Criswell
Theological Review 1.2 (1987) 295-308
Copyright © 1987 by
COVENANT AND THE KINGDOM:
GENESIS 1-3 AS FOUNDATION
FOR BIBLICAL THEOLOGY
Eugene H. Merrill
The
thesis of this paper is that the key to a proper biblical her-
meneutic and theology is to be
found in the covenant concept of both
the OT and NT, especially in the form that concept
takes in Genesis.
The
centrality of the covenant to biblical theology has, of course,
been recognized for years by biblical theologians,1
but only since the
relatively recent recovery of comparative covenant
materials from the
ancient Near East have biblical covenant form
and content been
reevaluated and tied in closely to the meaning and
even structure of
the biblical message.2 M. Kline, in a
publication entitled The Structure
of Biblical Authority,3 has argued, on the basis of his
own previous
studies of biblical and ancient Near Eastern
treaty and covenant
forms, that the entire Bible is formulated on the
model of an extensive
and expansive covenant. That is, the Bible does not
merely contain
covenant records, but is itself and in its
entirety a covenant text.4
1 See especially W. Eichrodt,
Theology of the Old Testament (2 vols;
Testament Theology:
Basic Issues in the Current Debate (3rd ed.;
Eerdmans, 1982) 138, n. 107; Henning Graf Reventlow, Problems
of Old Testament
Theology in the
Twentieth Century
(Philadelphia: Fortress, 1985) 126-28. ,
2 V. Korosec, Hethitische Staatsverlrage.
nant Forms in Israelite
Tradition," BA 17 (1954) 49-76;
D. J. McCarthy, Treaty and
Covenant (An Bib 21; Rome,
1963); M. Kline, The Treaty of the Great King (Grand
Rapids:
Eerdmans, 1963); K. Baltzer,
The Covenant Formulary (
versity Press, 1971).
3 M. G. Kline, The Structure of Biblical Authority (
1972).
4 Ibid., 75.
296
CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
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While
this may be an overstatement, it does suggest the dominance 0
the covenant idea in certain segments of biblical
scholarship.
I. Biblical Concept of Covenant
By
"covenant" is meant "a written agreement or promise usually
under seal between two or more parties especially for
the perform-
ance of some action."5
The Hebrew word used to express "covenant"
is tyrb a term that first
occurs in Gen 6:18 and that apears about 285
times in the OT.6 It is translated by
Greek 5ta8liK1l in the LXX and in
the NT. Though the terms are not exactly
synonymous, the Greek
referring more to a "will" or "last
testament," the concept of a legal
contract at least is common to both.7
Until the advent of 19th century archaeological
research, very
little was known of covenants in the ancient East
apart from the OT
and even these (including the biblical) were little
understood. The
discovery, publication, and study of cuneiform
tablets and other
inscriptional material, especially
from Boghazkoy, the old Hittite
capital,. have shed
considerable light on international treaty and cove-
nant arrangements from the
Late Bronze and Early Iron Ages (ca.
1400-1200 B.C.). This is particularly
instructive to biblical scholarship
because according to the traditional dating the
Mosaic covenants fall
within this period or a little earlier.
The Hittite treaties reveal that such contracts
existed in one
of two forms:8 (1) The parity treaty
between equals and (2) the
sovereign-vassal (or suzerainty) treaty
which was drawn up by a
superior power and imposed upon an inferior. Both
types generally
contain at the minimum certain clauses including
a preamble, an
historical prologue, the list of stipulations, the
witnesses, the curses
and blessings, and provision for deposit and public
reading of the
covenant text. The major difference, of course,
was that the superior
party in the suzerainty treaty coerced the vassal
into acceptance of
the fidelity to the covenant terms while he himself
had no such
obligations except as he voluntarily subscribed to
his own stipulations.
