Westminster Project 7.1

1. The distance between God and the creature is so great, that although reasoning creatures owe obedience to him as their creator, yet they could never have any fruition of him as their blessedness and reward, except by some voluntary condescension on God’s part, which he has been pleased to express by way of covenant. 
(WCF 7.1)

Over the past few weeks, in chapter 6 of The Confession, we have examined how the sin of our first parents (original sin) and our own personal sins (actual sin) have severed us from the blessed presence of God. In and of ourselves, there is nothing we can do to make ourselves right with our Creator because we are spiritually dead. From this spiritual death, all our efforts to justify ourselves before Him are tainted with sin (Rom 3:23-24; 5:12; cf. Isa 64:6). Simply put, all humanity is in a hopeless situation and is condemned from the moment of conception (Job 14:4; Ps 51:5).

This is not to say that we, as creatures, lack some innate sense that we have a Creator or that we owe Him our allegiance. Romans chapter 1 is clear: we have been created, and God has made this apparent, “for what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse” (Rom 1:19-20, NIV).

So the question arises: If we know there is a God, and we know that we “could never have any fruition of Him as [our] blessedness and reward,” what hope is there? Hope for all humanity came by way of grace, in that God, “by some voluntary condescension,” was pleased to make a covenant with His creatures so that salvation might truly become a reality.

A contract is an agreement between two equal parties, like in a marriage or business partnership. But our relationship with God is far from equal; the distance between Creator and creature is vast (WCF 7.1). That is why the Bible uses the imagery of suzerain-vassal covenants from the ancient Near East. When a nation was defeated and powerless, sometimes the conquering king would make a covenant with them. They would be blessed if they obeyed the law and terms dictated, but if they broke the stipulations, they would face the wrath of the king. 

All humanity is a defeated people—our sin has rendered us “dead in the water.” Yet by God’s grace, He made a covenant with some. This theme recurs throughout the Old Testament: God’s grace and humanity’s covenant-breaking. We see it with Israel, hear it from the prophets, and read about it in the Psalms. God comes to His broken creatures, makes a covenant with them, yet something within us continually pushes His grace and mercy aside to follow our own desires—we keep breaking covenant.

This is why the ultimate Covenant Keeper, God’s Son Jesus Christ, had to come. He is the only man who could perfectly keep the requirements of the covenants made with Adam, Abraham, Israel, and David. Not only did He keep the stipulations perfectly, but He also took the curse of covenant-breaking upon Himself on the cross. The cross is where God’s grace and wrath meet—they meet in the person of Jesus Christ, who was presented as an atoning sacrifice for our sin (Rom 3:25).

Salvation does not come by our own covenant-keeping; it comes by placing all our hope, trust, and faith in Jesus’ perfect covenant-keeping and sacrifice. It is those who trust Him who will never be put to shame (Rom 10:11).