God's One Household

The promises, types, and shadows of the Hebrew Bible are fulfilled by the Son of God and Messiah of Israel, Jesus of Nazareth.

An accusation commonly heard in popular preaching is ‘Replacement Theology.’ This seemingly dreaded label is hurled against anyone who claims a promise from the Hebrew Bible made to Ancient Israel finds its fulfillment in Jesus and his Church, but the term misses the point of the New Testament – Fulfillment, not Separation or Replacement.

The New Testament teaches neither ‘Replacement Theology’ nor the idea that God has two distinct covenants and peoples, each with a separate eternal destiny and means of achieving it.

[Iceland - Photo by Sigurdur Fjalar Jonsson on Unsplash]

Instead, the Scriptures proclaim that all God’s promises find their substance in Jesus Christ. “For however many be the promises of God, in him is the Yea! Wherefore also through him is the Amen!” God has One Covenant, One Covenant People, and only one means of salvation. “I am the way, and the truth, and the life! No one comes to the Father except through me!” – (John 14:6, 2 Corinthians 1:20).

God’s Covenant with Abraham always envisaged the inclusion of the Nations, and in Christ, the “middle wall of separation” between Jews and Gentiles has been dismantled so God might “create one new man” from both Jewish and Gentile followers of Jesus.

No one is disadvantaged or more privileged before God based on ethnicity. No longer are Gentiles “strangers alienated from the Commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of the promise, having no hope and without God in the world.” Gentiles become “fellow citizens with the saints” in the one “Household of God”- (Ephesians 2:12-19).

The promises of God are implemented by Jesus Christ. In him alone are the shadows and types prefigured in the Hebrew Bible made real. All God’s past mysteries are laid bare by the Nazarene.

• “Now to Him who is able to establish you according to my Gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery which has been kept in silence through times everlasting but now is manifested, and by the Scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the everlasting God, is made known to all the nations for the obedience of faith” – (Romans 16:25-26).

The Nation of Israel has not been “replaced” by the New Covenant People of God. Instead, the Promise to bless “all the nations” through Abraham has come to fruition as Jews and Gentiles are united in Jesus to form One New People, not two separate nations living under distinct covenants - (Romans 16:25, Galatians 2:28, 2 Corinthians 1:19-2:0).

Jesus is the promised Messiah, the “Son of Abraham” and Heir who came to fulfill “all the Law and the Prophets.” What was “written” beforehand is actualized in the man from Nazareth - (Matthew 1:1, 1:22, 2:15, 2:17, 2:23, 4:17, 5:17-20, 8:17).

In the Gospel of John, Jesus is the True Tabernacle in whom the Glory of God resides. “Grace instead of grace” arrived in the “Word made flesh.” Though the Law came through Moses, “Grace and Truth came to be in Jesus.” He is the true Temple, the place where the presence of Yahweh is found rather than any structure “made with hands” - (John 1:14-18, 2:19-21).

The true worshippers of God must now worship Him “in the Spirit and truth.” The old limitations of holy space and time no longer apply. With Christ’s arrival, debates about where to locate the Temple become pointless. Rebuilding any stone building to house God’s presence would be regression - (John 4:23-24).

Likewise, the ancient feasts of Israel find their significance in the Son of God. He is the true “living bread from heaven” that imparts life, not the manna given by Moses in the Wilderness - (John 6:50-51, 7:37-39).

When the Day of Pentecost was “fully filled up,” the Spirit was poured out on the saints gathered “with one accord” in Jerusalem. The Apostle Peter proclaimed this to be the promised Gift of the Spirit predicted by the Prophet Joel. The “Promise of the Father” was given to Jesus upon his Exaltation, and he therefore bestows the Gift of the Spirit on his disciples - (Acts 2:16-21, Joel 2:28-30).

Paul explained how Jesus came to “redeem us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse in our behalf” in Galatians. This was so “the Blessing of Abraham should come to the Gentiles.” The promises of the Covenant were to Abraham and his “Seed,” and that seed is Jesus Christ. The Covenant always intended to include the Gentiles, and this has been achieved through the Death and Resurrection of Christ - (Galatians 3:13).

The Law of Moses served as a “custodian” until the time of fulfillment when the “Seed” came. But now, the time of “custodianship” has ceased. Jesus, Abraham’s True Seed and Heir, is the “end of the Law for righteousness for all who believe” - (Galatians 3:19-25, Romans 10:4).

