What's in a Name?
What do we mean to communicate by taking the name "Grace Covenant Church"?Grace
“As for you, you were dead in your sins and transgressions… but God who is rich in mercy made us alive with Christ… It is by grace you are saved, through faith” (Eph. 2:1-10). The church stands on the knowledge and hope of God’s grace. She exists by grace. She is holy by grace. She lives to proclaim the glory of His grace. “Come let us reason together, though your sins be as scarlet they shall be as white as snow, though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool” (Isa.1:18).
It was God who came seeking sinful man, not man seeking Him. It is God who preserves the earth, though wrath is deserved. It was God who called Abraham out of idolatry, sent Moses to deliver Israel from slavery, promised an eternal kingdom to a son of David and sent His own Son, born in David’s line, to die for our sakes. It was God also who raised Him to life again and us with Him--though it is also written that Christ rose from the dead Himself by the power of His own divinity as the second member of the Trinity. The church that does not preach grace does not know man nor God.
Even faith is a gift of God. “This is not of yourselves, it is a gift of God, not by works lest any man should boast” (Eph.2:9,10). “It does not depend therefore on man’s desire or effort, but on God’s mercy” (Rom.9:16).
This is not fatalism, but realism. The dead do not give themselves life. The deaf do not hear. The blind do not see. The lame do not come. But the word of God comes with the power of the Spirit to open eyes and ears, heal the lame, give life to the dead. And everyone who hears and believes will be saved. To all who call on Him, God has promised to answer. “Those who ask receive, who seek will find, who knock will find the door opened to them” (Luke 11:9). The prostitute was made clean. The thief on the cross was promised paradise. With repentance murderers will eat at the Table of the Lord, because He died in our place.
Covenant
What does the word covenant mean? Why is it important? Why place it in the name of the church?
A covenant is an agreement between two or more parties. A marriage is a covenantal agreement, though between equals. It commits the parties to each other with binding obligations.
God‘s covenant with us is called a sovereign covenant because He establishes it according to His sovereign love and mercy and calling. He seals it in the water of baptism. He nourishes it with the word and sacraments. And He is the sovereign judge of those who break covenant and turn away in unbelief, “trampling the blood of the Son underfoot and treating it as an unholy thing” (Heb.10:29).
Covenant is the organizing principle of the Word of God. It is our God-given systematic theology, keeping everything in perspective and balance, leaving nothing out. It shows the unity of the Word of God from beginning to end, the one plan of salvation being worked out under His sovereign power and purpose.
God made a covenant with Adam when He placed him in the garden and said not to eat of a certain tree. Adam broke the covenant and brought death into the world. God showed His grace by promising to send a Saviour (Gen.3:15). But that grace would also be realized by way of a series of covenants.
He made a covenant with Noah never again to send such a devastating judgment as long as the world would last. He made a covenant with Abraham “who believed God and it was counted as righteousness” (Gen.15:6).
He made a covenant with the people at Sinai through Moses and sealed it in the blood of the sacrifice. It was not the law that gave the hope of salvation, but the blood that spoke of Messiah.
He made a covenant with David that it would be a son in his line who would be seated forever on the throne of the promised eternal kingdom.
And the one born in David‘s line, the divine Son incarnate, established the fullness of the covenant of grace in His own blood. “Then He took the cup, gave thanks and offered it to them, saying, `Drink from it all of you. This is my blood of the covenant which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins‘” (Matt.26:27). The covenant of God is a covenant of grace established in the blood of God’s own Son.
At the same time, as in all covenants, there are two sides. We are placed under obligation to love and serve Him in faith. We must also instruct our children whom God claims with us as His own. Even Abraham was instructed to give the sign of the covenant, the seal of the righteousness which is by faith, to his son Isaac at 8 days of age.
Church
The church is that which belongs to Jesus Christ, a people called together to worship and serve Him. “Do not neglect meeting together as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another--and all the more as you see the Day approaching” (Heb.10:25).
The church is an organized body of believers who meet together for worship and encouragement under the authority of the elders called of God. She is referred to as the bride of Christ to show His love and care for her. She is called His body (I Cor. 14) to show her unity under Christ as the Head of the body. She is called the temple of the living God to show that she is holy and He dwells in her midst. She is called a flock, because Christ is the great Shepherd of the sheep who guards and keeps.
Worship is central to the church’s existence because it is in worship that the means of grace are exercised; the preaching of the word, the sacraments and loving spiritual discipline. The heart of worship is listening, for it is truly Christ who speaks when His word is faithfully proclaimed. Worship is a communal dialogue with God as we offer up prayers, songs of praise and gifts of thanksgiving in response to His grace. Worship is victorious because Christ has won the great victory once for all when He died and rose again. Worship belongs also to the children. “From the lips of children and infants you have ordained praise, to silence the foe & the avenger“ (Psalm 8:2). “Suffer the little children to come unto me and do not hinder them, for of such is the kingdom of heaven” (Matt.18:14).
We seek to be a Reformed Church where covenant is not presumption.
- evangelical but not shallow
- charismatic but not seeking after signs
- liberal but not in theology
- catholic but not Roman Catholic
- moral but not Legalistic
- sacramental but not sacerdotal
- seeker sensitive not seeker oriented
- traditional but not traditionalistic
- standing in Christ, yet on the way.
