Treasures New and Old

⁶Now these things occurred as examples for us, so that we might not desire evil as they did. ⁷Do not become idolaters as some of them did; as it is written, “The people sat down to eat and drink, and they rose up to play.” ⁸We must not indulge in sexual immorality as some of them did, and twenty-three thousand fell in a single day. ⁹We must not put Christ to the test, as some of them did, and were destroyed by serpents. ¹⁰And do not complain as some of them did, and were destroyed by the destroyer. ¹¹These things happened to them to serve as an example, and they were written down to instruct us, on whom the ends of the ages have come.

Our next passage to explore is 1 Corinthians 10:1-13 and particularly what Paul says in verses 6 and 11. In the larger context of the letter, it appears as though the Corinthians regarded themselves as spiritually enlightened and empowered. They had made it. However, Paul sees things differently and worries that they are actually facing spiritual threat if not disaster because of their confidence in their own spiritual security. Reading between the lines, you get the impression that there was a confidence that their participation in baptism and the Lord’s Supper and their spiritual experiences conveyed some sort of spiritual guarantee. However, Paul’s response here indicates that he considered that such foolish pride was very likely to cause them disillusionment. Moreover, they also betrayed a radical failure to understand the nature of Christian life which is all about finding security in Christ alone who is apprehended by faith alone.

Paul indicates that the truth that the people of God must have no confidence in anyone but God is grounded in the Old Testament, being found time and time again in commandment and in story.

He focuses on one story that has echoes of their own situation; the wilderness wanderings. There, in very concrete form, the Corinthians could recognise themselves and their own circumstances and Paul indicates that God’s attitudes and actions should teach them, rebuke them, correct them, and train them in righteousness. His acts of judgment in the past point towards his attitude now where his people are sinning in similar ways. God judged the worship of idols then. He judged fornication and testing and grumbling then, and he will do so now.

From this, we can see that Paul is happy to use the Old Testament scriptures in a broad way. He often uses them typologically, Christologically, and apologetically. However, it is clear that for him the Old Testament is also a book that records God’s dealings with his people in history and provides us with concrete positive and negative examples of what it means to live before God.

Matthew 13:51–52 occurs as the end of a long passage on parables in Matthew’s Gospel. During the course of his teaching, Jesus raises some of the issues that we’ve already mentioned previously. Intriguingly, as Jesus talks about the parables he uses much the same language that is used about the Old Testament. For example, Jesus talks about the fact that parables seem to confirm the hard heartedness of those listening. He quotes Isaiah 6 that talks about people having dull hearts, unseeing eyes, and unhearing ears. He also talks about the fact that as his disciples they have been given opened eyes and hearing ears. Moreover, just as he opens up the scriptures to his disciples in Luke 24, so he opens up the parables to them in Matthew 13. Then, at the end of his teaching on parables we get these verses:

⁵¹“Have you understood all these things?” Jesus asked. “Yes,” they replied. ⁵²He said to them, “Therefore every teacher of the law who has been instructed about the kingdom of heaven is like the owner of a house who brings out of his storeroom new treasures as well as old.”

In understanding the significance of these verses we first need to sort out who Jesus is talking about when he mentions ‘scribes'. One possibility is that he could be talking about Jewish scribes who become Christians. Another is Christian teachers of the Old Testament and even another is that he intends disciples in general. My own interpretation is that it is most likely to be the second or third option but that whichever it is, what is of particular significance is what he then goes on to say.

First, he asks if they understand ‘all these things’. In other words, he asks them if they understand the core message of the parables, at which point they assure him that they do. In response, he tells them that people like them, that is, people who have been instructed in the kingdom of heaven, are people who have been granted a heavenly insight. They have undergone a massive transformation in thought and perspective in having come to see that Jesus is the centre of God’s kingdom and purpose and this transformation is to be applied to their understanding of the Old Testament. As disciple-scribes they do not discard the Old Testament scriptures. Rather, they know that these scriptures have their focus and fulfilment in Jesus and as a result, they are able to dig deep into these scriptures and are able to draw out from them both new and old truths.

In other words, these disciple-scribes are able to do the sorts of things that we hear Jesus doing in his teaching and we see Matthew doing as he reads and comments on the Old Testament throughout his Gospel.  They are able to do what Jesus did with the disciples on the road to Emmaus.

