Francis Roberts wrote the longest work on covenant theology in the seventeenth century and his thoughts on grace in the covenant of works are interesting.  He argues that God’s entering into the covenant of works with Adam was an “act of divine grace and favour, not of debt” (God’s Covenants, 23).

God could have dealt only in terms of “command”, requiring duty from Adam without a reward.  However, because he condescended to Adam and entered into a covenant with him, it was “meer grace” (Ibid).  Roberts insists that Adam could not merit any reward.  In fact, even if Adam had rendered perfect obedience he would still have “been an unprofitable servant, having done nothing but what was duty” (Ibid).  On account of Creation, Adam owed God obedience.  On account of God instituting a covenant at creation, Adam had to be “double dutiful” (Ibid).  In fact, Roberts suggests that if God’s dealings with Adam in the covenant of works was an “Act of Divine Grace”, then God’s covenant of grace was an act of “superabounding and transcendent grace” (Ibid).

What is interesting is that Thomas Goodwin takes a rather different approach than Roberts, which is yet more evidence of the diversity among theologians in the Reformed tradition.  Sure, the covenant of works became firmly entrenched in our confessional tradition, but the details of the covenant of works have never been fully agreed upon.

Goodwin calls the estate into which man was born the estate of pure nature by “creation law”.  He recognizes that “our divines” rightly call it the Foedus Naturae, the Covenant of Nature (Goodwin also uses the term “covenant of works”).  This covenant is “founded upon an equitable intercourse set up between God the Creator, and his intelligent unfallen creatures, by virtue of the Law.”  We, as creatures, are therefore bound to deal with God according to that bond and obligation which is a result of the imago Dei.

Interestingly, Goodwin prefers, instead of “the covenant of works/nature”, the term “The Creation Law, Jus Creationis“.  In other words, “of what was equitable between God, considered merely as Creator, on one part; and his intelligent Creatures that were endued with understanding and will, on the other, simply considered as such creatures.”  This “law” between the Creator and creatures “lay in an equitable transaction between God and them, a congruity, dueness, meetness, on either part.”

Since God is Creator it became him to do for his creatures what was worthy of the Creator-creature relationship.  He was under no obligation to exceed what his position required as a Creator.  He gave all that was due for his creatures to attain their end of happiness because, as Creator, “his will regulated itself by what was meet for their (the creatures) Natures, as such, to receive from him, and for him as a Creator to give.”

During the pre-Fall administration, God bestowed “such faculties and powers, as the creature itself could any way judge requisite to his performing the work of a creature of an intelligent Nature.”   Specifically, then, when God created Adam and Eve, it became him to endow them with his own image of holiness “whereby they might be able to know, to love, and to enjoy a Communion with him … as their chiefest good.” Moreover, on God’s part, as a Creator, he was bound to continue his favor and goodness to Adam and Eve if they would remain in their estate of holiness.

Hence, the promise, “if you do these things, you will live”, was their life on account of “creation dues” and “an equity by creation law”. (All quotes from “Of the Creatures, and their Condition”, Works, 1691-1704, vol. II:20-21.)

Goodwin continues by asserting that though God bound himself to certain “dues” to his creatures, by virtue of his being, he was not obliged to preserve his creature in their state of innocence.  Importantly, Goodwin argues that we must not lay upon God any blame for the Fall (James 1:13-14). God stands free; it is “not upon prerogative, but Equity, that he is a Debtor unto Man.”  God was at perfect liberty to give or not to give what he had not compacted for.

Of course, Goodwin argued in this same work that Adam’s reward could not have been heavenly life; only Christ could merit such blessings.

Finally, regarding grace in the covenant of works, Thomas Boston says that “it was certainly an act of grace, favour, and admirable condescension in God, to enter into a covenant, and such a covenant, with his own creature.” For Boston, man was still bound to obey, perfectly, before the covenant “in virtue of his natural dependence on God.” Man could not have “required eternal life as a reward of his work” before the covenant. The entering into the covenant was itself an act of grace.  However, once the covenant had been instituted, man “may crave the reward on the ground of the covenant.” (T. Boston, The Complete Works of the Late  Rev. Thomas Boston, 12 Vols. (1853; repr., Wheaton, IL: Richard Owen Roberts, Publishers, 1980), VIII:18-19).

The Scot, Hugh Binning, describes grace in the covenant of works in the following way:

there were some outbreakings of the glorious grace and free condescendency of God; for it was no less free grace and undeserved favour to promise life to his obedience, than now to promise life to our faith. So that if the Lord had continued that covenant with us, we ought to have called it grace, and would have been saved by grace as well as now (Common Principles of Christian Relg., lec. 6).