The significance of all this to biblical studies
is the fact that
biblical covenant form resembles almost exactly
Hittite treaty form,
specifically the sovereign-vassal
type. The Covenant Code of Exodus
20-23
and the entire Book of Deuteronomy are the most outstanding
5 Webster's
Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary (
1976) 192.
6 BDB 136-37.
7 M. Weinfeld,
“tyrb,” TDOT 2 (1975) 256.
8 For the following,
see especially Mendenhall, BA 17 (n.
2 above).
Merrill: COVENANT AND THE KINGDOM 297
examples of this type. It is quite apparent that
Moses undoubtedly
utilized already existing treaty formulas in the
construction of biblical
treaty contracts between God and individuals or God
and
the comparison does not end with the literary
correspondences. An
essential feature of certain ancient Near Eastern
treaty-making was
the slaughter of an animal, often an ass, as,
perhaps, an example of
the fate to be expected by the covenant party who
violated his treaty
obligations.9 There was also the
sense of the binding together of the
contracting parties through the mutuality of the
animal sacrifice and
the sprinkling of its blood upon the treaty
participants or their repre-
sentatives. The importance of
slaughter and blood to biblical cove-
nants is, of course, well
known.
The reader of the OT who examines it from this
covenant stance
will see that covenant texts occupy a very
significant portion of
biblical composition. Deuteronomy, for example,
is recognized as
being almost entirely covenantal in its form and
content,10 as are
substantial parts of the rest of the OT. And, if
Kline is correct, the
entire Bible might be so analyzed. What is important
now is to see
that these individual covenants, far from being
isolated and unrelated,
are parts or successive elaborations of a basic
covenant theme. All
covenant references in the Bible are then but
progressively revealed
modifications and explanations of
that motif. This, we feel, is the
interpretive key to Scripture, a key
which, applied consistently and
skill fully, will unlock the mysteries of God's Word
to one who sin-
cerely wishes to understand
and communicate God's redemptive mes-
sage with authority and conviction.11
II. Covenant in Genesis 1-3
Let us turn now to a systematic examination of
the covenant
theme in the early chapters of Genesis with the end
in view of
establishing our thesis that it is
at the heart of divine revelation and
that it can provide the organizing principle around
which a consistent
and comprehensive biblical theology may be
developed. Because
Genesis
is the book of beginnings it is not surprising that covenant
should first be found there, and, in fact, found in
more specific
9 M. Held, "Philological Notes on the
32-40.
10 For an excellent commentary structured
along covenant lines see J. A. Thomp-
son, Deuteronomy
(TOTC; Leicester, England: InterVarsity Press, 1974).
11 This notion has been picked up and
published recently by W. J. Dumbrell,
Covenant and Creation (Exeter: Paternoster,
1984).
298
CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
REVIEW
instances than anywhere else in the Bible.12
So fundamental is the
covenant theme there it is not an exaggeration to
say that Genesis
provides the principal statement of God's purposes
of which the
remainder of the biblical witness is an
enlargement and interpretation.
The
understanding of his creative and redemptive ways must issue
from their initial statement in Genesis and not from
a stance that
considers Genesis to be only prolegomenon or retrojection.
The climax of God's creative work as revealed in
Genesis 1-2 was
the creation of man, an event reserved for the last
part of the sixth
day. In conjunction with the creative act appears
the statement by
God concerning its meaning and purpose. "Let us make man
in our
image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the
fish of the sea and
the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all
the earth, and over all
the creatures that move along the ground. So God
created man in his
own image, in the image of God he created him; male
and female he
created them. God blessed them and said to them,
Be fruitful and
increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it.
Rule over the fish of
the sea and the birds of the air and over every
living creature that
moves on the ground" (Gen
In its broadest sense, this mandate is a greatly
abbreviated cove-
nant expression in which the
sovereign (God) outlines to his vassal
(man) the meaning of the vassal's existence and the role that
he is to
play in the sovereign's eternal plans. Man was
created, then, to serve
as the agent of God in implementing God's
sovereign will and sway
over the universe.13 His subsequent fall
into sin made him incapable
of adequately fu1fil1ing the covenant requirements,
as we shall see, so
he was forced to attempt to do so with great
difficulty and struggle.