The Mosaic Law was an interim stage between Promise and Fulfillment. The Son came in the “fullness of time” to redeem those who were under the Law. Consequently, for those who are “in Christ,” no longer can there be “Jew or Greek, bond or free, male and female,” for we are all “one in Christ Jesus.”

The social and ethnic distinctions inherent in the Mosaic Law have no place in the New Covenant inaugurated by the sacrificial death of Jesus. All who have “put on Christ” are one in him, and all are now “Abraham’s children, and according to promise, heirs” - (Galatians 3:26-29, 4:4-7, Colossians 3:11).

RETURNING TO THE OLD?

To again observe “days, months, seasons and years” as required under the Torah would mean submitting to the “weak and beggarly elemental spirits” that previously tyrannized us. Why exchange the Spirit and Liberty for the death-dealing letter of the Law with its ever-present curse on all men who fail to do all that it requires? - (2 Corinthians 3:6-7, Galatians 3:10, 4:8-10, 5:1-3).

God has spoken with great finality “upon these last of days in His Son.” He spoke partially to Israel “in the prophets” - Here a little, there a little. The earlier prophetic word was true but promissory, preparatory, and incomplete. Now God has spoken completely in Jesus who alone “achieved the purification of sins” – (Hebrews 1:1).

Christ’s priesthood surpasses that of Aaron and the Levites. His death achieved what no animal sacrifice ever could. Only he succeeded in securing the forgiveness of sins and cleansing our conscience. Through his Death, Jesus delivered us who through “fear of death were all our lifetime subject to bondage.” No priestly act, sacrifice, or offering under the Levitical Priesthood ever accomplished what Christ has done for us - (Hebrews 2:14, 9:14, 10:22).

Jesus is the “guarantee of a better covenant, one legislated on better promises.” If the first Covenant had been “faultless,” there would have been no need for another, and this vastly superior New Covenant has rendered the old one obsolete, including its sacrifices, rituals, calendrical observations, and the Temple - (Hebrews 8:4-10:18).

The old system constituted “glimpses and shadows of the heavenly realities,” mere patterns of the permanent originals. “Let no one, therefore, be disqualifying you in eating and in drinking, or in respect of a feast, new moon and Sabbaths, which were shadows of the coming things, but the substance is of the Christ” - (Colossians 2:9-17, Hebrews 8:1-7, 9:9-10, 9:23-24).

The Body of Christ is composed of believers in Jesus, both Jews and Gentiles. Together, they are “resident aliens” and “sojourners” in this world, a people without a national homeland that possess the incorruptible inheritance of salvation.

The Apostle Peter applied several appellations to the largely Gentile congregations of Asia Minor that originally were used of Israel. They have been inherited by the Church of Jesus Christ:

• “But now, in Christ Jesus, you are the living stones being built up into a spiritual house for a holy priesthood to offer spiritual sacrifices well-pleasing to God, through Jesus Christ <…> You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for a peculiar treasure <…> at one time y0u were a no-people but now you are the people of God,” singular - (1 Peter 2:4-10, Exodus 19:5-6).

This theme of fulfillment is found throughout the New Testament. God defeated Sin, Satan, and Death on Calvary, not on the altar of the Temple in old Jerusalem or the Tabernacle in the Wilderness. The “mystery of God” that was hidden in past ages has been revealed in His Son, not the modern nation of Israel - (Romans 16:25, 1 Corinthians 2:1-9, 2 Corinthians 1:19-20).

Since the substance of God’s promises is available freely to all men in His Son, it would be foolhardy in the extreme to return to the types and shadows of the old and incomplete revelation for knowledge and revelation about the Creator of all things and humanity’s Redemption.

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SEE ALSO:

• One New Man - (By his death and resurrection, Jesus formed one covenant community - One New Man - based on faith in him, not ethnicity or nationality – Ephesians 2:11-22)

• The Gift of the Spirit - (With the outpouring of the Gift of the Spirit, beginning on the Day of Pentecost, the blessings for all nations promised to Abraham commenced)

• Covenant Heirs - (With the outpouring of the Spirit on the Day of Pentecost, the blessings for all nations of the Abrahamic Covenant commenced)

• Jews and Gentiles - (The equality of Jews and Gentiles before an impartial and just God is pivotal to Paul’s Gospel. They stand or fall before Him on the same basis)