Douglas Wilson and Covenant Objectivity: A Baptist Appraisal

Introduction

Douglas Wilson, the lead pastor at Christ Church Moscow, Idaho, has become a very well-known figure in recent years. His popularity seemed to dramatically rise due to his bold stand against Covid restrictions and vaccine mandates. In 2020, I came to Grande Prairie, and it was here that I made some acquaintances with people from the local CREC Church (Doug Wilson’s denomination).[1] Some of these have become friends. I know them to be godly people who love the Lord and His Word. However, Douglas Wilson’s theology is of concern to me. Some of these concerns are standard Baptist concerns with Paedobaptist theology, but in some respects, Wilson is distinct from the standard Paedobaptist. The main idea I will cover in this paper is his concept of “covenant objectivity,” which I will critique from a Baptist perspective.

Paedobaptist and Baptist Covenant Theology

Typical Paedobaptists today insist on the invisible/visible church distinction, which means there are some members of the “visible church” (those who are baptized members in our churches) who are not truly members of the “invisible church.”[2] We can agree with this as Baptists to an extent. The work of the Spirit in someone’s life is invisible (though it has visible effects), and so it is impossible to discern whether someone is truly regenerate with one hundred percent accuracy.[3] Yet, Baptists are those who believe that we should strive for a pure church, with only truly regenerate people as baptized members of our churches. We strive for a pure church by insisting that we only baptize and welcome into membership those who are visible saints, who profess faith and obedience and do not live lives or hold doctrine that contradicts that profession. As the 1689 says:

All people throughout the world who profess the faith of the gospel and obedience to God through Christ in keeping with the gospel are and may be called visible saints, as long as they do not destroy their own profession by any foundational errors or unholy living. All local congregations ought to be made up of these.[4]

The invisible/visible church distinction helps Paedobaptists deal with the fact that, by baptizing infants, they are potentially bringing many yet-unregenerate people into their church membership. They see these children growing up in the church as members of the visible church, yet not necessarily members of the invisible church yet. Most Paedobaptist churches also practice membership and the Lord’s Supper in such a way as to exclude those who cannot give a credible profession of faith. Faithful paedobaptist churches do try to strive for the purity of the church, but from a Baptist perspective, they necessarily bring in an impure element, by their insistence on baptizing children who have not yet professed faith.

Covenant Objectivity

Doug Wilson’s view of the Church is a bit distinct, however, with his concept of “covenant objectivity.” This is part of what the Federal Vision movement (of which Wilson was/is a part) wanted to put forward. As Stephen Wellum notes in his article on Federal Vision:

In 2007 “A Joint Federal Vision Profession” was issued signed by its key representatives: John Barach, Rich Lusk, Randy Booth, Jeff Meyers, Tim Gallant, Ralph Smith, Mark Horne, Steve Wilkins, Jim Jordan, Douglas Wilson, and Peter Leithart. What united the diversity within the movement was the emphasis on the “objectivity” of the covenant with its various entailments for ecclesiology, the visible-invisible church distinction, and the sacraments.[5]

In Wilson’s view, God’s covenant is essentially the same in the Old Testament and New Testament, which is standard for paedobaptists. So, the New Covenant is composed of believers and their children, regenerate and unregenerate, just like Old Covenant Israel. These are marked out by their baptism, which corresponds with circumcision in the Old Covenant. Wilson goes on from this point to say that everyone who becomes a member in a local church through baptism can be said to be a member of the New Covenant. They may prove to be a covenant-breaker or a covenant-keeper, but they are objectively part of the New Covenant, nonetheless. Wilson gives a table on page 36 of “Reformed” Is Not Enough that explains his understanding:[6]

He writes about the difference between his understanding and a Baptist understanding in his book To a Thousand Generations:

