How do you relate to God? Since the triune God is truly transcendent, what binds us to him that we might know that he is near to his people? We long for certainty and assurance to know that our God is with us. So, how might we have confidence that we belong to God for blessing?
Covenant theology is the Reformed way of bringing Scripture to bear upon these questions. A covenant is a formal relationship. It binds two or more parties together in an official way. It has personal dynamics, thus the relationship aspect. It is also legal and authoritative in some sense so that this relationship, as such, is fixed and defined. A covenant establishes a relationship in a certain way so that those involved have specified connection to one another that is hard or impossible to dissolve.
This essay surveys the basics of Reformed covenant theology. The aim is to make these concepts that structure our reading of Scripture and its grand narrative of salvation more familiar. The further payoff is that covenant theology furnishes reassurance for our questions about our relationship with God.
Harrison Perkins | “Covenant Theology and the Contours of the Christian Life” | New Horizons February, 2026.
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Harrison Perkins
Harrison Perkins (PhD, Queen’s University Belfast; MDiv, Westminster Seminary California) is pastor of Oakland Hills Community Church (OPC), a member of the of the Heidelberg Reformation Association, a Senior Research Fellow at the Craig Center for the Study of the Westminster Standards, online instructor in church history at Westminster Theological Seminary, a visiting lecturer in systematic theology at Edinburgh Theological Seminary, and author of Reformed Covenant Theology: A Systematic Introduction. You can read more from him at Pastor Perks.
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