New Covenant Theology: A Critical Evaluation

[Posted With Permission, Peter Meney Of “New Focus“]

PART 1

Several friends have written to me during the last few years to tell me that their views of the Old Testament, of Law and Gospel, of the Covenant of Grace, of the Church and of the Person of Christ have been radically altered by the teaching of Fred Zaspel and John Reisinger. A few have turned judgemental and in their new enthusiasm for this new teaching, they have scolded me for keeping to old Reformed patterns of doctrine, exegesis and hermeneutics and have discontinued fellowship. Such disciples are far stricter than their mentors as both Reisinger and Zaspel invite constructive criticism and have altered, if not corrected, their views openly since the late nineteen-nineties. Indeed, they call their own views ‘elastic’. New Covenant Theology (NCT) off-shoots have also emerged with whom Zaspel, Reisinger and others to be mentioned in this series remain in dialogue seeking mutual solutions. This means, however, that any dialogue with the NCT has become like a dialogue with a piece of wet modelling clay as one never knows what shape they might drop into next.

A new character of thinking

In his booklet New Covenant Theology and the Mosaic Law, Fred Zaspel describes the idea behind the term New Covenant as the ‘new character’ of covenant thinking inaugurated by Christ. He claims that NCT stands midway between the two extremes of Covenant Theology and Dispensational Theology. Covenant Theology, according to Zaspel, emphasises the covenants of redemption, works and grace and thus tends ‘to carry the old order into the new’ with the law of the old covenant still binding on the new. In Dispensational Theology, Zaspel argues, the changes and differences between the old and new economies or dispensations are stressed and the law is seen as irrelevant to the covenant believer. New Covenant Theology, Zaspel urges, is centred on Matthew 5:17-20 where Christ says, ‘I am not come to destroy but to fulfil’.1 Zaspel thus sees Jesus as a new Moses and a new Lawgiver who is greater than Moses. The new law of Jesus contains what Zaspel calls ‘eschatological transcendence’ over the old and is to be found in His commandments and sayings, (Matthew 5:18-20).2 Zaspel then goes on to argue that Christ does not merely correct the abuse of the law in Matthew 5 but ‘rescinds’ some laws, ‘restricts’ others and ‘extends the requirements’ of a third group. As Christ is greater than Moses and greater than the law, it is His prerogative to do with the law as ‘He feels fit’.

Giving words new meanings

Zaspel explains that we have misunderstood the word ‘destroy’ in Matthew 5:17. The word does not refer to a ‘tearing down’ or ‘disassembling’ of the law but that Christ ‘has not come to make it fail its intended design.’ This ‘intended design,’ Zaspel sees in what he calls the ‘eschatological realization of the law,’ that ‘brings about its intended and ultimate purpose.’3 This, Zaspel explains, has nothing to do with the old Reformed idea that Christ came to obey the law on behalf of sinners. The old law lost its applicability when Christ came because it was both fulfilled and transcended eschatologically.4 We now live in the time of fulfilment and transcendence which Zaspel calls the time of the law of Christ. As we now have the ‘end’, we can dispense with the means to it. Moses, Zaspel tells us, has taken the back seat. We no longer ask what Moses says but what Christ says. Moses is the Type, Christ the Antitype.5 Zaspel says he is no Antinomian but explains that the shadow function of the law is past but the effect of it remains in Christ. Now, by obeying the fulfilled and transcended law ‘as interpreted by Jesus’, we receive a righteousness that surpasses that of the Scribes and Pharisees. Zaspel maintains that most Reformed writers have entirely missed the point concerning the purpose of the law and closes his booklet with the words:

Nowhere here is there any implication that Jesus came to merely ‘clarify’ or more fully explain Moses’ law. He did nothing of the kind. He came to ‘fulfil’ the law, to give it its final ‘filling up’. His teaching is a necessary advance ‘filling full’ that which awaited Him for precisely this purpose. In Jesus is found, indeed, a full and complete ‘definitive code of morality’. Without Him the old law has no relevance whatever, and the ‘filling’ which he gave it reflects and demands a degree of righteousness which Moses’ law only anticipated.6

Are your alarm bells ringing?

