David H.J. Gay > Quotes

“(Deut. 33:1-4,8,10).[30] (See also Deut. 11:1-7; 29:9-15).”
― David H.J. Gay, Christ is All: No Sanctification by the Law

“Only the Spirit can grant us understanding of Scripture, but it is Scripture alone that is the authority, not men (not even Puritans), not popes, not Councils, not tradition, not Confessions. Now it is that last – Confessions – that is the sticking point. It is, in my view, the fundamental difference between covenant theologians and new-covenant theologians. Both parties claim Scripture as their authority, but as I have observed, time and again, when it comes to facing the Scriptures on the issues involved in new-covenant theology, covenant theologians almost invariably – invariably, in my experience – fall back to the Confession or the system.”
― David H.J. Gay, Exalting Christ: Thomas Collier on the New Covenant

“The author of this letter [to the Hebrews] mainly and chiefly treats of the excellency of Christ and the gospel covenant or ministration [that is, the new covenant] above that of the law... [He treats] of the excellency of Jesus – a truth of very great concern, and, as it is the duty, so it should be the care, of every gospel minister and Christian, to keep up the dignity and excellency of Jesus Christ in his person, work and offices... Our work... is to exalt the true Christ... above angels (Heb. 1:4)... above Moses (Heb. 3:5-6)... above the priests, or priesthood, under the law (Heb. 5 and 7), and so consequently above the Old Testament [that is, the old-covenant] ministry and ministration – in authority, dignity and excellency. Hence he came to take away, or put an end to, that ministry, or priesthood and covenant, which is the second special work of the writer in this letter to the Hebrews, and should be of all good men – to exalt the new covenant above the old, which is the truth declared in the Scripture read unto you: ‘He takes away the first, that he may establish the second’; that is, [he takes away] the first or old covenant or testament, that he might establish the second. Now that it is the two covenants that it is here intended is clear, for the word ‘he’ and ‘first’ and ‘second’ are relatives: the word ‘he’ relates to Christ (Heb. 9:24,28), ‘first’ and ‘second’ relate to the first and second covenants (Heb. 8:6-8), which are called the old and the new covenants (Heb. 8:13).”
― David H.J. Gay, Exalting Christ: Thomas Collier on the New Covenant

“The best closing prayer I ever heard was: ‘Lord, make us as good as others think we are’.”
― David H.J. Gay, Christ is All: No Sanctification by the Law

“This was his purpose. He gave his law to the Jews in order to distinguish them from all others.”
― David H.J. Gay, Christ is All: No Sanctification by the Law

“Therefore... it [that is, the old covenant] is done away, first as it was a covenant from Mount Sinai, so it is clear turned out, and has no place in the gospel... (Gen. 21:10; Gal. 4:22-30, Heb. 12:18-24)... All of which evidently demonstrates that the law as it was a covenant from Mount Sinai is done away for believers.[104] As a consequence: As [the law][105] was a ministration by Moses, so it is done away, and is not to be preached or received, (as in the hand of Moses) as it was ministered, received and obeyed in the Old Testament. For it was ministered then on [condition of] life and death, and was (through man’s weakness) a ministration of death, and not of life.[106]”
― David H.J. Gay, Exalting Christ: Thomas Collier on the New Covenant

“God did not make the covenant ‘with our fathers, but with us’ (Deut. 5:3).”
― David H.J. Gay, Christ is All: No Sanctification by the Law

“That there are two covenants is clearly evident – old and new, first and second (Jer. 31:31-32)... Mark you, beloved, it is a new covenant, another covenant, not such a covenant [as the first or old covenant was], but a covenant distinct from that covenant [that is, the first or old covenant], where [whence?] you have the first and the second [covenants], the old and new [covenants], [both] in sense and substance. So Hebrews 8:7. They are called the first and second, for ‘finding fault with the first he established the second’, where the writer to the Hebrews makes application of Jeremiah 31 (Heb. 8:8-9... and Heb. 8:13... and Heb. 8:6).. But further, in Galatians 4 this truth is cleared by the apostle in [the allegory of] Sarah and Hagar, the free- and bond-women (Gal. 4:22,24)... And they are here held both to be two distinct covenants... and must be separated when the time was come, so that the covenants of the Old and New Testaments [that is, old and new covenants] are not one, as some imagine, but two – old and new, first and second – and that [they have] clearly to be distinguished, and not confounded together, any more than light and darkness.[47]”
― David H.J. Gay, Exalting Christ: Thomas Collier on the New Covenant

