SPECIAL TOPIC: THE TENSION BETWEEN OLD COVENANT
PROPHETIC MODELS AND NEW COVENANT APOSTOLIC MODELS (OT racial, national, and geographical categories vs. all
believers over all the world)
The OT prophets predict a restoration of a Jewish kingdom in Palestine
centered in Jerusalem where all the nations of the earth gather to praise and
serve a Davidic ruler, but Jesus nor the NT Apostles ever focus on this agenda. Is not the OT inspired (cf. Matt. 5:17-19)? Have the NT authors omitted crucial
end-time events?
There are several sources of information about the end of the world.
1. OT prophets (Isaiah, Micah, Malachi)
2. OT apocalyptic writers (cf. Ezekiel 37-39; Daniel 7-12; Zechariah)
3. intertestamental, non-canonical Jewish apocalyptic writers (like I
Enoch, which is alluded to in Jude)
4. Jesus Himself (cf. Matt. 24; Mark 13; Luke 21)
5. the writings of Paul (cf. 1 Corinthians 15; 2 Corinthians 5; 1
Thessalonians 4-5; 2 Thessalonians 2)
6. the writings of John (1 John and Revelation)
Do these all clearly teach an end-time agenda (events, chronology, persons)? If
not, why? Are they not all inspired (except the Jewish intertestamental
writings)?
The Spirit revealed truths to the OT writers in terms and categories they
could understand. However, through progressive revelation the Spirit has
expanded these OT eschatological concepts to a universal scope (“the mystery of
Christ,” cf. Eph. 2:11-3:13). Here are some relevant
examples:
1. The city of Jerusalem in the OT is used as a metaphor of the people
of God (Zion), but is projected into the NT as a term expressing God’s
acceptance of all repentant, believing humans (the new Jerusalem of Revelation
21-22). The theological expansion of a literal, physical city into the new
people of God (believing Jews and Gentiles) is foreshadowed in God’s promise to
redeem fallen
mankind in Gen. 3:15, before there even were any Jews or a Jewish capital city.
Even Abraham’s call (cf. Gen. 12:1-3) involved the Gentiles (cf. Gen. 12:3;
Exod. 19:5).
2. In the OT the enemies of God’s people are the surrounding nations
of the Ancient Near East, but in the NT they have been expanded to all
unbelieving, anti-God, Satanically-inspired people. The battle has moved from a
geographical, regional conflict to a worldwide, cosmic conflict (cf.
Colossians).
3. The promise of a land which is so integral in the OT (the
Patriarchal promises of Genesis, cf. Gen. 12:7; 13:15; 15:7,15; 17:8) has now
become the whole earth. New Jerusalem comes down to a recreated earth, not the
Near East only or exclusively (cf. Revelation 21-22).
4. Some other examples of OT prophetic concepts being expanded are
a. the seed of Abraham is now the spiritually circumcised (cf.
Rom. 2:28-29)
b. the covenant people now include Gentiles (cf. Hos. 1:10; 2:23, quoted in Rom.
9:24-26; also Lev. 26:12; Exod. 29:45, quoted in 2 Cor.
6:16-18 and Exod. 19:5; Deut. 14:2, quoted in Titus 2:14)
c. the temple is now Jesus (cf. Matt. 26:61; 27:40; John
2:19-21) and through Him the local church (cf. 1 Cor. 3:16) or the individual
believer (cf. 1Cor. 6:19)
d. even Israel and its characteristic descriptive OT phrases
now refer to the whole people of God (i.e.,”Israel,” cf. Rom. 9:6; Gal. 6:16,
i.e.,”kingdom of priests,” cf. 1 Pet. 2:5, 9-10; Rev. 1:6)
The prophetic model has been fulfilled, expanded, and is now more
inclusive. Jesus and the Apostolic writers do not present the end-time in the
same way as the OT prophets (cf. Martin Wyngaarden, The Future of The Kingdom in
Prophecy and Fulfillment). Modern interpreters who try to make the OT model
literal or normative twist the Revelation into a very Jewish book and force
meaning into atomized, ambiguous phrases of Jesus and Paul! The NT writers do
not negate the OT prophets, but show their ultimate universal implication. There
is no organized, logical system to Jesus’ or Paul’s eschatology. Their purpose
is primarily redemptive or pastoral.
However, even within the NT there is tension. There is no clear
systemization of eschatological events. In many ways the Revelation surprisingly
uses OT allusions in describing the end instead of the teachings of Jesus (cf.
Matthew 24; Mark 13)! It follows the literary genre initiated by Ezekiel,
Daniel, and Zechariah, but developed during the intertestamental period (Jewish
apocalyptic literature). This may have been John’s way of linking the Old and
New Covenants. It shows the age-old pattern of human rebellion and God’s
commitment to redemption! But it must be noted that although Revelation uses OT
language, persons, and events, it reinterprets them in light of first century
Rome (cf. Revelation 1:7).
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