The Everlasting Covenant
The Substance Of A Sermon, Preached By Mr. Thomas Hull, March 13th, 1881.
“Although my house be not so with God, yet He hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things, and sure.”—2 Samuel 23:5
The things of the “everlasting covenant” are stable things, for they are eternal; and these everlasting things are, to the people of God, precious things, because they are things connected with their salvation. They are loved with the everlasting love of God. They inherit the everlasting blessing; and, as they are interested in the everlasting covenant, they also have an everlasting inheritance, for their inheritance is the everlasting God. When these things are felt in the heart, they are found to be comfortable things in the case of all, the foundation of whose hope is the Lord Jesus, who is, as the promise runs, “A Stone, a tried Stone, a precious Corner-Stone, a sure Foundation,” against which the gates of hell cannot prevail. And the kingdom which belongs to them is a kingdom which cannot be moved. Thus the hope of God’s people is a good hope, through grace, which can never be removed from them; nor can they be removed from it, because the “Lord Jesus Christ is our hope;” and they that are one with Christ are bound up with Him in the bundle of life. He says, “I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any pluck them out of My hand.” He calls them by His grace; He claims them as His own. He dwells in their heart, and He is their God, their Guide, their Strength and Salvation, and their eternal Portion; therefore, it can well be said of them, “Happy art thou, O Israel; who is like unto thee, O people saved by the Lord?” Oh, what an arm of salvation is there! what a Corner-Stone for our hope! what stability for the faith of God’s weak and tried people! The stability of their hope is beyond all the power of hell to affect it. Their evidences may be affected, their frames and feelings may change, but their hope can never be destroyed, for their “life is hid with Christ in God.” Happy are they who trust in Him; blessed are they who enter into Him by faith; for to be found in Him is to be found saved of the Lord!
What a comforting portion these words have been to many of the Lord’s people! It was a very comfortable feeling David had in his soul when he uttered them, although it was some considerable time after the Lord first made known to him the covenant of which he speaks. Many changes had passed over him since that time, but he still viewed the covenant to be perfect, and he felt satisfied in his soul with that which God had prepared for him.
Let us, first, notice David’s reflection concerning his house. Things had not transpired in connection with the development of the covenant as he had expected in respect of it; yet that was not the fault of the covenant, nor of the God of the covenant. It was attributable to his want of a right understanding of some things he wrongly interpreted, through the weakness of his flesh and the strength of his natural affection. And who is there among the people of God that does not, at times, when He gives them a word of promise, see a great deal in it which raises their hope respecting things which deeply concern them? And sometimes they think they see things in it which afterwards do not come to pass. Hopes are, to a great extent, raised, and feelings elated at the time, concerning things which God really has neither promised nor spoken of unto us. But we try to hold our hope of these things, and want to bring them in as being connected with the promise which we would fain have reach to the pleasant desires of our hearts. But it is not always that God says to His people concerning these things as He did to one of old, “I have accepted thee concerning this thing also.” When this covenant was made known to David—as recorded in the seventh chapter of the second Book of Samuel—his heart was filled to overflowing with the goodness and the love of God. It so overpowered him that he wished to be alone with the Lord; therefore he went in and sat down before Him, while he contemplated this covenant and conversed with the Lord about it. And the very fact that God had spoken so graciously to him, and had promised to make him a house, filled him with surprise, and he said, “But Thou hast spoken also of Thy servant’s house for a great while to come.” It was not only a present blessing, but a prospective promise—an everlasting covenant which, I doubt not, he then thought concerned his children too. This thought cheered the heart of David. And where is the man of God who would not like to know that his children were interested in the same everlasting covenant as himself, in the same free grace blessings, the same eternal salvation? Where is the godly man who could wish for his children a better portion than that they should have a part in the mercy of God and the kingdom of Christ? But David here had to say, “Although my house be not so with God.” It had not proved to be so in the case of Absalom, and other members of his family. How little he saw of the manifested grace of God in his children—that is, so far as we know, at least. We read of one who was highly favoured of the Lord, and that was Solomon. God blessed him, and blessed him abundantly; but of the rest, some were cut off in their wickedness, and some lie in obscurity. Therefore, with respect to his children, David was compelled to confess that matters had not prospered as he had anticipated. With his house, it was not in spiritual things as he had desired, and hoped it would be. These are weighty things to godly parents; but how little do children in general think of them! It is sad to see what little value they set upon their own souls, upon the things of God, and an interest therein. Well might the Lord Jesus Christ ask that solemn question, “What shall it profit a man if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul?” What phantoms they choose to follow rather than consider their eternal future! How true it is that “the God of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious Gospel of Christ should shine unto them.”
