The Agreement of Grace
The Agreement of Grace
DR. LEONARD J. COPPES
(Translated by Mercedes Cordero and Carmen G. Villanueva)
WHAT TEACHES THE BIBLE IS BROUGHT OVER BY IT
OF THE AGREEMENT
An agreement is an agreement between two or more persons. This concept identifies several contractual agreements described in the Bible. Although the fundamental concept of the agreement is relatively easy to exhibit, it is not easy to define since one applies to different types of agreements registered in the Bible.
There are agreements that are bilateral, or between two parts that mutually they agree, such as the agreement between Abraham and Abimelec (Genesis 21:27) and the agreement between David and Jonatán (1 Samuel 20:8,18). It might give other examples of bilateral agreements, but with these two examples it remains clear that the word “agreement“ can represent an agreement entity two or more persons.
The Bible exhibits the God's dealing with the man like an external work of his advice eternal, by means of which, between the Trinidad, Father and Son agreed to redeem the elect ones. This is called the redemption agreement. This conclusion rests in the educations of the Bible that only one exists religion revealed by God. The practice of this religion consists of having companionship with, and adoring and serving to the only real God. The benefit of this companionship is that the man will have life in companionship with God as God planned it for him, more abundant life (Juan 10:10; Tito.1:2). Everything what is revealed in the Bible is a record of how this redemption agreement was executed in the agreements of work and of grace. This record is properly identified like the agreement.
The unilateral agreements are agreements in which a top part imposes his will (be benevolentemente or malevolentemente) on the low one. The Bible exhibits the dealing benevolente and cordial of God with the man like the exterior work of the agreement of redemption and like two unilateral agreements. They are called these the agreement of work and the grace agreement.
The phrase “agreement of works” describes the application of the eternal agreement of redemption as it was applied before the fall. This is a unilateral agreement to the effect that it was imposed on the man, or, the man did not take part in the definition of his terms or regulations. Neither he agreed that it was initiated.“ Obras” is the central phenomenon that the Bible describes as the characteristic that distinguishes it from other divine agreements. In this one there is an element of indisputable grace, and it is fundamentally of grace as for which the man was not deserving, of any form, any of many benefits that received on behalf of God. Nevertheless, it differs clearly from all the God's dealings with the man that came after the fall for the condition in which the man should remain in enjoyment of the companionship with God and his special blessings. So it is a works agreement not for the terms of his beginning (which were of grace) but for the terms of his continuation (the perfect obedience of the man towards God).
The phrase “agreement of grace” describes the application of the agreement eternal of redemption as it was applied after the fall. This, also, is a unilateral agreement while it is imposed on the man, that is to say, the man neither takes part in defining the terms or regulations, nor agrees his beginning.“ Grace” is the central phenomenon that the Bible describes as his distinctive characteristic on the agreement belonging to the garden of the Eden. It consists of grace both in his beginning and in his continuation. Nevertheless, this does not mean that the individual men have no responsibility towards God. They are persons in charge of expiring with the terms of the beginning. They must repent of his sinful rebellion against God, which consists of what there are and what they do. But they cannot do this for themselves. Therefore, they can expire with the terms of the admission (faith and repentance) only after being joined to Christ by the work of the Holy Spirit in them. After entering the agreement, the man must continue in obedience the same one. Also they are unable to do this themselves. But since they are joined to Christ and inhabited by the Holy Spirit, his efforts rest in and grow due to the God's work in them (Filipenses 2:10). So, once regenerated, they have a new spirit that for nature wails in obedience to God (Romans 8:15).
The Bible teaches that every human being after the fall still lives under the agreement of work (Romans 5:12). Every man is a person in charge of expiring perfectly with the straight God standards if it is going to have companionship with him. If a man does not expire with these standards, there neither escapes nor can escape of the state in which he was born, that is to say, the state of being without God and without hopes in the world: the state of sin and death. This standard is not another thing than the man is suitable for the companionship with God. God is a Saint (without any attraction to be involved by the evil or the sin), I joust (without any practice of evil or sin) and well (without any presence of evil or sin). As such, in its own nature he eradicates any sin that comes in front of him. So every man is under the curse of the law (Gálatas 3:10, 12-13) and it is needed from him that it is holy as well as God is holy (Lev. 11:44; 1 Pedro 1:16), that is to say, to be holy, just and good.
In the Biblical terminology, the grace agreement splits into the ancient agreement, which comprises what we call the Ancient Testament, and the new agreement or the New Testament. The ancient agreement is subdivided in the following agreements: the “Agreement Adámico” of before the fall, the Agreement Adámico, the Nonethical Agreement, the Agreement Abrahámico, the Mosaic Agreement (which consists of two agreements) and the Agreement Davídico of after the fall. Each of these minor agreements is represented in the Bible as it departs from a major agreement. The readership will notice that this division is slightly different from the presented one previously. The difference comes from the Bible itself. I dress with largeness, the agreement pre-fall is a part of the Agreement of Grace; I dress with restriction, it it is not. Speaking in general, this agreement is the necessary background and it serves like an introduction to the Agreement of Grace, properly speaking.
