall’ the natural ability to secure life for himself, whether by meeting the terms of a supposed works covenant or by exercising his will in the present. In either case, the premise is the same, life is within man’s grasp if only he will do what is required. Romans 9:16. But Scripture allows no such ground for boasting. From the beginning, life has never been in man’s power, but in the gracious gift of God, who has placed it entirely in His Son. I John 5:11. So any system that grants man the ability to secure eternal life apart from the sovereign grace of God in Christ is not merely flawed in its reasoning; it is fatally opposed to the gospel, for it shifts the glory from the ONE who saves to the sinner who supposedly can.
In summation, God’s purpose for mankind has always been bound up in His Son, “who verily was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you,” I Peter 1:20, and He has never granted life to man apart from Christ, not in Eden, not under the law, and not in the glory to come. John 14:6. Even in Eden, the garden was never a proving ground for man to secure life by his own works, but the stage upon which the eternal counsel of God in Christ would unfold. Ephesians 3:11. To seek life anywhere else is to miss it entirely, for “he that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life.” I John 5:12. Therefore, in light of the testimony of Scripture and the revelation of the gospel, II Corinthians 4:6, it’s difficult not to conclude that the claim that Adam could earn life apart from Christ is not merely unbiblical, it is anti-gospel. Acts 4:12. MPJ