Oh, children, we know we cannot give you grace, but we can pray for you! We can pray that the grace of Christ may be bestowed upon you, that your eyes may be opened, your hearts circumcised, and you thereby be made truly sensible as to what you are and where you are before God. That is a most solemn hymn which was sung at the commencement of the service—
“Pause, my soul, and ask the question,
‘Art thou ready to meet God?
Am I made a real Christian,
Washed in the Redeemer’s blood?
Have I union
With the Church’s living Head?’”
Oh, that God may impress that on your hearts in such a way that you may never be rid of the anxiety caused thereby until Jesus is revealed to your faith as having made the only, but complete, atonement for your sin!
Let us, in the second place, notice a few things connected with the covenant. In the midst of all David’s sorrowful reflections respecting his house, there had, however, been no unfaithfnlness on the part of God in performing the covenant. Some of David’s anticipations had failed, but the covenant remained the same, and this he found and confessed to be a good and stable covenant, “an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things, and sure.” It was underneath his hope, and it was still the stronghold for his faith. He not only felt, wrapped in it as in a mantle, and bound up in it by bonds of eternal love, but his heart rejoiced in it as his goodly portion and everlasting inheritance. Perhaps some one will say, “And what is this everlasting covenant?” It is a testament of everlasting blessing. As I said before, this covenant is full of blessing; it is a covenant of grace, and therefore it is a covenant of mercy and of salvation. How well, therefore, it is suited to our case, as hopelessly ruined sinners! The former covenant—the covenant of works—affords no help whatever to the fallen sinner in the matter of salvation. There is not one of you can derive any good hope from the law. If you think you do, you are miserably deceived; and if that law ever becomes, by the convincing power of God in your conscience, what some of us have felt it to be, you will find that it holds out no hope to you. Sinner, there is no sound of mercy there, no word of grace, no foothold for thy hope there. “Since to convince and to condemn is all the law can do.” And yet it is a covenant, a covenant which God gave to man—and more, that covenant was given at a time when man was prepared for it. It was first given in the garden of Eden. There, God, who formed man and made him upright, put him as he came from His hand, formed with a disposition and ability to keep the covenant He then gave him. But man, by his own act, made himself a sinner, and rendered himself thereby both unable and indisposed to keep the covenant of God. Sin, then, made a breach betwixt man and God which none but God’s own Son could fill up, and, if He had not stood in the gap, man must have gone to eternal ruin universally. But the Lord Jesus Christ was manifested in due time, according to the promise of God, and according to that covenant of grace which was made before the sinner fell, and in which the Lord Jesus Christ was the covenanting party on behalf of His people. He became their Surety. He offered Himself to God in their behalf. This covenant, then, might well be spoken of as an everlasting covenant, for when the first covenant failed, then a second was found prepared, and it stood firm. The second covenant was not shaken by the fall of man, if the first was. The fall was conducive to the development of the covenant of grace, for if man had never fallen, the second covenant would not have been needed. But when man fell, sin prevailed, and death entered into the world by sin; and then the covenant of God’s grace was from time to time developed, until it was clearly manifested as it now is made known to us in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Thus, underneath all this ruin caused by sin, there was God’s purpose of salvation found, and the foundation of Zion’s hope was laid deep in the eternal mind and counsel of Jehovah. He Himself framed the covenant for His chosen, and, “because He could swear by no greater, He sware by Himself, that by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us.” This covenant was a gracious provision made by God for the time of man’s necessity; and it was brought forth and proclaimed at that time, in the promise that the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent’s head. And as it was revealed in general, so it is in the case of every individual member of Christ made known in their time of necessity and extremity. But David, in speaking of the covenant, was favoured with a sweet and comprehensive view of it. He not only speaks of it as the “everlasting covenant,” but he also speaks of it as a well-ordered covenant, “ordered in all things and sure.” This has reference to all that belongs to Christ, and to all that belongs to His people, for they are so united that they cannot be severed; and the covenant so embraces both, that we cannot speak of one without speaking of the other. All that the covenant contains is found in Christ; all the covenant promises are given in