The
history of the human race is testimony to the miserable failure of
man to accomplish the covenant mandate, a failure
overcome only by
the Second Adam, our Lord Jesus Christ, who
perfectly demonstrated
on earth the authority that was inherent in the Adamic covenant and
who, moreover, by his perfect obedience to it has
guaranteed the
ultimate restoration of redeemed man to the
original covenant privi-
leges. Let us consider
several ramifications of this covenant statement.
Mankind as God's
Vice-Regent
That man is to serve as vice-regent of God is
seen clearly in the
fact that he is the "image" and
"likeness" of God. The former of these
terms, Mlc, is the word ordinarily
used in the OT to speak of an idol
12 In all its forms tyrb occurs twenty-seven times in Genesis or about one-tenth of
all the OT uses.
13 G. von Rad, Old Testament Theology (2 vols;
1.
146-47.
Merrill: COVENANT AND THE KINGDOM 299
or other object carved or fashioned to resemble
the deity that it
presents.14 The Greek, both in the LXX and NT,
usually translates it
ei]kw<n, from which English
"icon" is directly derived.15 The word
translated "likeness" in our versions is tvmd a term that is equally as
common (25 occurrences), and that appears occasionally
as a synonym
for Mlc
(Gen
seem to be in a parallel relationship, indicating
their synonymity.
that this imago dei
represents is, of course, a matter of divergent
opinions, but at the least it is that quality in
man that makes him
different from and superior to all else in the
created universe.17 It is our
judgment that much more is involved, for the
context of the passage is
quite suggestive in this respect. For example, the
first person plural
pronoun is used by God consistently throughout
the narrative. This
cannot be explained by reference to the plurality of Elohim, for that
plural of the divine name is nearly universally
interpreted as the pluralis
maiestatis or plural of majesty.18
Moreover, ordinarily the name Elohim
occurs with singular personal or relative pronouns.
The appearance of
“us," then, rather than "me" is a clue that
points to a plural of number,
a plural that suggests the divine Godhead-Father,
Son, and Spirit.19
The
Spirit had already been introduced as that person of God who
“moved" (better "hovered" or
"brooded") over the face of the deep
(Gen
1:2). It would appear appropriate that the Son should here be
identified as that divine person of whom man is the
image. The OT
speaks elsewhere of Wisdom who is hypostatized and
described as at
least a co-Creator with God (cf. Prov
specifically identifies Jesus Christ
as the Creator an 1:1-3; Col 1:16;
Heb
1:2). There is clearly a straight line of development from OT
hmkH to Mishnaic
xrmm to NT Logos.20
There is, furthermore, explicit evidence that
both the Father and
the Holy Spirit are invisible, spiritual entities
and that only the Son is
attributed with any bodily manifestation. This may
be seen in the aT
appearances of God as the Angel of the Lord or as
the "Son of Man."
Most
fully and unequivocally, it is seen in the NT incarnate Christ.
14 C. Westermann,
Genesis 1-11. A Commentary
(Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1984)
15 BAGD 222.
16 H. D. Preuss, "hmADA" TDOT 3 (1978) ~7 -00.
17 A. H. Strong, Systematic Theology (Philadelphia:
Judson, 1970) 514.
18 GKC #124g.
19 E. H. Merrill, "Is the Doctrine of
the Trinity Implied in the Genesis Creation
Ccount?" The Genesis Debate (ed. R. Youngblood;
9-22.
20 J. B. Payne, The Theology of the Old Testament (
1962)171-72.
