4
know not how often the whol Covenant of Grace is expressed in that word, I wil be their
Father, they shal be my children," or consider Ephesians 1:5, he says, where Paul
comprehends all of salvation in this one expression, having predestinated us to the
adoption of children."
15
Clearly, the Puritans ascribed a lofty and comprehensive place to
adoption in their soteriology.
Adoption compared in the two testaments
The Puritans believed that the metaphors of adoption and sons of God are valid for
believers of both testaments, but that only in the New Testament did the transforming
power of adoption come to the fore. Herman Witsius, one of the clearest on this point,
stresses that believers in the Old Testament era were also regenerated, betrothed to
Christ, and adopted to become sons of God. He writes, Believers, at all times, were the
children of God. Elihu, who was not of the people of Israel, called God his Father." Yet
the clarity on the adoption of Old Testament believers compared to New Testament
believers varies as much as the light of the stars before that of the sun.
16
Witsius goes on to say that believers under the Old Testament were children
under the severity and discipline of tutors, who bound heavy burdens, grievous to be
born, and laid them on their shoulders. Consequently, believers were obliged to be
subject to the weak and beggarly elements of the world, and like children, to be engaged
all the day in the trifling ceremonies of the Mosaic institution, which were, in a manner,
the play-things of the church. Compared with New Testament believers, they were
taught like infants, without being left to their own choice, and experienced little
familiarity with their Father. They were not allowed to enter the temple, and were
compelled to live under types and shadow by sacrifices and offerings in the land of
Canaan which served as a rather obscure pledge of the heavenly inheritance.
17
New Testament believers bask in the sunlight of God`s superabounding, adopting
grace and liberty merited for them by their Elder Brother. Witsius writes, For after our
elder brother, having taken upon him human nature, had visited this lower world, and
freely undergone a state of various servitude for us, he brought us into true liberty, John
viii. 36. removed the tutors, [and] blotted out the hand-writing of ordinances, which was
contrary to us. He now brings us into the Father`s secret counsels, shows us the Father