Christ; and all that God’s people hope for in that covenant they receive of Christ. Thus it is “ordered,” for God’s people are a predestined people. They were predestinated unto these things before the world began (2 Tim. 1:9), and every covenant good, every covenant blessing, was ordered for them, and the time, the means, and the manner of the development thereof, were all arranged and fixed. Thus, there is no peradventure here in respect of these things; and, when a child of God can come here, and get a view of the eternal mind, as revealed in the Word of God and in the covenant of His grace, oh, what happiness arises in the soul! Oh, what consolation it imparts to the heart, and what stability it gives to faith and hope! But we should never know anything savingly of the blessings of God, of His grace or His salvation, if it was not revealed in us by the Holy Ghost, for all knowledge would be of no use unless we had experience united with it; therefore David said, “He hath made with me an everlasting covenant.” But perhaps some one will say, “Is it not made with Jesus Christ for the Lord’s chosen race, and are not all the children of God interested in it?” Certainly, if we have received anything of this covenant, all have received it in the way of grace. “For who maketh thee to differ from another? And what hast thou that thou didst not receive? Now if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory as if thou hadst not received it?’’ When we come into this secret experimentally, it makes us feel very little. It humbles the proud sinner as it did David when he exclaimed, under a like feeling, “Who am I, O Lord God, and what is my house, that Thou hast brought me hitherto?’’ “What! has God in His gracious purpose gone before me to save me? Has He fixed His love upon me? Did He think upon me in my ruin and in my dread condemnation? Did He look upon me with love when I was in my sins? Was His eye upon me when I was an enemy to God, an alien and a stranger, and did thoughts of mercy rise in His heart as the fruit of His eternal love to me? Oh, wondrous grace, that God should think of me when I had no care for myself! Oh, wondrous love, that God should love me when I had no love for Him! Oh, matchless mercy, that He should call me His own when I had no desire for Him, nor for a knowledge of His ways!” Thus God commends His love to His people when He declares how He has looked upon them, how He has thought of them, and what He has purposed concerning them. The Apostle sums it up thus, “But God commendeth His love towards us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” Here we see that He not only lays the foundation, but He brings His people to build upon it.
And now, sinner, how stands the case with thee? Art thou “without hope, and without God in the world’’? Or canst thou say that sin is thy burden? If thou art distressed with sin and waiting for mercy, let me ask, where is thy hope? Or what is it founded? Perhaps you will say, “I have no hope.” Well, the hope of God’s people is often out of sight. “What a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for?” There are many of us who have hoped in God when we could neither see nor trace our hope. But, poor sinner, He puts His everlasting arms underneath thy sinking heart, and thy fainting soul, and, though thy heart may be sore distressed, and apparently without hope, yet He is still underneath, and the time of love comes round when the Lord brings His fainting people to feel that the foundation of their hope is laid deep, deep in the infinite mind and covenant, the precious blood and name, of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Let us look at the matter rather more closely for a few minutes. In doing this, we must come to the old subject, personal religion. This is not a thing of fancy, nor a mere notion of the mind. It is a reality, a gracious work—a work wrought in our hearts by the Holy Ghost—and that which God Himself does can never be undone. That which He has built up can never be pulled down, and that which He plants can never be rooted up. If God’s promise of grace is yours—if He has given you a part in this covenant—what He has purposed towards you in eternity will be fulfilled in your experience. You will, by faith, apprehend what God has designed, and enjoy that which God has appointed you. It is of no use our talking about the covenant abstractedly. We must talk about it as we experience it; and when we come to an experience thereof, we find and feel the blessedness of it; we find how the covenant is adapted to our case—to all our needs. We find how every need is met in it, and how everything concerning us is appointed and ordered there; how all the promises of God in the way of grace are sure there, for they are made in Christ and are treasured in Him. “It pleased the Father that in Him should all fulness dwell.” Thus, as we are brought to know the Lord Jesus Christ, we enter into the mystery of the covenant by faith; and this is the way the longing soul desires to come into the inner court, into the secret place of the Most High. Do you want to find the open door of mercy and of grace, whereby a poor trembling sinner may enter in