300
CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
REVIEW
We
would suggest, therefore, that the image of God entails also a
phenomenal aspect, a relationship between man and
the Son of Man
so close that the former could be said in the
strictest sense of the term
to be the image of the latter.21
If man of the covenant is to fulfill his covenantal
mandate, we
must attempt to discover how this fulfillment is
described. Unfortu-
nately, the evidence is sparse
because man sinned before realizing the
potentialities involved. We do learn,
however, that he was to cultivate
the ground (2:5, 15), that he had access to
everything in
Tree
of the Knowledge of Good and Evil (
incredible ability to name all the animals (
supposes either the skill of writing and recording
or the possession of
a phenomenal memory! Tragically, however, sin
marred the image in
at least the area of man's covenant capacities, so
that we can only
guess at the powers that man could have exercised had
he been
obedient. Or need we only guess? Paul on several
occasions refers to
a Second Adam, Jesus Christ (Rom
Second
Adam presumably was more than one who came to undo the
work of sin in human life; He came also to
demonstrate the possibili-
ties inherent in sinless man. In other words, Jesus
Christ, often
described as the Son of Man, was not only God but
was man par
excellence, the man whom God
intended Adam to be. Should we not
seek in the life of Jesus, the Perfect Man, some
insights into the type
of man created by God to carry out the Adamic covenant?
Jesus as Second Adam
A few examples from the Gospels must suffice. In
the story of
Jesus'
calming of the stormy sea, the disciples are so amazed at what
they see that they ask incredulously, "What
kind of a man is this, that
even the winds and the sea obey Him" (Matt
Luke
8:27-75)? Or one is reminded of the need for the payment of
taxes to Caesar. Jesus on one occasion told Peter to
go to the sea,
throw in a hook, and find a coin in the mouth of the
first fish caught
(Matt
17:24-17). When Jesus was about to enter
at the beginning of Passion Week, He first of all
amazed His disciples
by riding on an unbroken donkey (Matt 21:7) and
then proceeded to
show His lordship over a fig tree by cursing it so
that it withered
immediately (Matt
are usually attributed to His deity, but there is
every reason to believe
21 For the view that human-form theophanies are limited to Christ see J. A:
Borland,
Christ in the Old Testament (Chicago:
Moody, 1978) 65-72. Borland correctly;
does not limit man as the image of God to the
physical appearance of the Son
(pp.
106-7) for, as he suggests, Christ did not exist permanently in human form in
OT times.
Merrill: COVENANT AND THE KINGDOM 301
(“What
kind of man22 is this?") that Jesus
was exercising the God-
given authority of Adam, an authority designed for
the entire human
race, forfeited by sinful Adam, and restored in and
through Christ (cf.
also Ps 8), That man will once again possess these
powers may be
seen in the beautiful eschatological pictures of the
OT prophets in
which, for example, "The wolf will live with the
lamb, the leopard
will lie down with the goat, the calf and the young
lion and the
yearling together; and a little child will lead
them" (Isa 11:6, NIV).
Mankind as Nature's
Sovereign
Another feature to note in the covenant of Gen
1:26-28 is that of
the command to rule over the fish, the birds, and
large and small land
animals (
hdr
usually
used in connection with the absolute domination of one
party by another (Lev 25:43, 46, 53; 26:17, 1 Kgs 5:4, 30; Isa 14:2;
Ps
110:2).23 "To subdue" is wbk which means "to
tread down." The
same word is used in Mic
7:19 to speak of God treading iniquities
underfoot. In, another form it occurs in Jer 34:11 in the sense of
bringing one into bondage or subservience.24
Hence, these two verbs
are practically synonymous. This prerogative of man
was seen, of
course, in his naming of the animals and his care of
the garden. And
we have already suggested that Jesus, the perfect
Son of Man,
demonstrated in his own life on
earth His ability to dominate the
various aspects of the natural world. Moreover,
man, when fully
redeemed, will resume his covenant
responsibilities and privileges, by
the grace of God, and forever will reign over the
universe as God's
agent in fulfillment of the reason for his very
creation.