“Christ is to be lifted up now in the days of the gospel... in the preaching of the gospel, and that first for justification and life, as the only priest, atonement and peacemaker between God and his people... He is to be lifted up as the only prophet to teach as the only King and lawgiver to his church and people: and this is to be done both in the preaching of the gospel, and in the hearts of believers... In the preaching of the gospel, Christ is to be lifted up for justification and life; this was the end for which Christ came into the world... ‘That you might have [life] yet more abundantly’ (John 10:10).[25]”
― David H.J. Gay, Exalting Christ: Thomas Collier on the New Covenant

“All humanity is by birth united to Adam, and comes under the regime of the first age through Adam’s sin. All the elect are united to Christ (from eternity, by God’s decree; in experience, through faith in Christ), and come under the regime of the new age in, by and through Christ’s death, burial and resurrection.”
― David H.J. Gay, Christ is All: No Sanctification by the Law

“Covenant’ and ‘law’ cannot be divorced. Too often, however, the Reformed want to prise the law – at least, what they call ‘the moral law’ – away from the covenant. They want to hold onto the rule of the law without its role in the covenant. It cannot be done – biblically, that is.”
― David H.J. Gay, Exalting Christ: Thomas Collier on the New Covenant

“I must underline this. The apostle deliberately polarises the issue, and he does it for us. He demands that we choose between two mutually exclusive systems. He simply will not allow us to make a mongrel system out of the two; it is either/or. In reality, of course, there is no choice: it has to be the new covenant – every time!”
― David H.J. Gay, The Glorious New-Covenant Ministry: Its Basis and Practice

“Sadly, all this has too often been forgotten, and the law which was given uniquely to Israel, and applied only to them, has been mistakenly applied to Gentiles in the gospel age, to the confusion of both law and gospel.”
― David H.J. Gay, Christ is All: No Sanctification by the Law

“The truth is, the Judaisers’ ministry is in a totally different realm, a different age, a different system, to the apostle’s. They are – obviously so – living and working in the age and ambience of the law, and their ministry shows it. Theirs is an old-covenant ministry, a ministry of law. Paul, however, lives in the realm of the Spirit, and his ministry is that of the new covenant. This is what makes all the difference. His boasting, power and commendation come from his being in the realm of the Spirit, and not in the realm of the law.”
― David H.J. Gay, The Glorious New-Covenant Ministry: Its Basis and Practice

“that it [that is, Collier’s work] might prevail to exhort and stir you up to a more diligent search an enquiry into the covenants, that you may be able to distinguish between law and gospel. For... without the knowledge of the difference [between the covenants], or at least some clear insight into the gospel covenant [that is, the new covenant], you can never live clearly the life of faith, but at best it will be with you... a mixing of the old and new together. You can never be able ministers of the new covenant unless you are able to distinguish between new and old [covenants] that so you may be ministers of the new... Without this, you will never get completely free of[114] the Babylonian apostasy [that is, infant baptism – ultimately, Romanism]... Come to the clearness of the new covenant... It behoves you to be deeply and diligently enquiring into the knowledge of the new covenant... It concerns every believer to know that there are two... distinct [covenants], and to be enquiring into the new covenant as much as may be... Let men of learning and natural parts[115] take heed how they do endeavour any longer to darken this truth.”
― David H.J. Gay, Exalting Christ: Thomas Collier on the New Covenant