and sit down among the children of the Lord Jesus, as one of those who have obtained everlasting life, as one redeemed with the precious blood of Christ? Be of good courage, for your desire shall be granted; and, as sure as the Lord brings you to His footstool, so sure you will realize His covenant love; and you will realize it by the sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ, for that blood is part of the everlasting covenant; therefore it is called “the blood of the everlasting covenant,” and it was ordered in that covenant that that blood should be shed. Do you feel to need it? Do you need it in the way of atonement? If you would draw near to God, you can only do so by this blood. It is only by virtue of the doing and dying of the Lord Jesus Christ that you can stand accepted before God. There must be an experience of your interest in Christ; for if there is no partaking by faith of His righteousness, there is no other way whereby you can be just with God. There is no other righteousness in which you can appear before Him. We, as transgressors, must, if we are saved, be clothed with a righteousness not our own. And, since His blood alone can cancel our guilt, and His perfect obedience alone justify us before God, He is the only door of hope revealed to sinners in the Gospel. This is the way we need to find; this is the Rock, the Foundation, we need for our hope; and every poor sinner that comes to Him by faith shall be thus brought nigh to God. Your hope may sometimes seem to be withered and gone from you, but it will be revived again, for covenant love is unchanging love. Some of you who have been favoured with a knowledge of Christ for a number of years, and, who have experienced the blessedness of an interest in the “covenant ordered in all things and sure,” have found it comforting in your sorrow, consolatory in your troubles, and a good foundation for your hope in time of trial. Your heart has been strengthened again and again, as the Holy Ghost has brought it to your mind, and has spoken to you of the treasures of grace, of love, and of blessing therein for the poor and needy. And, as He has taken the Word of grace, the Gospel Word, and unfolded it, and you have received of the fulness of the grace which is in Christ Jesus in your hearts, oh, how satisfied you have been with God’s covenant! How glad your heart has been that His mercy, His grace, and His goodness have thus been prepared for a needy soul like you! And now the more you know of it, the more you want to know. Your views are sometimes enlarged, and your heart is enlarged too, as one part after another of this covenant is unfolded, and that often in the midst of trying circumstances. Thus one trouble, as it were, calls forth a promise, and another calls forth a covenant blessing, so that you receive one covenant good upon another from time to time, to the strengthening of your heart. And what does this prove? It proves that you are children of God, that you are His covenant children, that you are loved with an everlasting love, and that the God of the covenant still cares for you; that you are bound up in the bundle of life, and that all the rich provisions made for His Church belong to you. Oh, what a good thing it is to enjoy this—to have a bright earnest that the whole covenant of everlasting love is ours! What a mercy, friends, if we find, as we draw nearer to death, that these experiences of the covenant grow brighter! Some of us know what it is to need it in our lives, and surely we shall need it in death. Death is no trifle; to go from time into eternity, I say is no trifle; to stand before the judgment-seat of Christ is not a light matter. We shall want our evidences clear when we come to die, so as to be well assured that our hope is built upon the sure foundation God has laid in Zion, that, in the prospect of eternity, we may be able to say, “I know whom I have believed.”
When you are in the world, and have to do with the people and things of it—when one thing comes upon another in quick succession, and you are hurried hither and thither with the affairs of this life and the concerns of time—there are many changes will pass over even a heaven-born soul. How often we find that the work of God within us is obscured by those dimming shadows, and how much we are made to feel our need of the constant renewings of the Holy Ghost! Therefore, how comforting it is to realize the reviving and the sweet development of God’s work of grace in the soul under such circumstances! Oh, what a mercy to find that it is sufficient for the day and the hour when we must exchange time for eternity!
May the Lord grant us His covenant grace, that we may each know what it s to live in the Lord, and, when we come to die, may we, through faith in Christ Jesus, prove what it is to die in the Lord. Amen.
Thomas Hull (1831-?) was a High-Calvinist Strict and Particular Baptist preacher. In 1870, he was appointed pastor of the church meeting at Ebenezer Chapel, Hastings, a position he held for thirty-six years. He also served as editor for twenty-eight years of the monthly magazines the “Sower” and the “Little Gleaner”, publications which were founded by Septimus Sears.
