The following brief catechesis arose from a set of questions that were presented to me in the context of a wider-ranging discussion of covenant theology and the sacrament of baptism. As such they are not intended as any kind of comprehensive approach to covenant theology or the theology of baptism, but are limited both by the interests of the questioner and the context of the original discussion.

1. What is the covenant?

Ultimately, the sovereign, free, and ordered bond of love between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, by which each Person commits himself to the Others in self-giving goodness, truth, and mutual love.

Creation is caught up into this bond by God's loving, free, and gracious act of creation, by which creation is constituted in relation to God as Lord and participates analogically in the covenant life of God. Human beings, in Adam and as the sum and pinnacle of creation, were created in this relation in a personal way to be God's sons in the image and likeness of their Father and, collectively, to be the Bride of the Son. By faith in God and the promises of his first covenant, humanity would have lived in perfect and personal obedience, so that in time we would have come into full possession of God as our fruition and blessedness, receiving God's gracious inheritance, particularly the gift of the transforming Spirit.

Tragically, however, through sin Adam (and all of humanity with him) broke the covenant, failing to trust in God’s promises and was estranged from God and his gifts, falling under divine condemnation manifest in death and corruption.

Salvation is the re-creation of the human race in and through Christ who embodies all the promises of the covenant in himself, having received them by his own perfect faith-filled obedience, both suffering the just penalty for sin and finding the goal of creation to have already been achieved in him, by the power of the Spirit, in his glorious resurrection. In this way, God can offer a new covenant of grace to humanity in and through Christ.

2. How do we enter into this covenant in Christ?

We are solemnly admitted to the covenant through baptism, a sign and seal of faith.

First and foremost, however, baptism is an expression of the faithfulness of God himself who in and through Christ Jesus has accomplished salvation for us, a salvation that can be viewed through the lens of Jesus' undergoing baptism in his own person.

The baptism of Jesus points back to all of God's acts of creation and re-creation throughout salvation history, including:

• the original creation in which a new world was drawn by God from the watery deep,
• the safe journey of Noah and his family through water in God’s ship to a new world washed from sin,
• the powerful deliverance of Israel from the slavery of Egypt through the cloud and sea unto a new obedience,
• the entry of Israel into the promised land, crossing the Jordan, with the ark of God’s presence in their midst
• their gracious return from the exile of sin, returning across the great River, vindicating Israel against her enemies.

Jesus' baptism was also a new application of the rites given to God’s people for cleansing from the living death of leprosy and from contact with bodily death, rites that had once reconstituted Israelites as God's priestly people.

Analogously, Jesus' baptism recapitulated the ordination of Aaron and his sons as priests to serve in God's house as guardians of his holiness, servants to their Lord, and ministers to his people.

Finally, the baptism of Jesus set him apart as heir to David's throne, God's anointed and beloved servant, that is, the representative and sum of Israel's own sonship and her service to the nations--the Messiah or Christ.

Thus the baptism of Jesus summarized all of God's promises to his people through the centuries--promises of sonship, vindication, spiritual anointing, new creation, God’s presence, cleansing, and so on--and attested to God's faithfulness to all of those promises in Christ. It thus also marked out Jesus as the Elect One of God, the faithful remnant, even when everyone else had fled and fallen away.

Under the sign of baptism, Jesus truly lived out the meaning of baptism, living by faith in the promises of his Father, seeking rule by means of service, following the way of perfect obedience even unto death where, in the agony and forsakenness of the cross, he entered into the curse of the covenant. Jesus was able to pass through this judgment by faith in the Father who had sent him and proclaimed him his own beloved Son at his baptism in the Jordan, sealed him with every promise, and granted him his own Spirit as an earnest of the promised inheritance. And Jesus' own faith received its reward when the Father, by that same Spirit, raised Jesus from the dead, declaring him to be his holy son and vindicating him as the new, holy creation in whom all of God's promises are "Yes" and "Amen."

That same Spirit, in turn, was poured out upon the Church in the baptism of Pentecost, constituting the Church as God's own vindicated, holy new-creation people, the fulfillment of his promises in Christ, designating them as the elect and holy heirs of God. As they went into the world as God's ambassadors of reconciliation, heralds of the new creation, others were united to them through baptism to share in what they already were in Christ.  Thus, as God's anointed people, the Church is Christ for us, Christus totus, Head and Body.

