The Third Covenant

By Dr. Ken Matto

In Harold Camping’s insatiable need to come with something new to keep his minions hanging on to him, he has now devised a “Third covenant.” Of course, that third covenant is tied directly to his new revelatory system which is called the Latter Rain. The new understanding of the Latter Rain is that God is no longer saving people in the churches anywhere around the world. (He knows this because he is omniscient) God is only saving through para-church ministries. Of course, according to Camping and his followers only Family Radio is preaching the truth and if one tunes into Family Radio you will only hear Camping’s teachings, both by him and his servile followers. This means that Camping has set himself up as the only truth in the world today and the rest of the ministries out there are all false.

In June of 2007 at the Family Radio Bible conference in Towson, Maryland, Camping has now invented a third covenant which he states is now being revealed in these last days right before the Lord’s return on October 20, 2011, as touted by Him and his followers.. This third covenant is God saving multitudes of people in far off lands and under false religions such as Islam or Buddhism. If Camping and his followers would take the time to read a history of missions, they would see that this has been going on already for hundreds of years. Missionaries have been going to Africa, Asia, the South Pacific (I highly recommend the autobiography of John Paton in the New Hebrides.), and many other places. If Camping would look at ministries such as Unevangelized Fields Missions or Overseas Missions Fellowship, he would see that the Gospel is going to the remote portions of the world, and has been for hundreds of years already. A ministry which I support called World Missionary Press prints Gospel booklets in 319 languages which is 309 more than Family Radio presently has, so for someone to believe that Family Radio is the only ministry out there reaching people for Christ, they are sadly mistaken and brainwashed. In fact, Family Radio is using a tainted gospel as their primary teaching. It is the gospel according to Harold Camping and not the gospel according to the Bible. No longer is Family Radio a Christian ministry but it is now the personal and private pulpit of Harold Camping.

The problem is that Camping and his minions are very ignorant when it comes to missions. They will not read nor will they even suggest to each other to read about missions. This is because Camping and his minions only see Family Radio as the sole end time ministry that God is using to bring in the final harvest before the Lord’s return. This intentional ignorance has hamstrung these people in gaining a full understanding of God’s worldwide salvation program which began at the cross and will continue until the last day.

Camping now claims that Hebrews 8:8 supports his idea of a third covenant. As we read above they are quick to state that God found fault with the first two covenants. Is that what it is saying or is Camping once again twisting Scripture to make his case? Camping is definitely twisting Scripture but this time he is blaspheming against the Lord Jesus Christ because it was Christ who put the second covenant into effect by His death. Why would God the Father find fault with His Son’s sacrifice when He accepted it? The answer is that God found no fault with the covenant of Grace because it is through this covenant that God has been saving souls for thousands of years, even before Family Radio came on the scene.

Camping comes along and claims that there was found fault with the first two covenants and therefore we need a third covenant where by God is saving many in distant lands and false religions. If Camping would read his Bible, he would see that before the foundation of the world, God already named those whom He was going to save.

We can see very clearly that Revelation, in two places, reveals to us that God had named those whom He was going to save even before the world was formed. There is also an interesting verse in the Old Testament which speaks about the Saints of God.

Psalm 50:5 speaks about God gathering His Saints together. Those people are Saints because they have made a covenant with God by sacrifice. Now we know that no sacrifice that man can make can ever satisfy God’s requirement for salvation, so what we have in view here is the covenant of Grace which was fulfilled in the Lord Jesus Christ. This shows us that the second covenant was already in force since no one could be saved by works.

Jeremiah 3:14 is the only place in Scripture where God speaks of being married to Israel. Israel had become so corrupt that God eventually divorced Israel.

The reason that God gave Israel a bill of divorce was because they had become corrupt by committing adultery with the surrounding nations and adopting their false religions and sinful ways. This adultery with the nations was a violation of the Covenant of Sinai. The first covenant showed that the nation of Israel was unable to keep the covenant because of sinful tendencies which dwells in every human being. This is why God found fault with Israel and really the entire human race.

In Hebrews 8:8 God then continues on and states that He is going to make a new covenant with the House of Israel and the House of Judah. By the time Jeremiah had announced the new Covenant, Israel, the northern Kingdom was already in captivity for about 130 years.

James states that a person can keep every point of law but if there is just one infraction of the law, then all the rest of the obedience is nullified. That is the fault that if just one facet of the law is broken, it sends a person to Hell as if they broke the entire law of God. This is why God had to enact the second covenant which was the covenant of Grace. If He did not bring in this second covenant, then the Elect of God which He named from the foundation of the world would have been unable to keep the law in its entirety and thus obtain salvation.

God seeing the need for a second covenant for the purpose of His Elect, gave the covenant of Grace whereby the Lord Jesus Christ fulfilled all the law of God and by doing that, those who are the Elect of God are in Christ. It is as if the Elect had never sinned because the second covenant removed all the sins and iniquities of the Elect.

This better covenant has been what God was using for both the Old and New Testaments to bring His Elect into the Kingdom. People like Moses, David, Solomon, Isaiah and many others became saved by means of Grace because none of the Old Testament Saints were able to keep the law to its fullest because they were fallible people too. We previously saw that God named those whom He was going to save before the foundation of the world and we also read that Christ was the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world. Those Old Testament Saints were saved by means of Christ being slain in principle because He had no yet come into the world to finalize the covenant on Calvary.

This final or second covenant has been the means by which God has been saving His Elect and the same method will continue to be used until the last day. This is why there is no need for a third covenant because the second covenant, which was ratified by the Lord Jesus Christ, is sufficient to save all the Elect, no matter where in the world they are living.

Camping and his followers believe that a third covenant is being revealed today and that third covenant is God saving people outside the church and in many foreign lands. Throughout the history of missions we can see people being saved outside the church and then when some are saved a church is then formed with that nucleus of believers. Since Harold Camping believes that God is done with the church, he has now created the mythical third covenant which is between God and the Elect outside the church.

There is not one shred of biblical evidence to prove that God has superseded the second covenant with a third covenant. As we saw, the second covenant, Grace, is still in force and will be until the last one is saved. It does not matter where a person lives in this world nor at what time in history, if God has named them to be saved, then they will become saved at their appointed time. In the past Harold Camping has called the Gospel bland and this is why he must continue to invent new teachings to keep his followers hanging on his every word, even when his teachings cannot be found in Scripture but forced to come from Scripture. Can you imagine God the Father finding fault with God the Son and what He did on Calvary? Only a true cultist would dream something like this up.

Back