The baptistic assumption is that unbelief is utterly inconsistent with the New Covenant, such that the covenant cannot really be entered into by unbelievers. In other words, the sin of unbelief (to the point of apostasy) is an impossibility for members of the New Covenant. Therefore, the elect and the covenant members are the same set of people. The paedobaptistic assumption is that unbelief is utterly inconsistent with the New Covenant, such that it violates the covenant. Such a violation means that the curses of the covenant now apply to those unbelievers who are within the covenant. Therefore, the elect and the covenant members are not identical sets of people.[7]

Since this is the case in Wilson’s mind, he believes the new covenant community is incredibly visible: it consists of all baptized members of local churches. These are not necessarily all elect, but they are definitely covenant members. Wilson actually views the invisible/visible church distinction as somewhat problematic, and while trying to hold onto the substance of what it is trying to accomplish, he posits a better way of talking about the church that emphasizes its visibility and objectivity: historical and eschatological.

Because time is taken into account, we preserve the understanding of just one Church and at the same time preserve the necessary distinction between those Church members who are ultimately saved and those who are ultimately lost. The historical Church is the counterpart to the visible Church and consists of those throughout history who profess the true faith, together with their children. The eschatological Church is the elect, but it is not invisible. At the last day, every true child of God will be there, not one missing, and every false professor will have been removed. At the resurrection of the dead, this Church will be most visible.[8]

So in Wilson’s view, the New Covenant should not be emphasized as subjective or invisible.[9] It is very objective: tangible, physical, and visible. Wilson writes: “Membership in the Christian faith is objective—it can be photographed and fingerprinted.”[10] 

Wilson uses Jesus’ words in John 15 to prove his point. Jesus says: “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit” (John 15:1-2). He argues that both kinds of branches are “in Jesus,” therefore, there are people who are genuinely and covenantally united to Christ, who prove to be unsaved in the end. “So there is such a thing as genuine covenantal connection to Christ which is not salvific at the last day.”[11] He also uses the warning passages in Hebrews 6 and 10 to the same effect.[12] Another key passage for Wilson is 1 Corinthians 7:14: “For the unbelieving husband is made holy because of his wife, and the unbelieving wife is made holy because of her husband. Otherwise your children would be unclean, but as it is, they are holy.” The “holiness” here is seen as covenantal from Wilson’s viewpoint. Because of this covenantal status of children in the church, CREC members will often call their children “Christians” from an early age, since they have been baptized and are members of their church. And besides, they are not part of a “Muslim family,” but a “Christian family.” Wilson writes: “According to the Bible, a Christian is one who would be identified as such by a Muslim.”[13] 

All of this comes down to this idea of “covenant objectivity.” Being part of the New Covenant is something very objective: it can be seen by all, because it is equivalent to baptism and membership in a local church. Who is on your member roles? These are the members of the New Covenant. Just as it was possible to count up all the circumcised males and their families in Israel, and so affirm them as members of the Old Covenant, it is possible to count up all the baptized individuals and families in the church and affirm them as members of the New Covenant.

The Nature of the New Covenant

Reformed Baptists have always distinguished the Old Covenant from the New Covenant. We believe that the New Covenant is really new! It is not substantially the same thing as the Old Covenant or even the Abrahamic Covenant. It is not a new administration of those Old Covenants. Yes, God’s plan of redemption was promised and foreshadowed within those covenants (see Gal 3:8; Gen 12:1-3; Exod 20:2). But we maintain that the realization of the Covenant of Grace or New Covenant[14] happened historically in the first advent of Christ (Luke 22:20; 1 Cor 11:25). In Jeremiah 31:31-34, God announces the coming of a New Covenant, not like the Old Covenant with Israel when they came out of Egypt:

“Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the Lord. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”