In stark contradiction to the idealized
situation of the covenant
stipulation of Genesis 1 is the reality of human
existence vis-a-vis the
covenant after the fall. Man now knows that he is
naked, an under-
standing which not only derives from his
possession of the knowledge
of good and evil, but which makes him acutely
aware that he cannot
fulfill the covenant terms.25 He was told to
have dominion over all
things, but he failed to govern even his wife and his
own appetites.
He
has forfeited the right to reign and therefore does not have the
ability to reign. His attempt to undo his
nakedness and, hence, recover
his dignity and lordship is frustrated by the Lord
who shows him, by
covering him with the skins of a slaughtered
beast, that another
22 No explicit word for "man" is
used in Matt
"kind") is a common substitute for the term
"person" (see BAGD 694-95).
23 See W. WhIte,
“hdARA”, TWOT 2 (1980) 833.
24 J. N. Oswalt, “wbAKA," TWOT 1 (1980) 430.
25 T. C. Vriezen,
An Outline of Old Testament Theology (
1958) 209-10.
302
CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
REVIEW
way--a super-human way-must be found. God must do
the cover-
ing and the restoring or
there is no hope at all.
The Fall
and Covenant Modification
But to move more directly into the covenant
terms as they are
modified for fallen man in Gen 3:14-19, we
observe that the original
mandate ("to reign, to multiply, to subdue")
is preserved but in an
obviously qualified way. That is, man still has
the rights and obliga-
tions of the original
covenant, but will accomplish them only with
pain and arduous labor. And, moreover, even this
pain and labor
could not bring about the desired ends for which man
was created
were God not to intervene in history in the seed of
the woman and to
fulfill in this seed His sovereign purposes. The
second Adam was to
do what God had required of the first, and impute
to every Adam of
every age the perfect obedience of the mandate which
he achieved
by his life, death, and resurrection.
In the first place, because an animal (the serpent)
was the vehicle
of man's temptation and fall, animals must, in
general, be condemned
for insubordination though the serpent is
especially cursed (
Man
the sovereign had become the slave, a monstrous imbalance
which must be righted.
A result of this imbalance was a hostility
between man and
animal, an antagonism suggested here but explicitly
spelled out later
on in the Noahic
covenant (Gen 9:2). Animals would be docile only
by training and discipline, not as a matter of course.26
Only with the
reestablishment of the paradise world
could there be the compat-
ible relationship between
man and animals that God had originally
intended.
Satan, incarnate in the serpent, is, of course,
the real object of the
rebuke of the Lord, for it was he who had attempted to
subvert the
covenant arrangement, possibly because he himself
had originally
served as vice-regent of God (cf. Isa
14; Ezek 28). The enmity
between man and the serpent was only an
illustration of the more
profound and consequential enmity between man and
Satan, and
indeed, between the Seed of the woman and Satan. The
underlying
cause of the disruption of the covenant would be its
chief victim
when the covenant was renewed and perfected by the
Seed of the
woman, the Lord Jesus Christ.
In the second act of insubordination, that of
the woman to the
man and both to God, the result would entail the
on-going covenant
stipulations but with the added
ingredients of pain, a powerful attrac-
26 G. Vos, Biblical Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1954) 64.
Merrill: COVENANT AND THE KINGDOM 303
tion of wife to husband,27
debilitating labor, and death. Man must
carry out the mandate but the cost would be high-too
high in fact
for him actually to bring it to completion himself.
The promise of the
seed and the evidence of divine grace in the
garments of skin pointed
to a covenant completeness that would be a future
reality.
In the meantime, the command to be fruitful and
multiply would
be complicated by the pain of the woman in
childbirth. The injunc-
tion to man and woman to
rule over all things would be tempered by
the rule of the man over the woman, by the
subordination of her
desires to his. The earth which was to be
subject to man and the
ready source of his nourishment now would yield its
riches only with
toil. And the very soil which he tilled, and from
which he originated,
would eventually master him and cover him in death.