Therefore, by baptism, everything that belongs to Christ and to his Church in him, is held out and offered to us--we are recipients of God's promises in Christ, having God's own faithfulness proclaimed to us personally and individually, being incorporated into the very faithfulness of Christ and into the faith of his Church.  By baptism we are "Christians."  The only possible proper response is to turn in faith to God and live out what we already are through our baptismal identity. Someday, like Christ, and through the faith-filled obedience that follows the Way of the cross, we too will share fully in the resurrection and new creation that is already offered to us.

3. What does entering into this covenant accomplish for us?

Ultimately, salvation as part of the new-creation people of God. If by faith we live in God’s promises already offered to us in baptism, then we will truly be those who enter into union with Christ, within his Church, and are thereby called, adopted, vindicated, and set apart as holy, unto salvation. The life of God's people together in Christ with God as their Father and filled with the Spirit isn't simply the means of salvation or a benefit of salvation, but is the very goal of salvation. In the Church, constituted by baptism, salvation has already begun, though only by anticipation.

4. Does covenant blessing or curse depend upon our response to conditions of the covenant, that is, faith working in love?

Yes. But that does not mean the covenant is neutral, awaiting our response. The covenant is unqualifiedly Good News, God’s unmerited grace, and brings blessing.  The only possible proper response to the blessing it brings is faith and that faith is one that works in love. If that blessing is rejected through faithlessness, it is not because God has not offered sufficient blessing to us, but due to our own ingratitude and faithlessness. God is always faithful.

5. Does our covenant status as baptized Christians imply our election?

Yes, since election is only revealed in and through the covenant. The covenant people, as the body of Christ, the Elect One of God, are chosen by God as the people who have the ordinary means of salvation and offers of grace by Christ. Sadly, many of those who are among this chosen people will turn out to be reprobate through apostasy from whatever common operations they once enjoyed.

Nonetheless, God's purposes shall surely stand as he gathers all those elected to salvation in and through the chosen covenant people. Those who persevere in faith have no one to thank but God in his free and sovereign electing love poured out--salvation is by grace alone. Those who apostatize have no one to blame but themselves for having squandered God's good gifts.

Election is not a logical premise, not "information" from which we are to decide whether or not to respond to God in faith, or worry whether or not we are elect, or use as an excuse if we decide we are reprobate. Rather, it is Gospel--the Good News that God has chosen to make salvation available in Christ by faith to all who respond and that ultimately we need not depend upon our own resources--since they are never sufficient--but upon the grace of God alone.

Election is a conclusion: that if we find ourselves drawn to Christ by faith, among the baptized people of God, we are only there because God has brought us there. The proper response here is faith in God's gracious purposes, dependence upon and trust in his promises in Christ which alone are sufficient, and such faith saves, assuring us of our salvation and election. After all, Christ himself took upon himself the role of Israel, God's Old Covenant chosen people. And where Israel had apostatized and fallen away time and again, Jesus persevered by faith as the true and faithful elect remnant. Thus Jesus is the Elect One of God, par excellance, and our election must always be seen as election in Christ, though faith in him.

6. Should we distinguish, then, between our election to the covenant, for all who are baptized, and another kind of election, for all who persevere unto eternal salvation?

If someone enters the covenant community through baptism and we believe that God foreordains everything that comes to pass, then that baptism must be as much part of the eternal decree of God as anything. It is the historical manifestation of an eternal election to be part of the covenant people. Since the covenant is an administration of grace and Good News, that election must flow from the unchanging and free love of God and the grace that is found in the person and work of Jesus Christ.

Against the background of the Old Testament revelation of Israel as God's chosen people, when the New Testament speaks of "election," it often speaks corporately in terms of the chosen new covenant people of God who constitute the visible body of Christ through baptism. If someone enters the visible body of Christ by baptism--united in some manner to the Head as a member of the Body--then, that person is, in that sense, "elect in Christ." If that person apostatizes and no longer abides in Christ (like the branches in John 15), he is no longer elect in Christ, but is reprobate, should he never repent and return. Whatever time we abide in Christ is a manifestation of God's sovereign love for us, his offers of grace, and his faithfulness to us.

"Election," in the strictest sense, however, issues in perseverance, our faithful response to God's faithfulness to us in Christ. If we persevere to the end, we have only done so by grace through faith, that is, the purposes of God in election. We persevered because we were elect, by the grace of God. That is the chief point of the Scriptural teaching on election.