Here, for an orthodox Christian, a number of alarm bells must be ringing. Zaspel leaves us in the dark as to which part of the law is rescinded, which is altered and which is extended. So, too, Zaspel’s New Covenant Theology reveals a radical break with Reformed theology in that it views the covenants of grace, redemption and works as having no part in the continuing revelation of both testaments. The New Covenanters’ claim to have discovered a ‘new character’ of theology is chiefly fostered by a rejection of orthodox Reformed terms such as ‘the covenant of grace’ and giving old terms new meanings. This is illustrated by Zaspel’s interpretation of Christ’s attitude to the law which appears to contradict Christ’s own words, ‘I am not come to destroy but to fulfil.’ In modern, and surely in Biblical parlance, ‘destroy’ means ‘to do away with utterly’. Yet Zaspel says he is not speaking of ‘destroying utterly’ any part of the law but of ‘rescinding’ it, which one would think was the same thing. My OED defines ‘rescind’ as ‘abrogate, annul, revoke, cancel’. Thus, the father of New Covenant Theology, John Reisinger tells us that the law and the Old Covenant, which he equates with the Ten Commandments, are ‘done away’ altogether.7 Zaspel claims that Christ’s words take on new meanings in the light of His fulfilment of the law. The old form is annulled and has been replaced by what Zaspel calls a new effect. By effect, Zaspel does not mean the condemning effect of the Mosaic law on sinners but the post-law transcendence with which Christ replaces it. Though with his doctrine of ‘transcendental eschatology’ Zaspel would gladly promise believers a new spirituality, all he really gives us is legal add-ons which create a new law, for believers. New Covenant teaching is thus basically New Law teaching, that is, a new development of Neonomianism.

Sound Biblical scholarship views Christ’s fulfilment of the law as including His own substitutive obedience to it as the federal Head of His Bride, the elect Church. Christ obeyed both the letter and the spirit of the law because part of His redemptive work was to bring in righteousness where man had none. In order to fulfil the law, Christ had to keep it in the very form and effect in which it was intended as a law which mankind had failed to keep. New Covenant leaders such as Zaspel and Reisinger merely stress nebulously what new, extended teaching Christ brought with Him. Their Christ did not thus fulfil the law in His own body; indeed, He rejected some parts, altered others and added more. This reminds us of Andrew Fuller’s teaching on the law in his chapter on Substitution which claims that Christ did not put Himself under the law but stood “above the law, deviating from the letter, but more than preserving the spirit of it.”8 This does not agree with Matthew 5:18 where Christ claims that not one jot or tittle of the law shall pass away. Furthermore, Christ speaks here of the vast importance of even the least of the law’s commandments. After all, Moses did not invent the law but was given it by the God of both Testaments. The law shows the eternal standard of Father, Son and Holy Ghost and is a description of the Divine character. As God is immutable, nothing can be added to or taken away from that character. So, too, the Apostles were diligent in quoting the Mosaic law as being still valid as we see in Romans 13:9. When Christ Himself takes up one of the Ten Commandments, it is not to rescind, restrict or extend it but to say what it means as in Matthew 5:27-28. Besides, in Matthew 5, Christ is not criticising the moral or spiritual state of Moses but that of the Scribes and Pharisees who externalised the law.

Zaspel, however, so concentrates on the legal, literal aspect of his extended New Covenant law, that he is in danger of externalising it like the Scribes and Pharisees did the original Mosaic law. He is giving us New Covenant Traditions of the Elders. It is furthermore quite clear that Zaspel rejects the Mosaic law because he understands it purely as did the Scribes and Pharisees whom Christ condemned. Thus Tom Wells in his defence of NCT tells us, that it is probable that Jesus and the Ten Commandments do not agree in what they teach.9 Zaspel claims that we must look to the effect of the law rather than the form, but does not explain clearly what this effect is. We must therefore look to other writings of the New Covenant movement to see what they mean by ‘the effect’ or ‘new character’ of their ‘new law’.

