In the modern debate over the place of God’s Law in the Christian life, one of the most misunderstood and misrepresented doctrines is the relationship between Law and Covenant. This confusion becomes especially evident in conversations about Israel, the Church, and the charge of so-called “replacement theology.” As a Christian who affirms the abiding validity of God’s Law—a Pronomian—I have frequently been accused of either being a Judaizer for upholding the Torah, or an antisemite for affirming that unbelieving Jews are not in covenant with God. These accusations arise not from malice, but from category errors. To be clear: the Law is not the Covenant, and covenantal blessings are not granted on the basis of ethnicity, but on faith in Christ alone.
The Law Is God’s Standard—Not a Covenant in Itself
God’s Law is not simply a Mosaic construct. It is an eternal expression of God’s character and righteousness. Before Sinai, long before Moses ascended the mountain to receive the Ten Commandments, Scripture records that Abraham “obeyed my voice and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws” (Genesis 26:5). This shows that God’s Law predates the covenant made at Mount Sinai. Similarly, even Cain was told, “sin is crouching at the door,” revealing that moral categories like righteousness and sin were already intelligible and binding (Genesis 4:7). The Law is not identical with any particular covenant—it is the moral fabric upon which all of God’s covenants are based.
This means that while a person may be outside a covenant with God, he is never outside the demands of God’s Law. To say that someone is not in covenant does not mean that they are lawless in the sense of being free from obligation. Rather, it means they are still under judgment for violating that Law, without access to the covenantal promises of mercy and restoration.
Covenant Membership Requires Faith in the Covenant-Keeper
Throughout redemptive history, God has established covenants with His people—but always on the basis of grace, received through faith, and never by birthright alone. Paul makes this point with surgical precision in Galatians 3:
“Know then that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham” (Gal. 3:7).
He does not say, “those who are physically descended from Abraham.” He says, “those of faith,” and the object of that faith necessarily is Christ. The same chapter concludes,
“If you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise” (Gal. 3:29).
This utterly dismantles any notion that Jews who reject Christ are still part of God’s covenant people. Paul is not anti-Jewish—he is Jewish. He is pro-Christ. And to be pro-Christ is to define covenant membership through union with Him, not through genetics or tradition.
Jesus affirms this in John 8, when speaking to the Jewish leaders who claimed Abraham as their father. He responds:
“If you were Abraham’s children, you would be doing the works Abraham did… You are of your father the devil” (John 8:39, 44).
The key here is that Jesus acknowledges their ethnic descent from Abraham but denies their covenantal status. Why? Because they reject Him.
John reiterates this in his first epistle:
“No one who denies the Son has the Father. Whoever confesses the Son has the Father also” (1 John 2:23).
In other words, if a person does not have Christ, they do not have God. That includes unbelieving Jews, Muslims, Gentile pagans, and secularists alike. Covenant relationship is no longer—nor has it ever been—granted by ethnicity. It is by grace through faith in Jesus the Messiah.
All the Promises of God Are Yes in Christ
Another devastating blow to the idea that anyone can be in covenant with God apart from Christ comes in 2 Corinthians 1:20:
“For all the promises of God find their Yes in him.”
Not some of the promises. Not just the “spiritual” ones. All the promises of God, including those made to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and David, are fulfilled in Christ and only in Christ. This is not replacement theology. This is fulfillment theology. Jesus is the seed of Abraham (Gal. 3:16), the true Israel (cf. Matt. 2:15), and the ultimate Davidic king (Luke 1:32). To receive the promises, one must be in Him. Outside of Him, there is no covenant and no claim to divine inheritance, no matter one’s lineage. Therefore, no unbeliever, whether Jew or Gentile, can claim to have a part in God’s promises outside of Christ.
This applies equally to Jews and Gentiles. As Paul says in Ephesians 2:12–13,
“Remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise… But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.”
Gentiles are grafted into the commonwealth of Israel—not as a replacement, but as a continuation of God’s one covenant people in Christ. But this also means that ethnic Jews who reject Jesus are, tragically, alienated from the same commonwealth and strangers to the promises until they believe.
This Is Not Replacement Theology—It’s the Gospel
Critics often misunderstand this as “replacement theology”—the idea that the Church replaces Israel and inherits her blessings while Israel is cast off. But that is a caricature of what the New Testament teaches. Pronomians do not believe God has abandoned Israel. Quite the opposite—we affirm that all God’s promises remain true and secure. But they are only accessible in Christ. The Church does not replace Israel; the Church is Israel, reconstituted around her Messiah, composed of both believing Jews and Gentiles.
Paul’s olive tree analogy in Romans 11 is instructive here. The natural branches (ethnic Jews) were broken off because of unbelief. Wild branches (Gentiles) were grafted in through faith. But even those natural branches can be grafted back in “if they do not continue in their unbelief” (Rom. 11:23). God’s plan for Israel is not abandonment—it is grafting in through Christ.
This is not replacement. It is restoration. But the restoration must come on God’s terms, not ours.
The Law Still Stands—And So Does the Standard of Covenant Faithfulness
Far from nullifying God’s Law, the New Covenant internalizes it. As promised in Jeremiah 31:33,
“I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts.”
The Law remains the moral standard by which sin is defined (1 John 3:4), but the covenant defines the relational context in which the Law is either a source of blessing (Deut. 28:1–14) or judgment (Deut. 28:15–68). That is why Christ is essential. Without His blood, the Law condemns. With His blood, the Law becomes our delight.
Christ is the perfect Law-keeper, the Lamb who takes away sin, and the Risen King who rules with righteousness. He did not come to abolish the Law (Matt. 5:17), but to fulfill it and fill it full.
The Tragedy of Unbelief and the Hope of Grafting In
None of this should lead us to arrogance or boasting. Paul warns against exactly that in Romans 11:18:
“Do not be arrogant toward the branches… remember it is not you who support the root, but the root that supports you.”
We grieve for those outside the covenant—especially unbelieving Jews, to whom belong the patriarchs, the Law, and the promises (Rom. 9:4–5). But we also rejoice in the hope that they can still be grafted in by faith in Christ. That door remains open. The tragedy is not that they are cut off; the tragedy is that they reject the one who would welcome them in.
Conclusion: Only Christ Grants Covenant Status
To declare that only those who believe in Jesus are in covenant with God is not antisemitism, and it is certainly not replacement theology—it is the Gospel. Christ alone is the fulfillment of the Law, the mediator of the covenant, and the heir of every promise God has made. Only in Him can anyone—Jew or Gentile—have access to God.
To insist that unbelieving Jews—those who reject and hate the Messiah—are nonetheless in covenant with God is to reject the very heart of the Gospel. Scripture does not allow for such a contradiction. “Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him” (John 5:23). “No one who denies the Son has the Father” (1 John 2:23). “Whoever believes in him shall not perish”—not “whoever has the right bloodline” (John 3:16). To compromise on this is to alter the message that saves.
Let us not confuse Law with Covenant. The Law is eternal—it is the standard by which all are judged. But covenant membership is reserved for those who are united to Christ by faith. Our goal is not to diminish the significance of Israel, nor to exalt the Church as a replacement. Our goal is to exalt Christ, in whom the covenant is kept and through whom all nations are blessed.
The mission remains: to proclaim the Gospel—that only in Jesus Christ can anyone be grafted into the household of God. Let us call all people everywhere—Jew and Gentile—to repentance, faith, and covenant life in the Son.