WHAT THE BÍBLIA TEACHES ON
THE AGREEMENT OF GRACE
I. THE DEFINITE AGREEMENT OF GRACE
In the theology of the agreement the whole history after the fall of the man in sin is seen like a progressive work of the agreement of God's Grace (Tito. 1:2). From the first promise to Adam after the fall and across the history until the last days, God arranges all the things to achieve his intention of redeeming for himself his people.
A. The Agreement of Grace in the Ancient Testament
This agreement has several administrations in the time before Christ's arrival. From Adam up to Abraham one shows in several separated agreements, which are essentially only one that I compromise in which the grace prevails (Efesios 2:12). This means that the central or basic blessings of the agreement come to those who receive it like a God's gift (Romans 9:6-8). At the same time, all those who receive it they were called to and they answered with faith, for which they retain the divine promise of eternal life across the seed that would restore the man to have real companionship with God (Romans 4). To the agreement of the Mosaic period there is called he the first or ancient agreement in the New Testament (Hebrews 8:7-9). Resting in and tipológicamente indicating towards the promise in Christ, it was administered in this time by promises, predictions, sacrifices, circumcision and the lamb of the Easter as a big number of other guys and batmen given to the Jews. These signs were sufficient for those times across the work of the Spirit to instruct and to develop the God's village in his faith and in the Messiah who had to come (Juan.3:10; II Timoteo 3:16; 1 Corinthian. 9:10,10:6-11). For Him, the God's people had entire pardon of sins and eternal salvation (Hebrews 11, vs.16 especially; 12:23).
B. The Agreement of Grace in the New Testament (New Agreement)
When Christ came, the mystery was completely revealed, the shade was a reality, and the types turned into anti-types. The grace agreement now is called a new agreement. The ordinances by which this new agreement is administered are the preaching of the Word and the sacraments of the baptism and the Dinner of the Gentleman although these are less, simpler and outwardly less splendid, in them the agreement is revealed more completely, egg white and powerfully to all the nations, both Jewish and kind. Only there is only one I compromise of grace across the whole history of the man from the fall.
C. The relation between the previous agreements and the new agreement
Although the distinction between different agreements belongs to the period of the Ancient Testament, this several agreements are often, and correctly, seen like only one agreement, in contrast with the New Agreement in Christ (Hebrews 8; Efesios 2:12). Consequently, it is adapted to see Christ like the crucial point in the history of the redemption and two big periods (earlier and A.D.) like the mark of a big structural division in the history. These two periods have to turn being related entirely one with other like promise and fulfillment and like shade and reality.
II. The DEVELOPMENT of the agreement of grace in the history
A. Adam: the agreement of the beginning (Genesis 3:14-19; Romans 8:7, 20-22; 16:20; 1 Timoteo 2:15)
The God's words, Eva and the snake immediately after the fall brought to Adam promises and curses that find his culmination in Jesus Christ. How are you declarations define the conditions of the life, one has concluded correctly that are the substance of the agreement. The central promise of this agreement (the destruction of the snake and the wound of the seed of the woman) the stable thing as an agreement of grace. The God's words declare the nature of the struggle that will happen in the cause of bringing the man to salvation. In the perspiration of the forehead of the man, across the childbearing pain, for the provision of only one Champion, God will reach for the man absolute redemption. The intention of all this program is the restoration of the man to the state of communion and blessing for which it was created originally and of which cannot fall down (Juan 6:39).
B. Noé: The Agreement of Preservation (Gene 6:17-22; 8:20-22; 9:1-17)
After the deluge, God did an agreement with the man across Noé to preserve the ground until the redemption history was completed. This preservation takes as his essential goal to support and to govern to the world up to reaching the finished redemption. The sovereign God grace centers in, or chooses to, only one family that he saves from the destructive judgment of the deluge. He seals his grace relation with them for the sign of the rainbow. After the deluge, God declares that the Noé progeny will be bless you in Sem, suggesting that the redemption would come across this familiar line, and this way briefly it outlines the history of the world. It is clear that the redemption rests only in the divine grace and comes across the promise.
C. Abraham: The Agreement of Promise (Gene 15,17; Romans 4; Galatas. 3)
This promise agreement can be called in the only sense in view of Romans 4 and Gálatas 3. In this agreement, God moves forward his redemption intention on having chosen certain village (election) and to promise to give him eternal life and earthly domain (Romans 4:13). These promises are exhibited in types like the promise of ground (Hebrews 11:8-10; 13-16; Romans 4:13), a seed (Romans 4:9-12) and blessing to all the nations of the world (Romans 4:16-18, Gálatas 3).