In this passage, we see that the New Covenant is not like the Old Covenant. Jeremiah doesn’t say that it is different in administration, but the same in essence as the Old Covenant. He says it is not even like the Old Covenant! The Old Covenant was broken, but a new covenant was coming. In this covenant relationship, all the individuals in the covenant would be marked by four things: (1) Regeneration. “I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts” (cf. 2 Cor 3:3). (2) Adoption. “And I will be their God, and they shall be my people” (cf. 1 Pet 2:10). (3) Illumination. “And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord” (cf. John 6:45; 10:14; 2 Cor 4:6). (4) Justification. “For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more” (cf. Rom 4:5-8). These things can only be said of true believers. Only true believers have been regenerated, adopted, illuminated, and justified. There may be some people who get baptized and come into membership in our churches because they seemed to be true Christians, though they prove later that they are not (Acts 8:9-24). But the people who are actually in the New Covenant are never “covenant breakers.” Covenant breaking is an Old Testament reality (Jer 31:32). The amazing thing about the New Covenant is that it cannot be broken. It was ratified by the finished work of our Lord Jesus Christ. Those who are truly his sheep cannot be snatched out of his hand (John 10:27-30).[15] If anyone walks away from the Saviour after being under his influence, they show that they were never part of this New Covenant. He will say to them at the judgment, “‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness’” (Matt 7:23). Membership in the New Covenant is something quite subjective and personal, though at the same time it bears visible, objective fruit.

Dealing with Specific Passages

In all the passages Doug Wilson quotes in favour of the idea of covenant-breakers and the unregenerate being in the New Covenant, there is no mention of these people being in the covenant. He is reading the idea of “covenant” into these passages. He is eisegeting rather than exegeting.

In John 15:1, it says, “Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away.” Jesus is using a metaphor here, which should not be pushed too far to make a fine theological point. Certainly, Doug Wilson would not argue that this branch is “in Jesus” (united with Christ) in the same exact way as a true believer is savingly united to Christ. Therefore, Jesus speaks of a kind of connection with him that falls short of true saving power. The Puritans and their confessions had a term for this kind of person: a temporary believer.[16] In John 8, we read of many Jews who “believed in” Jesus (John 8:30-31), but he goes on to tell them that they are offspring of the Devil (v. 44). These people had a connection to Christ in some way, but they prove to not truly be adopted into God’s family, and they do not love Christ, and they are not his sheep.

Hebrews 6 and 10 speak of the same kind of person. They had some form of enlightenment (Heb 6:4; 10:26) and tasted and shared in the Holy Spirit and the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come (Heb 6:4-5). Nevertheless, they deliberately and totally turned away from Christ, siding with those who crucified him, despising him and his atonement. Truly regenerate people, who are adopted into God’s people, who know him and have been justified, do not apostatize from Christ in that way. The one phrase Doug Wilson may point to in favour of his view is Hebrews 10:29: “and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified.” Though the New Covenant is certainly mentioned here (“blood of the covenant”), it is not clear whether the person who profaned the blood was the one who was sanctified. John Owen’s view was that the “he” in “he was sanctified” is Jesus Christ himself, who was “sanctified” (or consecrated, set apart) by his blood on the cross as our High Priest (see John 17:19).[17] Another view, which Owen mentions, is that there could be a kind of sanctification here that falls short of true saving sanctification. A kind of sanctification that fell short of salvation was found under the Old Covenant sacrifices as well: “For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God” (Hebrews 9:13-14). The burden of proof is on Wilson to show definitively that this person did not just despise the blood of the covenant, but that he was sanctified by it, and further that this “sanctification” entails being part of the New Covenant.

In response to the quote from 1 Corinthians 7:14, we may simply say again that there is no mention of a covenant at all in this verse. It does not say that children and unbelieving spouses of believers are in the New Covenant. Moreover, this “holiness” of children and unbelieving spouses must come short of true saving faith, as evidenced by the fact that it is possessed by an unbeliever! It is not a “covenantal holiness.” It is rather the sanctifying effect that Christians have on the world and on their families, that sometimes leads to salvation. Christians are salt and light in the world (Matt 5:13-16), that is, they bring a preservative and illuminating effect to it. The world is better off for having many Christians in it. An unbeliever is better off for having a believing wife. And children are better off when they have one or two believing parents. However, an unbelieving spouse and children who have yet to give a credible profession of faith should not be called “Christians.” We should wait until God saves them and they bear visible fruit before we put the label “Christian” on them. If we call children in the congregation Christians just because they are in a “Christian family” we run the risk of giving unbelievers false assurance and lowering the standards of church purity. We should also note that Paul understands that the sanctifying effect of a believing spouse or parent may come short of salvation: “For how do you know, wife, whether you will save your husband? Or how do you know, husband, whether you will save your wife?” (1 Cor 7:16).

