Week 2 | The Gospel and the Old Testament

The Gospel "According to Scripture"

In Week 1 we learned that the gospel is the announcement that Jesus is King and that it happened 'according to Scripture', 'for our sins'.  But there is a very important question that we need to answer before we can fully understand the significance of Jesus' kingship and how it relates to our sins: what does 'according to scripture' actually mean?

When Paul claims that his Gospel is 'according to scripture' (1 Cor. 15:3-4) and Jesus states that 'the time is fulfilled' (Mark 1:15), they didn't mean that there are a few passages in the Old Testament that predicted the events that happened in and through Jesus. Instead, they meant that the entire story of the Old Testament was being fulfilled. Not a small handful of carefully selected texts, but the narrative sweep of the Hebrew scriptures reached its dramatic conclusion in the proclamation that Jesus is now king. In order to understand the Gospel, we have to understand the story of the Old Testament. At risk of oversimplification, the basic plot line goes something like this:

In Genesis 1-2, God creates a good world, and humans are created in his image and likeness and given the responsibility to wisely rule over creation on His behalf (Gen. 1:26-27). God is king of creation, and humanity was to rule as His vice-regents. They were given everything they needed, made to trust in God's provision, but were told not to eat from the a single tree lest they suffer death (Gen 2:17). In Genesis 3, humans succumb to the temptation to eat from this tree, believing that they will 'become like God, knowing good and evil' (Gen. 3:5). The consequences are dire. Genesis 4-11 shows how humanity, because it rejected God's call to rule over creation and trust in his provisions by trying to be like gods, becomes increasingly more depraved. At the end of Genesis 11, it seems like the world had forgotten about God. But God's plan for humanity was that they would wisely rule over creation, and God set out to restore His good creation through faithful humans. He calls Abraham in Genesis 12:1-3, promising that Abraham would have a family that would be a 'blessing to the nations'. Genesis - Deuteronomy tells the story of the growth of Abraham's family, Israel. 

Abraham's family was to be set apart from the nations, to be a witness to the goodness of God and His intention for creation. God rescues Israel from captivity in Egypt, and then gives Israel a law that will enable them to remain distinct from the pagan nations, setting an example to the world of what God originally intended for creation. In Deuteronomy 27-30, God promises Israel that He will give them a land of security and abundance in which they will live in peace if only they obey the law, the covenant, that God had made with them. But from the story of Exodus onwards, it is clear that Israel will follow in the footsteps of the first humans and rebel against God. The rest of the Old Testament is a story of how Israel fails to be obedient to the covenant that God has made with them. 

Israel enters and settles the land in Joshua. When they are faithful and listen to God they prosper, when they ignore God they suffer. After they are established in the land, they continue to sin against the law and find themselves under attack by the pagan nations. Much of this sin is a rejection of God's commands to be distinct from the nations around them; many Israelites would rather worship the pagan gods and follow the customs of the pagan nations than remain distinct. In Judges, God must send leaders to rescue Israel every time they fail. 

In 1st Samuel 8, Israel does the unthinkable: they reject God as king by asking for their own. This is a rejection of God, and the prophet Samuel promises the people that it will only lead to more pain and suffering. The first king, Saul, is an abysmal failure. The second king, David, is a 'man after God's own heart' (1 Samuel 13:14), and although he makes many serious mistakes, God promises that one day a king will rise up from the line of David who will establish an eternal kingdom and build a permanent house for God's name (2 Samuel 7:8-17). This king will be God's representative on the earth and wisely guide the family of Abraham, enabling them to follow the law and make good on the covenant with Abraham that his family will be a blessing for the nations. 

David's son Solomon's promising rule ended in failure. The Israelites are divided into two separate kingdoms because of a civli war, with the northern kingdom (Israel) being ruled by Jeroboam, and the southern kingdom (Judah) being ruled by Rehoboam (1 Kings 11:9-13). The northern kingdom is never again faithful to God, and in 722 BCE they are destroyed by the Assyrian empire and taken into exile (2 Kings 17:22-23). The southern kingdom of Judah oscillates between faithfulness and wickedness, and they too are eventually conquered and taken into exile in 586 BCE by the Babylonian empire (2 Kings 24:10-14). These were the consequences of rejecting God. 

But hope wasn't lost. The writer of Deuteronomy understood that Israel might fail, and that, after facing the consequences of their failure, God would one day rescue his people (Deut. 30:1-10). He did, after all, create human beings to be his representatives on the earth, and promised Abraham that this would be accomplished through his family. Prophets like Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, seeing that Israel had been divided and sent into exile because of their sins against God, understand that this cannot be the end of the story. Passages like Isaiah 2, 9, and 11 reminded Israel that, because God was faithful to his promises, he would one day restore Israel, reestablishing them in the land and installing a Davidic king on the throne. When these events take place, God will have competed the rescue of his good creation. This restoration, according to Isaiah (40:9, 61:1), is called 'good news'. Similarly, Ezekiel promises that the wicked leaders of Israel will be replaced with a God-ordained 'good shepherd' (Ezekiel 34), and Jeremiah claims that this will be a second Exodus, eclipsing the significance of Israel's original deliverance from Egypt (Jeremiah 23). 

In 539 BCE, King Cyrus of Persia overthrows the Babylonian empire, and, being an adept politician, he allows the various nations that were incorporated into his empire to continue to practice their own customs and worship their own gods, provided that they pay taxes and show deference to Persian hegemony. As recounted in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah, Cyrus allows the captives of the southern kingdom, now known as 'Jews' (derived from the name of the tribe of Judah), to return to Jerusalem and rebuild the temple. While the Jews clearly see this as an act of God, it is clear from Nehemiah that the promises have not been fulfilled and that Israel is still being punished for their rebellion. He states that, even under benevolent Persian leadership, the Jews are 'slaves' in their own homeland (Nehemiah 9:36). They continued to look forward to a day when God would come and restore Israel. In the meantime, they attempted to follow the law. According to the prophet Malachi, God would send a messenger ahead of him, announcing the return of Israel's God (Malachi 3-4). 

Between the return from Babylonian exile following 539 BCE and the birth of Jesus, Jews had to fight to maintain their identity under Persian, Greek, and Roman rule. Boundaries were drawn between Jews and non-Jews; the law, and especially practices like circumcision, sabbath, and food laws demarcated the Jews, demonstrating their fidelity towards God and their distinction from the pagans surrounding them. They longed for the restoration of Israel, the return of the Davidic monarchy, and the fulfillment of God's promise to bring the story of creation to its intended conclusion. When that happened, it would be, of course, 'good news'.

When Paul says that his gospel, the announcement that Jesus is king, is 'according to scripture', he is claiming that this story has come to its dramatic conclusion in Christ. This is a massive claim that has a similarly massive impact on our faith, our theology, and our practice. The Gospel is the good news that the story of Israel is resolved in Jesus becoming king. We will explore the significance of Jesus' kingship next week.