There are, of course, a number of issues that need to be discussed in relation to what has been said.  There are important reasons, both theological and exegetical, why the majority of Reformed theologians have spoken of grace in the covenant of works; and, as you well know, there are reasons why a small minority (very, very small) have resisted the language of grace in the Adamic administration.

So, you see, there are some real points of disagreement on this issue, and I haven’t even touched on Adam’s reward, which was either continued life in Eden or the reward of heaven.  Important Christological issues are connected with this issue!

William Ames (1576-1633), professor of theology at Franeker in the Netherlands, was one of the most influential theologians in the early seventeenth century. He was educated at Christ College, Cambridge under the great Puritan, William Perkins (1558-1602). His learnedness earned him the title “the learned Dr. Ames.” John Eusden, in the introduction to Ames’ Marrow of Theology, comments that “No previous thinker in the Calvinist-Puritan tradition analyzed the covenant of grace with an acuteness comparable to that of the Franeker professor” (p. 52).  I might dispute that, but the comment is not far off.

In The Marrow of Theology Ames treats the subject of the covenant using a method that Owen would later adopt. Ames speaks of a covenant of works in this manner: “In this covenant the moral deeds of the intelligent creature lead either to happiness as a reward or to unhappiness as a punishment. The latter is deserved, the former not” (p. 111). He spends far more time, however, on an exposition of the covenant of grace which ended up being his most significant contribution to the development of covenant theology.

That the covenant of grace is one and the same from the beginning (Genesis 3:15) is a basic presupposition that guides Ames’ thinking. He notes, however, that the application and administration has differed in each particular administration. There is a progression from the imperfect to the perfect, which means, for him, that the “manner of administration of the covenant is twofold: One points to the Christ who will appear (imperfect) and the other to the Christ who has appeared (perfect)” (p. 202). In the history of salvation, he divides up the covenant of grace into periods from Adam to Abraham, Abraham to Moses, and Moses to Christ.

These divisions, identical to Owen’s in Theologoumena, represent a biblico-theological approach to the unfolding nature of God’s redemptive purposes. But, even in this approach Ames is concerned to speak about Christian doctrines, common to systematic theology, like election, justification, sanctification and glorification. In each redemptive period there are, however, different applications of the aforementioned doctrines.

In the period from Adam to Abraham, Ames notes the following doctrines in relation to the covenant of grace:

“From Adam to Abraham it should be noted, first, that redemption by Christ and the application of Christ was promised in general. It was to be carried out by the seed of the woman in order to banish the works of the devil, or sin and death. Gen 3.15; Rom. 16:20 …

Second, calling was evident in the distinction between the seed of the woman and the seed of the devil, and between the sons of God and the sons of men, Gen. 6:2.

Third, the way of justification was set forth by expiatory sacrifices offered and accepted for sins.

Fourth, adoption was indicated both by the title of sons, common to all the faithful at that time, and by the translation of Enoch into the heavenly inheritance.

Fifth, sanctification was expressly taught by the prophets and foreshadowed by typical oblations and rites of sacrifice, Jude 14; Rom. 12:1.

Sixth, glorification was publicly sealed by the example of Enoch and the saving of Noah and his family from the flood. 1 Peter 3:20, 21” (p. 203).

We can only fully appreciate the nuances of Ames’ approach to the covenant when we compare the period from Adam to Abraham with the period from Moses to Christ. For example, Ames speaks of doctrines like justification and sanctification, but with a different application of each doctrine because of history of revelation had progressed further.

“From the time of Moses to Christ, these same things were further adumbrated by extraordinary and ordinary means.Redemption and its application were extraordinary. They were signified, first, in the deliverance from Egypt through the ministry of Moses, who was a type of Christ, Matt. 2:15, and by the entrance into the land of Canaan through the ministry of Joshua, another type of Christ. Second, in the brass serpent, by looking at which men who were about to die were restored to health, John 3:14; 12:32. …. (p. 204).

In the ordinary sense Christ and redemption were foreshadowed by the high priest, the altars, and sacrifices for sins.

Justification was shown in many sacrifices and ablutions and in the sacrament of the Passover.

Adoption was shown in the dedication of the firstborn to God.

Sanctification was set forth in all the offerings and gifts as well as in the observances which had anything to do with cleanliness.

Glorification was shown in the inheritance of the promised land and the communion which they had with God in the holy of holies” (p. 205).

Ames next speaks of the administration of the covenant from the coming of Christ to the end of the world. Christ’s coming ushered in a new administration that would continue until the end of the world, hence the New Testament (pp. 205-6). The New Testament differs from the former administration in quality and quantity. For example, its difference in quality is in clarity and freedom.

“Clarity occurs, first in the more distinct expression than heretofore of the doctrine of grace and salvation through Christ and through faith in him (together with other kindred points of the doctrine). Second, it is expressed not in types and shadows, but in a most manifest fashion (p. 206).

