It may be my own ignorance, but I have always been puzzled by the one 
convenant/multiple administrations theme of CT.  In the United States, we 
have one constitution, but a multiplicity of administrations of it.  We may 
bicker quite a bit about how to administer that constitution, but both major 
parties do agree to the same constitution.  (Please do not allow this to 
become a political debate - I know there are some on both sides who would 
accuse the other side of  overthrowing the constitution.  Just go with me a 
bit on this :-) )  However, there are some parties who, if they gained 
control over the gov't could not be counted as a different admin. of the 
same constitution; parites whose basic beliefs run contrary to the very 
essence of the const.  For example, if the communist party were to gain 
control and have their way, it could not be an administration of the present 
constitution, for the tyranny of communism is entirely in opposition to the 
freedom of a democratic republic.

In the same sense, how can a covenant of bondage be simply a different 
administration of the covenant of freedom; cov. of individual responsibility 
a differnt admin of cov. of federal headship, a covenant of the reminder of 
sin a different admin. of the covenant of forgetting sin, works~grace, 
death~life, and on and on.

There is a covenant of life of which  there has been only one 
administration: the gospel.  It is true that the gospel was not known in all 
its details until the coming of Christ, and it is true that Grace Covenant 
believers in old times worshipped according to various forms.  But GC 
believers have never worshipped by any other reality than Christ and faith 
in Him.  The Lord said, "The time is coming and now is when they that 
worship the father will worship him in spirit and truth.  Notice that he did 
not say that it was only a COMING thing, but was already the PRESENT truth: 
God's people have never worshipped him in any other way.  The CG believer 
was a child during the times of the OC, and his life was no different than 
that of a slave.  And even though the coming of Christ has made him an adult 
in the household of God, it has not changed his relationship to God nor 
changed the content of His blessing: he has merely gone from promise to 
possession; from being an heir of the father's wealth to being a possessor 
of it. (See Gal. 4)  To insist that a present day believer must once again 
come under the jurisdiction of the law is to say an adult must take the 
place of a child, and worse yet, that a worshipper must become an idolater! 
(See Gal 4.8,9) Note that Paul, talking to converted GENTILES, who formerly 
served idols says that accepting the demands of the Judaizers would be to 
return to the weak and beggarly elements to which they were formerly in 
bondage.  I do not accuse all CT'ers of this, for not all remain consistent 
with their theology and I suppose some just do not see the necessary outcome 
of what they profess.

The OC is a one administration of the covenant of works, not grace.  The CW 
is another eternal covenant, if you will, but one by which no one but the 
Lord Jesus has ever been justified.

Joe T



----- Original Message ----- 
From: "John Reisinger" <24jreisinger26@...>
To: <soundofgrace@...>
Sent: Thursday, December 09, 2004 2:37 PM
Subject: [soundofgrace] infant baptism


Is it possible that the following quote shows the REAL REASON Reformed 
Baptist have never dented the Reformed Paedo-baptist?

  A great deal of Baptist apologetics, as it seems to me, has failed to come 
to terms with the indubitable fact that the Covenant of Grace, although it 
exhibits diversity of administrations in the time of promise and in the time 
of fulfillment, is none-the-less one covenant. As we shall see in a 
subsequent chapter, Reformed Paedo-baptists argue from this fact to a very 
wrong conclusion, namely, that as children were baptized under theold 
economy, so they ought to be baptized under the new. Neverthe less their 
contention is correctthe covenant of grace is one on all ages. In my view 
Baptists will never seriously disturb Reformed Paedo-baptists until they see 
this. The divisive, atomistic approach of so much contempory Baptist 
apologetics is about effective at this point as a shot-gun against a Sherman 
tank.



  Children of Abraham, by David Kingdon, Carey Publications, 5 Fairland 
Close, Haywars Heather, Sussex RH16 3EF, 1973



  I have never met a single Pastor, except Fred Malone (he was first a 
baptist then a presbuterian and then a Baptist again), who was converted 
from a Paedo-baptist position without first leaving Covenant Theology. I 
think Kingdon has in backwards. Malone's book is the best "out theologizing" 
the paedo-baptist that has been written but I doubt it will convert any 
Presbyerian pastors. I hope I am wrong.   JGR



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