If we do fall away in unbelief, then we cannot turn and blame God for not electing us. We have only ourselves to blame. God had held out to us every good gift in Christ and we are without excuse.

7. Does our baptism presume we are regenerate or elect to salvation?

No. We baptize in terms of God's promise and profession of faith. And God's promise is for all of those who profess faith, together with their children. Trusting God's promises, acting on the basis of them, and living in terms of them is not "presumption," but faith.

Moreover, we do not baptize because the one to be baptized is necessarily already regenerate. Rather we baptize in order that the one who is baptized be made regenerate or might grow in his regeneration.  There are several senses in which we may say that the Spirit regenerates through baptism.

First, baptism sacramentally turns us away from the old Adam and inserts us into the covenant, identifying us with Christ--the One born from above, raised from death, renewed in the Spirit, in whom is new creation--and identifying us with his covenant people--the new-creation people, born from above on Pentecost. Thus, all that is meant by "regeneration" is offered and sealed to us in baptism so that, sacramentally and conditionally, we can be said to be "regenerate."

Second, for those who receive Christ in faith as he is offered to us in baptism, the sacrament is a means by which the Spirit communicates and augments regenerating grace in order that we might more and more die unto sin and live in newness of life, and so, by faith, coming to embody our identity in Christ as dead to sin, renewed in the Spirit, and living among the new-creation people of God.

As for election, baptism is related to election, first of all, in that baptism is the sovereign manifestation of God's eternal will for that person to be part of his visible chosen people. Secondly, for all who receive baptism, looking to Christ in faith as he is offered in the sacrament, baptism then also serves as one part of the assurance of our election in Christ, into whom we are baptized.

8. When an infant is baptized, does God create faith in the child?

I'm not entirely sure what it would mean for God to "create faith." Faith isn't a thing to be created. It doesn't come in discrete amounts to be divvied out or as a substance to be infused.

Faith is a relationship of trust. Baptism is, as I said above, the faithfulness of God applied to us individually and personally--a faithfulness made known in the faith-filled obedience of Christ unto death and as the one to whom God was faithful by raising him from the dead. That faith of Christ is carried forward in the faith his Church in response to God’s saving work through Christ Jesus.

If God was faithful to Jesus even through the forsaken hell of the cross and Jesus' own faithfulness received the promised reward, then we have absolutely no reason not to place our faith in God when he extends that same faithfulness to us personally at the baptismal font among the people in whom that faith continues to live. So baptism elicits faith in the child, incorporating that child into the faith of Jesus and his Church, though such faith can wither away through ingratitude.

Therefore, as the baptized people of God, we must live out that baptismal identity by all the more turning to Christ in faith, repenting of our sins, and calling upon our baptized children to do the same.

9. What is the place of church and family?  Specifically, what is the obligation that covenant keepers raise their kids as covenant keepers?

It is the holy privilege and obligation to raise their children as "covenant keepers," that is, first and foremost as those who place their all faith in Christ alone for their salvation, for it was into Christ that they were baptized.

Parents and the wider church family, therefore, need to preach the Gospel to their baptized children because that Gospel belongs to those children. It is their most precious possession and it is kept living and pure through an ever-growing faith. After all, the whole Christian life is one of faith and repentance from beginning to end. That is part of what it means to live under the sign of baptism.

10. What about baptized children who are reared in unfaithful churches and families?

A great tragedy, for they will be judged in accordance with the greater measure of grace held out to them.

But God knows the difference between high-handed sin and being misled or being left in ignorance by those into whose spiritual care we were entrusted in baptism. I am sure our Father will sort things out in his mercy with regard to all his baptized children.

It is not, however, the fault merely of those unfaithful churches and families. We who have had the benefit of faithful teaching and families have an obligation to all of those who, by baptism constitute our Christian brothers and sisters, an obligation to call upon them to improve their baptisms, to live out the grace already offered and promised to them in Christ. We must tell them of the holy obligation that baptism bestows, the obligation to turn to Christ in a living faith, and rely wholly upon him for salvation. In doing this we thereby proclaim the Gospel first to the "Jew," then also to the "Greek." We cannot, without hypocrisy, lay all the blame upon those unfaithful churches and families if we too are neglecting our mandate towards them.