Conclusion: Baptists on Objectivity and Subjectivity

Baptists see membership in the New Covenant as very subjective and personal, and yet expressed very visibly and objectively in the local church. There is the invisible work of the Spirit in the heart that no one can see. But this does not entail that we cannot or should not discern that work. The Spirit’s work always has an audible sound (“you hear its sound” John 3:8). When the Spirit works and draws us to Christ, we believe in Christ and profess Christ (Eph 1:13; Rom 10:9). We become broken over sin, humble and repentant (Zech 12:10). We begin to follow Jesus and are willing to be baptized and start a life in the church, pursuing godliness (Acts 2:37-47). Baptists do not believe in some “invisible” part of the church that never shows fruit of faith; hence we do not baptize infants or small children who cannot credibly profess faith and repentance.[18] It seems that the standard “invisible/visible” distinction and Doug Wilson’s “covenant objectivity” view are both attempts at including infants and small children in the covenant community, the local church. Both have problems, because we were never meant to include them in the covenant community. This distorts the very reality of what the new covenant is: the community of true saints, the elect, bought by Jesus’ blood, who are regenerated, adopted, illuminated, and justified.

This does not mean that Baptists have perfect insight into who is a true believer all the time. Baptist and Paedobaptist churches will always have to deal with the unfortunate reality of apostasy. Sometimes people look like they are attached to Christ and part of his people, and yet they fall away (John 15:1; Heb 6 and 10) or they are revealed as untrue on the day of judgment (Matt 7:21-23). However, this should not discourage us from striving for a pure church, as Jesus gives us the general rule that a tree is known by its fruit (Luke 6:43-45).[19] Generally, a person who professes faith and whose walk matches that profession, can be brought into the church through baptism and thought to be a member of the New Covenant community. We must also exercise the keys of the kingdom by excommunicating those who show bad fruit later, which maintains the visibility of the church (Matt 16:19; 18:17-20; 1 Cor 5). However, the final assessment of who truly knew God is up to Him (Rev 20:11-15).

Douglas Wilson seems to be trying to maintain the purity of the visible church, which we can laud him for. However, from a Baptist perspective, he is actually muddying the waters of the church, because he is still including children as covenant members, like other paedobaptists. This is the fundamental flaw of both systems, based on their faulty covenant theology which does not take God’s definition of the New Covenant seriously.

Pastor Rory St. John

Coram Deo Baptist Church

Grande Prairie, Alberta

Footnotes

[1]Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches. https://crechurches.org/ 

[2]Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter 25:1-2: “The catholic or universal church, which is invisible, consists of the whole number of the elect, that have been, are, or shall be gathered into one, under Christ the head thereof; and is the spouse, the body, the fullness of Him that filleth all in all. The visible church, which is also catholic or universal under the gospel (not confined to one nation, as before under the law), consists of all those throughout the world that profess the true religion; and of their children: and is the kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ, the house and family of God, out of which there is no ordinary possibility of salvation.”

[3]The 1689 Confession in Modern English, 26:1: “The catholic—that is, universal—church may be called invisible with respect to the internal work of the Spirit and truth of grace.”

[4]Ibid., 26:2. 

[5]https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/essay/the-federal-vision/. Wilson’s relationship with the Federal Vision Movement is complex. It is not my intention to explain that in this paper.  