From this we can see that it is not the intention of Jesus that the Old Testament scriptures are dispensed with. Rather, they can be read as documents that were written to God’s people before Christ but they are to be read in the light of God’s revelation of Jesus Christ. The Old Testament is therefore Christian scripture and there are many things that it teaches that are ‘old’ in the sense that a Jewish reader could agree with what is said. However, the fact that it has been fulfilled in Christ will also mean that there are many things that it teaches that are ‘new’ in a sense that only a Christian reader could understand fully.

My own take on this verse is therefore that it is quite possible for a Christian preacher to interpret a passage in the same way that a Jewish reader might and to do so is entirely Christian. However, the Christian preacher will also note and often explain how this passage contains things concerning Christ (when it does!).

We’ve now had a look at what Paul says in Romans 16:25–27 and on Luke’s reflections on the Emmaus road experience in Luke 24. Now it is time to have a look at what Jesus himself says. The first passage is John 5:39-40. In talking with the religious leaders of his day, whom he affirms as diligent students of the scriptures, Jesus says:

You diligently study the scriptures because you think that by them you possess eternal life. These are the scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me to have life.

Jesus notes that when these religious leaders search the scriptures they do so with a primary motivation which is set toward their final acceptance by God (‘eternal life’). However, Jesus asserts that the scriptures that they search do not of themselves give life. Rather, it is the message that they contain about him that leads to life. He is their true purpose in being written and to fail to come to him is to corrupt and foil that purpose.

The point is that it is possible to study the scriptures and master them technically but not know their core message or to hold it at arm’s length. To master the scriptures is to know them in the light of the one two whom they testify.

Let’s now try and work out the relationship between what we said about Luke and what this passage says. First, we noted that the Old Testament scriptures contain things concerning Jesus. Second, we noted that this does not mean that Christ is the subject of every scriptural text or that every text must speak of him. Third, we have now seen that Jesus says that the scriptures as a whole testify of him. So, how do we put this together?

It seems to me that one way to do this is to say that we should approach the Old Testament scriptures with a Christological conviction or presupposition. This does not mean that every text testifies of Christ but that they are part and parcel of a united testimony to the person and work of Christ. To cut them loose from this testimony is to misread them. We will build on this some more as we continue to look at what else Jesus and his apostles say in the other passages we look at.

Since we’ve touched on Luke 24, it may be helpful to observe what Luke 24 does not say.

First, Luke 24:27 does not actually say that Christ is the subject of all the Scriptures. It says that Jesus explained to them the things concerning himself in the Scriptures. This appears to mean that the Scriptures contain things about him, or, in the words of John 5:39–40, they testify to him.

Second, Luke 24:27 does not say that ‘every passage of scripture’ testifies to Christ. It does say that the scriptures contain things concerning Christ but not that ‘every passage’ contains things concerning Christ or that ‘all biblical texts’ somehow testify to Jesus Christ. In fact, given the context, it may very well be that Jesus was specifically referring to the testimony of the scriptures to the necessity that the Christ should suffer (Luke 24:26)

A similar point can be made in relation to Luke 24:44. What it says is that ‘everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets, and the Psalms.’

I only point this out because I often read comments on Luke 24 that give the distinct impression that some people think that the verses actually read something along these lines:

‘And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them that all the Scriptures said things concerning himself.’ (Luke 24:27)

‘He said to them, “This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms is about me and must be fulfilled.”’ (Luke 24:44)

Romans 16:25–27 is a helpful piece of background for understanding the account of the road to Emmaus in Luke 24. The narrative is straightforward enough. Two disciples are journeying toward Emmaus. Jesus comes among them and they fail to recognise him. They tell him some of what had recently happened concerning the death and resurrection of Jesus and he tells them that the prophets had made clear that it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and then enter into his glory. Then, beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself. After they have travelled a bit further with them he is finally recognised, at which point he disappears from their sight. They then reflect on the fact that their hearts had burned within them while he opened the OT Scriptures to them, at which point Jesus appear again and again opens their minds to understand the Scriptures.

The narrative is intriguing for a number of reasons. For example, there are the references to opening, to eyes, and to heart and mind.

• In verse 25 the disciples are said to be ‘slow of heart’.
• In verse 31 their eyes are opened and they recognise him.
• In verse 32 they explain how their hearts burned when he opened the scriptures to them.
• In verse 45 he opens their minds to understand the scriptures.