“There is nothing wrong, let me say at once, in thinking of the law in these three categories – moral, ceremonial and judicial. The trouble is – and what a trouble it is! – from Aquinas, through Calvin and so to covenant theologians, almost everybody nowadays accepts it as received wisdom that the law existed in these three distinct and stated parts. Yet these parts are neither ‘distinct’ nor ‘stated’ in Scripture. Nor is there any need to deduce the threefold division – it served no useful purpose except to uphold the pre-determined system of covenant theology. Nevertheless, covenant theologians (and almost everybody else), having assumed ‘the threefold division of the law’, then proceed to jettison two of the three parts, leaving the so-called moral law (or nine or nine and a half),[53], as the binding, perfect rule of life for believers. What an utterly unscriptural procedure! For a start, it is impossible to be consistent with the threefold division. More than that, Scripture will not allow such a neat segregation of the law. Scripture never talks in terms of the threefold division. Above all, to use the clever technique to get round Scripture, making it teach the direct opposite of what it does teach... words fail! For these reasons, the jargon of the threefold division of the law should be dropped. As I say, it serves no useful purpose. On the contrary, it grievously and utterly confounds scriptural teaching. The law in question is the law, the law of Moses, the law of the first or old covenant. The law, full stop.”
― David H.J. Gay, Exalting Christ: Thomas Collier on the New Covenant

“What is more, those who continue to hold to ‘the survival of the fittest’ should never be revolted at genocide or natural disaster – it is only ‘the survival of the fittest’! Above all, never again should blinded sinners, deliberately self-blinded sinners, ever try to complain about God ‘allowing’ such things, and ‘doing nothing about it’. Let ‘the survival of the fittest’ be their comfort! They want ‘blind fate’ as their god; they mustn’t complain when blind fate does things they somehow don’t like.”
― David H.J. Gay, The Glorious New-Covenant Ministry: Its Basis and Practice

“(Gal. 3:23-25 – note the ‘we’ and ‘our’; Eph. 2:11-16).”
― David H.J. Gay, Christ is All: No Sanctification by the Law

“And this is the heart of the matter – the new covenant. This is what makes the difference between the Judaisers and the apostle. They labour in the letter, the law, the old covenant; he labours in the Spirit, in the gospel, the new covenant. And it is not only, as it were, the message that is different. The power, the boasting, the glory of the apostolic ministry, its very ethos, lies in that it is a ministry of the new covenant, not the old. With the change of covenant, the entire ministry has changed.”
― David H.J. Gay, The Glorious New-Covenant Ministry: Its Basis and Practice

“The design of God by Jesus Christ in his new-covenant work was to make all things new (Rev. 21:5)... The design of God by Jesus Christ was the recovery and restoration of all again [after the fall], and to make all new... A new people, brought out from the old flock, a people renewed by the power and Spirit of grace, by and through the gospel... This new creation shall be effected by and under a new covenant... By the new covenant [the elect] shall be renewed, and become heirs of all things, in and with Christ their Head and Lord thereof. It is new-covenant grace, and new-covenant work – all true blessedness is by the new covenant; that is, the covenant of this new estate (Jer. 31:31; Heb. 8:3,13; 12:24).[176”
― David H.J. Gay, Exalting Christ: Thomas Collier on the New Covenant

“Tell me, what privilege is it for a poor infant to have a little water sprinkled upon him? Will it confer grace, or will it not? Will it regenerate, as you have been taught? O ignorance! The Lord cause it to vanish! Can the infant, [even] if elected, make any use of this ordinance, or receive anything held forth in it to the eye of faith? No! He cannot! Faith is required in those that participate in gospel ordinances. Indeed, men and women are to be baptised because they are regenerate, not to regenerate them.[148]”
― David H.J. Gay, Exalting Christ: Thomas Collier on the New Covenant

“To say that the law applies to the entire human race, is to render these statements and demands utterly superfluous and meaningless. What is more – and a glance at the passages quoted above will confirm it – we are talking about the law, the law of God, the law of Moses, the whole law, the law in its entirety. The law was given to Israel, for Israel, to distinguish Israel from all others.”
― David H.J. Gay, Christ is All: No Sanctification by the Law