[6]“Reformed” Is Not Enough: Recovering the Objectivity of the Covenant (Moscow, ID: Canon Press, 2002, 2010), 36.

[7]To a Thousand Generations: infant baptism – covenant mercy for the people of God (Moscow, ID: Canon Press, 1996), 34.

[8]“Reformed” is Not Enough, 76

[9]This does not mean that he denies the subjective element of individual regeneration or personal faith. He makes this quite clear in his book Against the Church (Moscow, ID: Canon Press, 2013). He wants to emphasize objectivity over subjectivity, but he does not totally reject the subjective element.

[10]Ibid., 22.   

[11]Ibid., 135.

[12]Ibid., 133-134. 

[13]Ibid., 22. In some sense I can agree with this as a surface level identifier. I was brought up in a “Christian family,” and went to a “Christian school” from grades 6-8, and I live in a somewhat historically “Christian country.” We sometimes use the word “Christian” like that. However, most of the time, when labelling someone as “Christian” I would want to know that person is living as a visible Christian.

[14]Baptists often use the term “Covenant of Grace” and “New Covenant” as synonymous terms. This sometimes leads to confusion between Paedobaptists and Baptists, because Paedobaptists use the term Covenant of Grace to refer to one covenant, which has different administrations (Old and New, etc.).  

[15]“My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand. I and the Father are one.”

[16]1689 14:3 on Saving Faith: “This faith may exist in varying degrees so that it may be either weak or strong. Yet even in its weakest form, it is different in kind or nature (like all other saving graces) from the faith and common grace of temporary believers. Therefore, faith may often be attacked and weakened, but it gains the victory. It matures in many to the point that they attain full assurance through Christ, who is both the founder and perfecter of our faith.”

[17]“It is not real or internal sanctification that is here intended, but it is a separation and dedication unto God; in which sense the word is often used. And all the disputes concerning the total and final apostasy from the faith of them who have been really and internally sanctified, from this place, are altogether vain; though that may be said of a man, in aggravation of his sin, which he professeth concerning himself. But the difficulty of this text is, concerning whom these words are spoken: for they may be referred unto the person that is guilty of the sin insisted on; he counts the blood of the covenant, wherewith he himself was sanctified, an unholy thing. For as at the giving of the law, or the establishing of the covenant at Sinai, the people being sprinkled with the blood of the beasts that were offered in sacrifice, were sanctified, or dedicated unto God in a peculiar manner; so those who by baptism, and confession of faith in the church of Christ, were separated from all others, were peculiarly dedicated to God thereby. And therefore in this case apostates are said to "deny the Lord that bought them," or vindicated them from their slavery unto the law by his word and truth for a season, 2 Pet. 2:1. But the design of the apostle in the context leads plainly to another application of these words. It is Christ himself that is spoken of, who was sanctified and dedicated unto God to be an eternal high priest, by the blood of the covenant which he offered unto God, as I have showed before. The priests of old were dedicated and sanctified unto their office by another, and the sacrifices which he offered for them; they could not sanctify themselves: so were Aaron and his sons sanctified by Moses, antecedently unto their offering any sacrifice themselves. But no outward act of men or angels could unto this purpose pass on the Son of God. He was to be the priest himself, the sacrificer himself,—to dedicate, consecrate, and sanctify himself, by his own sacrifice, in concurrence with the actings of God the Father in his suffering. See John 17:19; Heb. 2:10, 5:7, 9, 9:11, 12. That precious blood of Christ, wherein or whereby he was sanctified, and dedicated unto God as the eternal high priest of the church, this they esteemed "an unholy thing;" that is, such as would have no such effect as to consecrate him unto God and his office” (John Owen, An Exposition on the Epistle to the Hebrews, vol 6. [Monergism.com], 667-668).

[18]It should be noted that Baptist views on infant salvation vary. See 1689 10:3 and 15:1 for one view.

[19]It should be noted that Wilson is striving for the purity of the church as well.