In the Old Testament God’s people are often said to be hard of heart or dull in their understanding or unable to see (we referred to this in the earlier discussion of Romans 16). Here, as Jesus walks and talks with them this hardness of heart, blindness, and dullness of understanding, dissipates in relation to the Old Testament scriptures. They become people who recognise, whose minds are opened, and whose hearts are warmed.

You can see how this builds on the information that we had from Romans 16 where Paul told us that God’s great purposes in Jesus Christ were made known in the Old Testament scriptures but that they were somewhat hidden from Old Testament people and they could not fully see, understand, or experience them. Luke 24 tells us that knowledge of Jesus and being taught by him leads to a revelation of the whole content of the Scriptures. In the words of Romans 16:25-27, the mystery hidden for long past is revealed, and this happens as Christ is known and experienced.

The implication is that the key to understanding what the Old Testament is really about is to see it in the light of who Jesus is and what he has done. The New Testament scriptures introduce us to Jesus and once we have met him and been taught by him we will be able to understand and receive the message of the Old Testament scriptures and we will find it to be a message full of Jesus.

It’s worth noting that a similar point could be made from 2 Corinthians 3, which also raises the concept of Israel’s hardness of heart. The difference appears to be that Luke 24 talks about Jesus rather the ministry of the Spirit, which appears to be Paul’s focus. For more on this, see Scott J. Hafemann, Paul, Moses, and the History of Israel: The Letter/Spirit Contrast and the Argument From Scripture in 2 Corinthians 3 (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 1995), and 2 Corinthians, (NIVAC, Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2000).

None of this means that you need a special mystical experience of Jesus and that once you have this all the secrets of the Bible will be revealed. The Bible’s message can be read by anyone. However, I do think that it means what the New Testament says in numerous other places, that is that true interpretation of the Bible can’t be divorced from relating to the one to whom it points.

There is a plethora of works on how Jesus and the New Testament authors use the ‘Holy Writings’ (2 Tim 3:15) or ‘Scriptures’ (2 Tim 3:16). However, I’m not aware of many that fully explore in one place the various places where they tell us what they think about those scriptures and how they should be dealt with. In the following days or weeks my intention is to give some reflections on some key passages from the New Testament where Jesus or his apostles give their reflections on how they approach these scriptures. Before we do this, I ought to clarify that there is some debate as to whether what they call ’scripture’ is exactly equivalent to what is called the ‘Old Testament’. At the moment, I don’t intend to explore this.

In order to kick off, I thought it might be helpful to look at a place that is not often looked at, Romans 16:25-27, which says:

Now to him who is able to establish you by my gospel and the proclamation of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery hidden for long ages past, but now revealed and made known through the prophetic writings by the command of the eternal God, so that all nations might believe and obey him—to the only wise God be glory forever through Jesus Christ! Amen. (NIV)

These final verses of Romans pick up many of the main ideas of the letter. In particular, they echo the language and ideas of the first seven verses of the letter. In other words, Paul started his epistle by talking about God’s revelation in Jesus and finishes in the same way. However, there are a couple of things to specifically notice about what he says in these closing verses.

First, he talks about ‘the command of the eternal God’, thereby making clear that God has ordained and determined what happened in history and in Christ. It is under his direction and supervision.

Second, he uses the term ‘mystery’ in verse 25. For Paul, a mystery is a secret that was hidden from human beings, which is apparent in what he says in these verses as he talks about this mystery having been hidden in the past. However, for Paul a mystery is also something that is now revealed. Again, this can also be seen in what he says here as he talks about this mystery being revealed as he proclaims the gospel which is about God’s great deed in Jesus Christ.

Now as soon as we say these two things there is an apparent contradiction that becomes evident. Paul says that God’s mystery was hidden in the past but he also says that it was made known through the prophetic writings. You can’t help wondering how the gospel can contain a mystery that was hidden in the Old Testament scriptures and yet at the same time made known through those same scriptures? However, I think that there is a way through this apparent contradiction. What paul is saying is that God announced his purposes in the Old Testament but the people there could fully understand or apprehend those purposes. They just could not see these things clearly, even though they might have got hints of what was coming. This is reflected in the comments both in the Old and New Testaments about God’s people being hard hearted or stiffnecked or darkened in their understanding (this will explain some things that we will meet later and I’ll say some more about it then).

So, while we want to hold on to the doctrine of the clarity of scripture, it seems as though some things in the Old Testament were not all that clear to those to whom those scriptures were originally directed.