The dangerous error of Covenant Succession Part 3

II. The Fallacy of Covenant Succession Examined cont'd

Another area where support for 'Covenant Succession' is drawn from is that of Scriptural testimonies. The lives and the language that surrounds a number of individuals is employed to bolster this fallacy. However, instead of providing support for the concept of 'Covenant Succession', each one of these Scriptural testimonies argue against this fallacy in different ways:

1. Psalm 22:9,10: But thou art he that took me out of the womb: thou didst make me hope when I was upon my mother’s breasts. I was cast upon thee from the womb: thou art my God from my mother’s belly. These words are taken to refer to David and are viewed as supporting the premise that children can be regenerated from infancy and even when they are in their mother's womb.

However, these words do not refer to David at all but to the person of the mediator Jesus Christ. The whole Psalm in a messianic prophecy from beginning to the end. It commences with a subsequent cry from the cross, it concludes with another cry from the cross. This Psalm is prophetic of the sufferings of the Messiah. Verses 9,10 can no more apply to the personal experience of David than the words of v16: For dogs have compassed me: the assembly of the wicked have inclosed me: they pierced my hands and my feet. Did David also then have his hands and his feet pierced? This would have to be the consistent interpretation if vv 9,10 are going to be applied to David.

The dangerous error of Covenant Succession Part 2

II. The Fallacy of Covenant Succession Examined

Any considered examination of the Scriptural evidence upon which this fallacy is based will require us to seriously question this thesis.

It is surely a most foolish practice to draw a distinction between how we treat and view our children before God and how they actually are in reality before God. How great is the folly of treating our children as being in the covenant when they may not be? It surely must be crystal clear that a person is either in the covenant or they are not. If it is claimed that the children of believers are in the covenant then it must emphatically follow that they will be converted and will persevere unto the end. Not one of them will fall out of the covenant and be lost if they are really and truly in the covenant! This is the infallible terms of the covenant of grace. They cannot be in the covenant and not eventually be saved.

Even the holders of 'Covenant Succession' have to admit the obvious reality that not all children of believers are in Christ. So where is 'Covenant Succession' here? Some go as far as to assert that those who do not persevere are not really their true children after all. A scandalous assertion!

If it has to be acknowledged that sadly many children of believers are not in the covenant because they end up dying out of Christ, then where is the reality of 'Covenant Succession'? The reality makes a mockery out of the claim! All the children of believers are not in the Covenant! Therefore they should not be treated as such.

Sodomy Not Genetic!

It has always been the contention of Biblical Christianity that Sodomy is a perverted moral choice and not a result of a person's genetic constitution. Eight major studies of identical twins in Australia, the U.S., and Scandinavia during the last 20 years have arrived at the same conclusion. Sodomites are not born that way!

The first very large, reliable study of identical twins was conducted in Australia in 1991, followed by a large U.S. study about 1997. Then Australia and the U.S. conducted more twin studies in 2000, followed by several studies in Scandinavia.

Read the whole article - Identical Twin Studies Prove Homosexuality Not Genetic

Quotable Quote

John Owen, the prince of theologians wrote:
Can it be conceived that there should be a redemption of men and those men not redeemed; that a price should be paid and the purchase never consummated? Yet all this must be true, and innumerable other absurdities, if universal redemption be asserted: a price would be paid for all yet few delivered: the redemption of all perfected yet few redeemed: the judge satisfied, the jailor conquered and yet prisoners remain enthralled in bondage, and that eternally.

The dangerous error of Covenant Succession Part 1

There is a belief, professed among some ultra-Reformed, and hyper-Calvinistic circles, that the children of believers do not need to be evangelised and certainly do not need to be converted in the conventional sense of the term. It is 'nurture' and 'discipline' that they need, not 'evangelism' is their mantra!

These 'covenant children', as they are described, are to be looked upon and treated as being 'the children of God'. They must therefore be treated, not as the enemies of God, but as members of, and brothers and sisters in, the kingdom of God. They are even to be welcomed to the Lord's Table in many instances from an early age and encouraged to be partakers of the bread and wine.

This view goes under a number of different titles such as: 'Covenant Succession', 'Presumptive Regeneration', 'Presupposed Regeneration', 'Dormant Regeneration' or 'Covenantal Regeneration'. All with slight variations of meaning in each term, and maybe in some cases no difference of meaning at all. Some adherents certainly engage in semantics where they deny they believe in or hold to 'Presupposed Regeneration' but rather describe their view as 'believing covenant promises' or 'trusting in covenantal election'. Same thing only different words!

Another step along the road of the great apostasy!

BBC News - Church of Scotland General Assembly votes to allow gay ministers

BBC News - Gay marriage: Deal to allow bill to proceed in Parliament

The Church of Scotland's ruling General Assembly has voted to allow active sodomites to become church ministers. This, along with David Cameron striking a deal with Labour to push through sodomite marriage, marks another milestone along the road of the great apostasy that is to take place prior to the Saviour's return, 2 Thessalonians 2:1-3: Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto him, That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition.

A return to the days of Lot in Sodom was prophesied by the Saviour Himself, Luke 17:28-30: Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded; But the same day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man is revealed. Those days are upon us.

It is little wonder that the Word of God depicts true believers as yearning for that day when Christ will return and bring to an end this reign of wickedness, Revelation 22:20: He which testifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus.

Creationists at heart!

Carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere have supposedly broken through a symbolic mark in recent days. Daily measurements of carbon dioxide levels recorded at an United States government agency laboratory on the island of Hawaii have topped 400 parts per million for the first time in the modern age.

The claim is made that the last time carbon dioxide levels were regularly above 400 parts per million was 3-5 million years ago. In the evolutionary scheme of things this is supposed to be before modern humans existed.

BBC News - Carbon dioxide passes symbolic mark

CNN - CO2 levels hit new peak at key observatory

Free Presbyterian Position on Ecclesiastical Separation

Statement from the Free Presbyterian Church in Ulster General Presbytery

This statement has been published and distributed to Free Presbyterian congregations

Our Stand on Separation

The Scriptures lay before Christ’s Church the will of God pertaining to the doctrine of separation. With regard to this doctrine the following points are made clear in God’s Word. (It is important to underline that the points outlined below that present the Biblical teaching on separation, constitute a summary of what the Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster has stated, believed and preached during its entire history).

1. The holiness of God is the undeniable root of separation at both a personal and an ecclesiastical level. God’s holiness is the essence of His very being, thus He is “glorious in holiness”, (Exodus 15: 11); and He is transcendently holy, so that “There is none holy as the Lord”, (1 Samuel 2: 2).

2. On the basis of His own holiness the Lord commands His people to be holy, “Ye shall be holy: for I the Lord your God am holy”, (Leviticus 19: 2), (1 Peter 1: 16).

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