Fallen Man's Covenant
Capacity
We are still left, however, with the intriguing
question of the
extent of unredeemed man's ability and right to pursue
the covenant
stipulations of Gen 1:26-18. At the
outset we must be reminded that
unregenerate man is generally not
even aware of a covenant mandate,
except possibly “intuitively," to say nothing of
a command to pursue
it. But it
cannot be argued that he does pursue it even in his blindness.
Man's
environmental struggles all represent his endeavors to ..be
fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, and subdue
it." Ironically (or perhaps
even predictably) he appears to be waging a losing battle
as the
present-day ecological concern so eloquently
testifies. Man carries
out the mandate, but as is true with every thing
else that he does as
fallen creature without divine orientation, he
perverts it, misunder-
stands it, exploits it, and finally seems to be in
danger of destroying it.
But
this is not to be, for the Adamic covenant was
without condition-
man was created to fulfill it and he will, both
partially and imper-
fectly as fallen first Adam,
and fully and perfectly in and through
Second Adam. The ecological crisis
is not, fatal, but only witnesses to
the inadequacies of rebellious man. Christ has triumphed
not only
over death and sin but over the environment. He will
undercut the
ecological peril by bringing in the fruits of His redemptive
work,
even a new heaven and a new earth wherein dwells righteousness.
One thought that is staggering in the face of
man's inability to
the Adamic covenant
perfectly is his sheer accomplishment
27 This seems to be the best understanding of
the phrase jtqvwt
jwyx lx ("unto
your husband [will be] your desire"). So W. C. Kaiser: Jr., Toward an Old Testament
Ethics (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1983) 204-5. As Kaiser points out, the wrong m this
is that in turning in such a way to her husband
the woman will turn from dependence
on God.
304
CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
REVIEW
scientifically and technologically in
spite of his limitations. He has, by,
dint of creative and imaginative genius, risen to
heights of achieve
ment undreamed of by his
predecessors of only a century ago. He has
not only been able to dominate this planet with his
superior intel-
lectual powers, but has now
planted his feet on the moon and his
implements of discovery on the planets as well. All
this, we feel, is
part of the mandate, but only its superficial,
external part. The factor
that is missing is the ascription to God of the
glory and praise due His
name. Man fulfills the covenant, even to a
remarkable degree, but at
the same time he does not fulfill it at all for he
does not operate as the
conscious agent of God. Part of the meaning of the
image of God is to
act for God and represent God, but man will not
have God to rule
over him.
III. The
Prospects of Covenant Fulfillment
The Christian man, on the other hand, is able to
understand the
covenant and even largely to fulfill it in
points. And where he cannot
fulfill it or overcome the liabilities built
into it because of sin, he can'
at least await with patience and perseverance the
redemptive day:
when these liabilities will be removed in fact and
when he will enter
into the covenant relationship with the saints of
all the ages, and with
them pursue its goals and purposes eternally.
Christ, who showed by
example what it meant to keep the covenant and
whose obedience
retrieved it and made it a viable vehicle of
divine intercourse wit4
man, has pioneered the way that all men can follow.
He is the first-
fruits not only of them who sleep but of them who will
in the day of
His
glory share with Him the joy of covenant-keeping, the joy of
reigning forever and ever as the agents of the
Mighty God, the
Everlasting
Father.
If God is immutable; if the covenant of Gen
1:26-28 is inviolable,
unconditional, and eternal; if Christ
as Second Adam has showed
His
earthly life and ministry what it meant to keep the covenant
perfectly-all of which is true-then we should
expect some biblical
statement about the fulfillment of the Adamic covenant by redeemed
man. But before such an investigation is undertaken
some considera-
tion of the biblical view of
time must be made.
Biblical View of Time
Basically, there are two ways in which time can
be understood--
the linear and the cyclical.28 The former sees time
plotted on a non-
28 For an excellent discussion of the
matter see Mircea Eliade, Cosmos and,
History (New York: Harper &
Row, 1959) esp. 62-92.