(Footnotes)

1 Pages 2-3.

2 Pages 4-6.

3 Pages 13-14.

4 Pages 15-16.

5 Page 19.

6 Page 21.

7 Tablets of Stone, p. 86.

8 Works, vol. II, p. 689.

9 New Covenant Theology, p. 206.

PART 2

There is no new law

The Socinian and New Covenant idea which teaches that Christ came to add to the law and make it more perfect must be rejected on the grounds that God’s Word itself denies the need for such a development. As the law is the reflection of God’s perfect nature and will for mankind, it is thus God’s perfect will for mankind (Psalm 19:7). It is, at the same time, His perfect standard of righteousness and shows “what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God” (Romans 12:2). In other words, the law shows man what law-duties he has in relation to God, both regarding what he should do and what he should not do. No other law is necessary for this purpose. The gospel shows man what he cannot do of himself, i.e. keep the perfect law, but also how Christ not only kept the law on man’s behalf but covenanted with the Father in eternity to take on Himself the elect’s punishment that they might go free and not receive the condemnation they deserve. No other gospel is necessary for this purpose.

Rejecting the covenant of grace

Reformed Christians believe that this eternal covenant of grace was the basis for the gospel of salvation for the elect which came into action as soon as Adam sinned. John Reisinger teaches in his book Abraham’s Four Seeds that there was never such a covenant of grace in either Testament. He considers the term to be unbiblical and quotes Galatians 3:8 as evidence that the gospel to Abraham excludes by definition a covenant of grace with Abraham:

And the scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith, preached before the gospel unto Abraham, saying, In thee shall all nations be blessed.1

Though the entire chapter, one would think, is a clear reference to the covenant of grace, Reisinger says:

Nowhere in all the Word of God does the Holy Spirit call the gospel the Covenant of Grace nor does any verse remotely imply that when God graciously makes known the gospel promise to an individual, or to a whole nation, that he is thereby putting the individual under a covenant of grace. If Covenant Theology is correct, then Paul should have said, ‘God made a covenant of grace with Abraham.2

The Romanists included the notorious Marcionite Prologues into their Vulgate Bibles to show their allegiance with Marcion’s rejection of the Old Testament, especially its teaching on saving grace. New Covenant Theology follows in their wake. Furthermore, Reisinger has wrenched his Galatians ‘proof text’ out of its covenant context. Paul is arguing in the Galatians text for a gospel of salvation anchored clearly in the covenant with Abraham. He is indeed stressing that “God made a covenant of grace with Abraham” saying of it, “And this I say, that the covenant that was confirmed before of God in Christ, the law, which was four hundred and thirty years after, cannot disannul, that it should make the promise of none effect.” Here, Paul is distinguishing clearly between the covenant of grace and the law. Grace was plentiful within the covenant but the condemning law came much later and cannot disannul that covenant. Reisinger must be familiar with Luke 1:54 ff. where the covenant with Abraham made for eternity is described as one of mercy (eleous), a term used synonymously with grace as in Jude 21 and 2 Corinthians 13:14. Reisinger, oddly enough, rejects the covenant of grace because he feels it is not in Biblical terms, yet his own gospel is clothed in theological jargon reminding us of American New-Lighters, Two-Seeders and New Divinity who developed a new religious meta-language. So New Covenanters explain their gospel in terms such as ‘protoevangelium’; ‘escatalogical transcendence’; ‘unique seed’; ‘natural seed’; ‘special natural seed’; ‘spiritual seed’; the ‘four seeds’; ‘the doctrines of grace’ and ‘covenant of redemption’. Whether valid or not, this is not Biblical terminology.

John Gill gives us the lead by telling us that the term ‘covenant of grace’, though not literally and explicitly found as a technical theological term in Scripture, is used:

… properly enough, since it entirely flows from and has its foundation in the grace of God: it is owing to the everlasting love and free favour of God the Father, that he proposed a covenant of this kind to his Son; and it is owing to the grace of the son that he so freely and voluntarily entered into engagements with the Father; the matter, sum and substance of it is grace; it consists of grants and blessings of grace to the elect in Christ; and the ultimate end and design of it is the glory of the grace of God.3

