2 Testaments, 1 Story

I’ve observed something interesting in Scripture….God’s penchant for balancing events in the Old Testament with others in the New Testament…..Like the idolatry of the Hebrews worshipping the golden calf in the desert while Moses was on Mt. Sinai receiving the Ten Commandments….3000 of them died as a result of their disobedience. In the New Testament at Pentecost, 3000 people were saved when they believed in Christ as Peter proclaimed the Gospel from the high point of worship in Jerusalem.

At the tower of Babel, people were diversified in language and disbursed so that they could not cooperate in reaching up to God….In the New Testament with the development of the church Christ set out to unify and draw them toward God and all the multitude of languages were heard as they were spoken through a Holy Spirit language from the tongues of the Apostles in order to bring them together at Pentecost.

Jacob and Esau, brothers, battled in the womb and the younger one was victorious. In the NT, Jesus (a descendant of Jacob) and Herod (a descendant of the Edomite nation founded by Esau) were at the focal point of a great spiritual battle that was won also by the heir to Jacob’s lineage.

Twelve brothers formed the basis for twelve tribes of people arising from God’s promise to Abraham that pointed toward the coming Christ and a large group of people identifying as a nation of “God’s people” . In the New Testament twelve disciples formed the basis for God’s fulfillment of that promise in Christ and would be responsible for the proliferation of the Gospel among those who would become known as “God’s people”. The OT people shared biological connection as a common factor and their history led toward Christ. The NT people share spiritual connection as a common factor and their history arose from Christ.

God used a large scale, overwhelming flood of water to cleanse the earth in the OT of a proliferation of evil. In the NT the cleansing flow of water in baptism overwhelms the heart of an individual and purifies from the penalty and power of evil.
In the OT, Noah obeyed God, taking his family into a boat to protect them from the fierce flood and storm. In the NT, Christ stood in a boat and called the storm into obedience to the authority of God.

There is a beautiful and poetic ebb and flow to God’s redemptive work as he brings his purpose to bear across time, generations of peoples, governments, and geographies.