Merrill: COVENANT AND THE KINGDOM 305
ending straight line with only accidental or
coincidental repetitions of
events and these only of an insignificant nature. The
latter, however,
interprets time as occurring in series of
repeatable, nearly identical
events. It is measured in terms of aeons
which, though lasting for
thousands of years, have decisive -and dramatic
beginnings and end-
ings. Time in the linear
sense, an understanding that originated in the
17th
century,29 views history as a continuously
ongoing process with
little or no theological significance. The religions
and philosophies of
the ancient world, particularly those of the Graeco-Mesopotamians,
conceived of history as a cyclical phenomenon.
Worlds and men are
created to live, interact, and die, only to be
recreated time and time
again. Reincarnation is only one feature of such a
world view.
Biblical notions of time are not properly either
linear or cyclical,
but a combination to be described, perhaps, as a
"loop." Eternity is
linear while the parenthesis that we call time, a sort
of interruption of
eternity, is cyclical in nature, though only
unicyclical.30 God, eternally
existent, created all things to serve his own
interests. His creation,
however, through its disobedience, has
temporarily intersected the
continuum of eternity, but through Christ the
promise of a resump-
tion of the linear has been
made. When history has run its course, the
turn. In one sense, time will have been blotted out,
and the linear
aspect of the divine historical process will appear as
never having
been broken at all. Or, to put it another way, the
establishment of a
new heavens and a new earth will be nothing more or
less than a
reconstitution of the pristine heavens
and earth known by sinless
Adam.
Because human history since the fall has been characterized by
sin, and since sin will be eradicated .completely
from the universe: it
follows that the cycle of human history between
the fall of First
Adam
and the advent of Second Adam is to be as a bubble on a
string--when the bubble is pricked, the string alone
remains.
Redeemed Mankind and the
Age to Come
In order to visualize what qualities will be
characteristic of man
in the Age to Come, we need only refer to the
original covenant of Genesis once again. Man will
be in the un-
impaired image of God and will exercise lordship,
under God, of all
the universe. Specifically, however, it is instructive
to search out the
eschatological teaching of the
prophets, for there they detail man-to-
man, man-to-nature, and man-to-God relationships that
are only sug-
gested in Genesis. There will
be no war (Isa 2:4; MIC 4:3; Joel 3:10),
29 Ibid., 145-46.
30 Ibid., 136-30.
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CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
REVIEW
but justice and righteousness will prevail (Isa 9:7). The "natural"
animosities between animals and between men and
animals (which,
after all, are not natural) will end (Isa 11:6-9; 65:25; Ezek 34:25; Hos
2:18).
There will be no death or sorrow (Isa 25:8) and even
the desert
lands will come alive and produce abundance (Isa 35:1-2; Joel 3:18).
Man
will then rule with God and for God over all things (Dan 7:27;
Rom
5:17; 1 Cor 6:2; 2 Tim 2:2; Rev 2:26-27; 3:21; 20:4).
In Paul's
great exposition of the truth concerning human
redemption in Romans
8,
he goes on to speak of the redemption of the creation as a whole.
He
suggests that "the creation waits in eager expectation for the sons
of God to be revealed" (
understood as the full, final restitution of the
elect to their position as
partners with God in the covenant plan (cf. 1 Pet
1:7,13).
The Apostle continues by showing how that all
creation was
"subjected to frustration" or made to partake of the
divine curse
because of man's sin (cf. Isa
24:6; Jer 12:4). There is hope, however,
for nature, a hope that will be realized following
the completion of
the redemption of man. The corruption of the earth
(suggested by the
thorns and thistles of Gen
free from its bondage (cf. Acts
whole creation has been groaning as in pains of
childbirth. . ." (Rom
8:22).