By excluding the covenant of grace from the gospel, Reisinger is merely showing his disregard for the Old Testament. He finds no traces of gospel redemption there. Thus, the gospel promised to Abraham, for Reisinger, did not take place savingly in the lives of the Old Testament saints but was merely an eschatological promise of what was to come after Christ came but in no wise before. However, the Genesis account of the everlasting covenant of grace with Abraham from Genesis 12 on is pure gospel in its teaching that God, even then, was choosing out a people for himself. Indeed, without the OT teaching of the Covenant with Abraham, proclaiming the righteousness which is of faith as experienced by Abraham, we cannot possibly understand aright what the New Testament teaches. For instance, when Paul writes in Ephesians 2:8 ff. on the work of grace in salvation, he places it in a covenantal context outside of which one is a stranger to the gospel ‘having no hope and without God in the world’.

There is no limbus partum in the Christian faith

The Roman Catholic idea of a place where Old Testament believers were detained until Christ arose from the dead and then were set free is void of Scriptural and historical backing. The similar New Covenant idea that the Old Testament saints were under their fallen obligations until Christ paid the price of their sins in future time is equally unscriptural because Christ obligated Himself to pay for those sins in eternity. John Reisinger, in keeping with Rome, teaches that the status of Old Testament saints is different to the status of New Testament saints and that they were in a grey zone between being saved and entering into a future Church, being grafted into the vine and becoming part of the Body of Christ. In his chapter, ‘Who is the Great Nation?’ in his book Abraham’s Four Seeds, Reisinger accepts that there were believing souls in Old Testament times but they nevertheless had not what he calls ‘hope realised’ until Christ came in time. He appears thus to suggest that there was a kind of suspended salvation for OT saints which turned into real, empirical salvation at the point in time when Christ atoned for their sins and Pentecost (why Pentecost?) became a historical event.

This is not Biblical theology; whatever Zaspel and Reisinger call it. The nature of the Church has always been faith in Christ and not rational trust in Christ by sight. There is thus no difference in a saving aspect between the faith of Abraham and the faith of Paul. Indeed, Abraham is depicted in the Scriptures as being the father of the faithful. ‘Hope realised’ will be the lot of the entire Body of Christ on the Resurrection Morning. Indeed, when the author to the Hebrews describes Christian faith, he begins with the faith of the fathers in times past and, before listing their names, tells us (11:1) that, “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Thus, the Old Testament saints are presented to us as exemplary in their true faith and not as second class believers.

Truth to tell, Reisinger declares himself and his followers to be second-class Christians as they base their belief in an eschatological ‘hope realised’ rather than a hope substantiated through faith. Indeed, Reisinger, in keeping with most of the ‘American Religion’ sects influenced by freemasonry and the then budding Mormon movement, has a multi-tiered-view of believers even more complicated than that of the old papist system. He depicts coming to ‘realised hope’ as a hierarchical climb. Starting from believing Jews who are not yet Christ’s Bride, the Church, he moves up to those who have not attained hope realised and then to those who have. Then he arrives at the Non-Baptist Christians and then proceeds higher to ordinary Baptists until he has his Four Seeders sitting right at the top of the ladder of progression.

Reisinger clearly contradicts Genesis 15:6 “And he (Abraham) believed in the Lord and he accounted it to him for righteousness”. Could Abraham have been more saved than at that time? Furthermore, Jesus told the Jews, “Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it, and was glad” (John 8:56). This was before Christ’s vicarious death on the cross, before the resurrection and before Pentecost! We note, too, that Paul speaking to the Roman Christians of their common father in the faith in chapter 4, echoed the words of Genesis 15:6. Indeed, Paul uses Abraham as the prime example of one who believed in Jesus. There is thus no reason whatsoever to disbelieve the fact that those Old Testament saints mentioned in Hebrews 11, and the myriad more whom the author had not time and parchment enough to name, died safely in the Christian faith and entered into the eternal inheritance of the saints, God’s true elect. Hebrews 11:13-16 is worth quoting here:

These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country. And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned. But now they desire a better country, that is an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them a city.

Footnotes)

1 Abraham’s Four Seeds, p. 38.

2 Ibid, p. 38-39.

3 Of the Everlasting Covenant of Grace, Body of Divinity, Vol. I, p. 310.