Freedom comes, first, in doing away with government by law, or the intermixture of the covenant of works, which held the ancient people in a certain bondage. The spirit of adoption, though never wholly denied to believers, is also most properly said to be communicated under the New Testament, in which the perfect state for believers most clearly shines forth …. Second, the yoke of ceremonial law is taken away in that it was a mortgage bond held against sinners, forbade the use of some things in the nature indifferent, commanded many burdensome observances of other things of the same nature, and veiled the truth itself with many carnal ceremonies” (p. 206).

Ames further elaborates the difference between the Old and New Testaments by speaking of how the new differs from the former intensively and extensively (207). It differs intensively in terms of the application of the Spirit; the new administration produces a more spiritual life (2 Corinthians 3:18). The administration differs extensively insofar as the Gentiles are now heirs of the promises that were once confined to Israel.

The Puritan, Thomas Goodwin, affirms that Adam possessed the Spirit in Eden.  Goodwin suggests that the Spirit “was in Adam’s heart to assist his graces, and cause them to flow and bring forth, and to move him to live according to those principles of life given him (6:54)”  There are, however, differences between his having the Spirit and ours!  The emphasis in our experience is, of course, Christological; we receive the risen exalted Spirit of Christ (Rom. 8:9) who dwells in our hearts by faith (Eph. 3:17), which happens to be the best way to discuss the ordo/historia salutis problem in my opinion.

Goodwin adds: “We have the Spirit upon Christ’s account, in his name, purchased by him, as whom he had first received, also purchased as the head of the church” (6:55).  So, on account of Christ being made Lord of the Spirit, the Holy Spirit is referred to as “the Spirit of Christ” (Rom. 8:9) and the “Spirit of the Son” (Gal. 4:9).

Adam retained the Spirit according to the tenor of the covenant of works (Do this and live).  Interestingly, Goodwin argues that “as by one act of disobedience he forfeited life (“Cursed is he that continueth not in all things”), and so in like manner the Spirit was forfeitable by him upon the same terms” (6:55).   However, in the case of a Christian the Spirit is given by promise; it is an absolute gift, “and not upon conditions on our parts, but to work and maintain in us what God requires of us” (6:55).

Goodwin again adds: “The gift of the Spirit is not founded upon qualifications in us, to continue so long as we preserve grace in our souls, and do not sin it away” (6:55).  We receive the Spirit in the same way that Christ received the Spirit: “by election”.  And, because it is on account of election, the Spirit is given without conditions, but to work conditions.

In Goodwin’s mind, then, Adam’s obedience wasn’t strict obedience performed in the power of his human faculties; his obedience, rather, was performed according to the operations of the Spirit, but perseverance in full obedience was not the natural outworking of possessing the Spirit.  That is to say, posse peccare was still a very real threat, despite the Spirit’s presence.  Thus, there is an analogy between Adam and Christ when it comes to obedience performed in the power of the Spirit.  The difference, however, is that Christ received the Spirit “without measure” and did not fail, whereas Adam received the Spirit in measure and did fail!

I wonder if anyone knows whether Meredith Kline’s “strict justice” view of the CoW has any room for the Holy Spirit (assisting?) in Adam’s obedience?  (An honest question, not a rhetorical one)

Some questions that arise from understanding the Adam-Christ parallels are these:

1. Was Adam made in a covenant or made for a covenant? Was Adam first made under law and then God entered into covenantal dealings with him?  Can we even begin to make the analogy with Christ who first took on the terms of the covenant (i.e. pactum salutis) and was then “born under the law” (Gal. 4:4)?

2. Christ was the man of the Spirit par excellence.  Owen writes: “The only singular and immediate act of the person of the Son on the human nature was the assumption of it into subsistence with himself” (Works, 3:160).   All other acts on the human nature were done in the power of the Spirit (see Lk. 1:35; ch. 4; Matt. 12; Acts 10:38; Heb. 9:14).  So, was Adam the man of the Spirit, at least in some way?  Has anyone ever considered the work of the Spirit on Adam?

3. Christ’s merit was covenantal; he earned heavenly life for his people.  The efficacy of the work was tied to the value of the person, the God-man.  Was Adam able to earn heavenly life or just earthly bliss? Reformed theologians are divided on this question.  How strict is the analogy between the two?

4. If Christ had faith, did Adam also have faith?  That Adam lived by faith does not mean that we jettison the covenant of works, in my opinion.  As Bavinck argues, “faith for Adam and Christ was nothing other than the act of clinging to the word and promises of God” (RD, III.312).

5. Adam was a prophet, priest, and king; so, too, was Christ. Is anointing fundamental to the office of King?