Sword & Trowel 2016: Issue 2
SINAI WAS NOT AN ADMINISTRATION OF THE COVENANT OF GRACE
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N Hebrews 8 – 10, the Bible speaks of a better cov- enant of which the Lord Jesus Christ is the Mediator. Here it is affirmed that there was another covenant, an inferior one, of which the Lord Jesus Christ was not the mediator. These two cov- enants, an old and a new, are shown to differ greatly. The old covenant is none other but
– by John Owen – This article, first published
in Sword & Trowel in 1983, was abridged and adapted from
John Owen’s Exposition of the Epistle to the Hebrews.
Law, Psalms, and Prophets, con- tain and declare the doctrine of justification and salvation by Christ. The true church of old (the regenerate people
that which God made with the people of Israel on mount Sinai. The new cov- enant is that which we call the covenant of grace, which stands in opposition to the original covenant of works made with Adam. Here is a question of great impor- tance, namely, whether the old and the new are two distinct covenants, or simply different dispensations or ad- ministrations of the same covenant. It is agreed that the way of recon- ciliation with God, of justification and salvation, was always one and the same; and that from the giving of the first promise (to Adam) no one was ever justified or saved except by the new covenant, and Jesus Christ, the Mediator thereof. It is also agreed that the writings of the Old Testament, namely, the
among Israel) believed and walked with God on the basis of this teach- ing. This is proved beyond doubt because the doctrine of justification by Christ is frequently illustrated in the New Testament by testimonies taken out of the Old. Was the old covenant only a
different administration of the covenant of grace? The Scripture plainly and expressly makes mention of two covenants, and distinguishes between them in such a way that what is spoken of can hardly be accommodated to a twofold administration of the same covenant. The one is described as the cov- enant that God made with the people of Israel in Sinai. The other is the new or Gospel covenant (Matthew 26.28).
And these two covenants are fre- quently compared one with the other, and opposed to each other (2 Corinthians 3.6-9; Galatians 4.24-26; Hebrews 7.22; 9.15-20).
John Owen on the Covenants page 33
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