by Herman Bavinck
Election is not the whole counsel of redemption, but is a part, the first and principle part, of it. Included and established in that counsel is also the way in which the election is to be actualized - in short, the whole accomplishment and application is redemption. We know that the election was purposed in Christ, and that the counsel of God is not merely a work of the Father, but also a work of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. It is a Divine work of ther Holy Trinity. In other words the counsel of redemption is itself a covenant - a covenant in which each of the three Persons, so to speak, receives His own work and achieves His own task. The covenant of grace which is raised up in time and is continued from generation to generation is nothing other than the working out and the impression or imprint of the covenant that is fixed in the Eternal Being. As in the counsel of God, so in history each of the Persons appears. The Father is the source, the Son is the Achiever, and the Holy Spirit is the one who applies our salvation. Hence everybody immediately and to the same extent does injustice to the work of the Fsather, the Son, or the Spirit, when he removes the foundation of eternity from time by loosening history from its anchorage in the gracious, almighty Divine Will.