D. Moisés: The Agreement of The Law
Although it is in a certain way inappropriate, this one has been called the agreement of the law because it is here that the God's law finds his finished expression. God now forms Abraham's people in a nation on having given him the ground and the law. In this, he fulfills the promises tipológicas given to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (Josué 21:43-45). Israel was hardened like a nation distinctive and dedicated like the God's priests (Ex-19:6). The prescripts of the Law were positive expressions of the justice eternal and the truth, of the God's nature (Psalm 19). He was taught to the people by the requests of a holy life, convincing them this way in sin (the first use of the Law, 1 Timoteo 1:8-11), increasing his knowledge of the need for redemption (the second use, Romans 7:7-11) and emphasizing the type of life for that one was expecting from the God's holy people (the third use, Romans 8:7-9; 13:8-10; Santiago 2:8-12). This agreement shows the redemption promise across the grace, both by means of the types and by means of the predictions (Deuteronomy 30), it was not teaching that the man could save himself by means of the good works (Gálatas 2:15-16; 3:1).
E. David: The Agreement of the Kingdom (2 Samuel. 7; Psalm 78:60-72; Mateo1:1; Lucas 1:32, 69; Juan 7:42; Facts 2:29-36; 13:23; Romans 1:3; Hebrews 1:5)
Into the agreement done across David, God it transformed a nation that had chosen to be merely a human kingdom in an eternal kingdom where your throne would dominate forever (1 Samuel 6:5-9; 2 Samuel 7). Under David and Salomón, they had a more finished possession of the ground and the God's kingdom was established tipológicamente in the ground. God promised to establish his kingdom forever on his people across David's descendant. After the kingdom was coming undone, the God's people began to understand better that there was a major way when there would come a bigger occupant of David's throne. This fiancé (the Messiah) would sit down in David's throne forever and would govern the ground in justice (Hebreos1).
G. Christ: The New Agreement (Deuteronomy 30:1-6; Ezequiel 36:22-27; 37:24-28; Sniveller. 31:31-34; 32:37-41; 33:14-26; Lucas 22:14-23; Hebrews 8, 10:15-18; Romans 4:9-12; 9:6-8, 16, 25; Efesios 2:11-22; Colosenses 2:11-12)
The sin of Israel possibly resulted in the expulsion of the people of the engaged ground as God had warned them in his agreement (Deuteronomy 28). Although Israel failed in his responsibilities pactuales, the redemption promise for they and the whole humanity did not fail, since it was resting in the sovereign God grace. Across Cradle and the prophets, God said to the people that it was going to establish a New Agreement with them (Deuteronomy 30:1-6; Ezequiel 36:22-27; 37:24-28; Sniveller 31:31-34; 32:37-41; 33:14-26). This New Agreement was inaugurated formally by Mister Jesus Christ in what commonly it is called the Dinner of the Gentleman.
Each of the successive agreements with Adam, Noé, Abraham, Cradle and David find his fulfillment in the New Agreement in and across Jesus Christ as it is demonstrated in the references of the New Testament under each of the previous titles. The Ancient Agreement, with his predictions and shades, now has passed to the New Agreement with his fulfillment and reality.
Jesus is this engaged seed of the woman who would defeat Satan. It is the way predicted for which Abraham's seed would bless to all the nations. It is the only one that has obeyed the God's Law perfectly given across Cradle and is not under condemnation of the Law. It is the only perfect sacrifice for the sin by means of who all the God's requests for the restoration of the man were fulfilled (Romans 8:1-7).
It is the fulfillment, David's so awaited descendant and now he reigns like Christ (Messiah or the ungido) on your kingdom sat in the engaged throne of God (Facts 2:29-36). Since they do not believe in him, the Jews by natural descent have been cut and separated from the God's people. The Jews who confess it like his Salvador, together with all the gentiles who do the same confession, they form real Israel de Dios (Romans 11:17-24; Gálatas 6:15-16), and they are taking part in the agreement of the promise, members of the same people of Israel, they have hope and God in the world, members of the God's family (Efesios 2:11-19). This way, after Christ's arrival, the physical descent does not determine already if one is Jewish or not, but he decides on the new nature of one, if it is circumcised or not in the heart (Romans 2:27-29; Gálatas 2:15). It is the receptacle of all the God's promises (Efesios 2:11-12: Romans 15:9-10; 2 Corinthian 1:20).
Although all the God's promises were fulfilled in Christ, even a major fulfillment of these promises is missing in the times for coming. When the work of God's redemption is finished, the veil will be removed and the reigned present of Christ will be evident completely (Hebrews 2:8, Filipenses 2:9-11). Then, Christ will deliver the kingdom to God the Father so that God is everything in everything (1 Corinthian 15:23-28).
III. important Abridged truths shown by the agreement of Grace
A. The unit and continuity of the God's People in all the times.
B. The unit of the only Intention of God for his people of the agreement across all the times.
C. The church of the New Agreement is the continuation and the successor legitimizes of the church of the Ancient Agreement (Romans 11:17-24; Efesios 2:11-22; Gálatas 4:28-31; Colosenses