This Image suggests that from the old will come something
new. The cursed universe will give birth to a new
one, a birth
associated with the rebirth of the redeemed ones in
their glorified
state.31 Can it be that the
violence and upheavals associated with the
last days of this era, those signs of the end of the
world, are at the
same time the birth throes of nature which agonizes
to deliver a new
heaven and earth worthy of the King and his subjects
who reign with
him (cf. 2 Pet
We would not suggest, of course, that the new
heavens and new
earth will be identical to those described in
Genesis. There are many
factors which would necessitate differences. For
example, Adam lived
in a garden, a life of pastoral, agricultural
pursuits. The citizens of the
New
Earth will live both in this kind of environment and also in a
great city, New Jerusalem, come down from God out of
heaven. We
are led to speculate, however, as to whether or not
such might have
been the case in the original
elapsed for a population large enough to be
conducive to urban life
had emerged. For Adam and Eve to have lived by
themselves in a
city as extensive as that described in Revelation
would be little short
31 C. Hodge, Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans (
1955) 274-75.
Merrill: COVENANT AND THE KINGDOM 307
of absurd (cf.
of Life, central to the Garden of Eden, is also a
major feature of New
different, but the underlying and essential
content is the same.
Also, there is no sun or moon in the world to
come, for the Lamb
is the light thereof (
was sunless light on the earth before man was
created (Gen 1:3), and
that the function of the heavenly lightholders was not only to give
light on the earth, but to serve as time indicators
(Gen
may have been prepared for this latter function in
anticipation of the
“interruption" of time mentioned previously, a kind of proleptic indi-
cator that day and night,
summer and winter, are testimonies to the
continually alternating pattern of life in time,
life as lived by fallen
man. As we see later, part of the Noahic Covenant is the promise by
the Lord that day and night shall not cease ''as
long as the earth
endures" (Gen
have become unnecessary and therefore nonexistent
even in
man successfully passed the probation of the Tree
of the Knowledge
of Good and Evil? The absence of a sea in the
renewed earth might
also be explained on this basis. Perhaps it had been
reserved by the
Lord
as a means of judgment and not as a necessary part of the
creation (cf. 2 Pet 3:5-7).32
A third contact is that of God's dwelling among
men. Rev 21:3
states explicitly that the tabernacle of God will be
among men and
“he will live with them. . . . But Genesis also describes man’s
fellow-
ship with God in terms that suggest that he was among
them in a
unique way, a way not paralleled after man s exile
from the Garden
(Gen
3:8-10).
Finally, John the Apostle visualizes the fact
that there will be no
curse in Heavenly Jerusalem (Rev 22:3), a decided
contrast to the
curse of Genesis 3, but nonetheless a reminder that
the resumption of
the covenant relationship will hark back to the
perfect, uncursed state
of affairs that formed the backdrop of the
original declaration of the
III. Conclusion
The proposition that covenant is a dominant
theme of the Bible
has, we trust, been at least partially demonstrated
by this brief look at
32 For the sea as a symbol of chaos out of which
came (comes) the created order
see B. K. Waltke, Creation and Chaos (
nary, 1974) 13-15.
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CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
REVIEW
early Genesis. It is much more than mere coincidence
that Genesis
and Revelation, the first and last books of
Scripture, should share in
common the idea of man in contractual relationship
with God, the OT
book rehearsing the covenant command to rule over
all things, and
the NT prophetically revealing that man shall
indeed fulfill that cove-
nant requirement perfectly
and eternally.33 Everything in between--
from Genesis 4 through Revelation 20--speaks of sin and
redemption
the violation of the covenant by First Adam and its
obedience and
fulfillment by Second Adam. By the grace of God we
may now exult
with David who exclaimed:
What is man that you are mindful of him,
The son of man, that
you care for him?
You made him a little lower than the heavenly
beings
And crowned him with glory and honor?
You made him ruler over the works of your hands;
You put everything under his feet. . . .
(Ps 8:4-6, NIV)
33 See now the stimulating and provocative
connection of Revelation 21-22 to the
OT
by N. J. Dumbrell, The End of the Beginning (
Books, 1985).
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