Emmanuel Evangelical Church Chippenham

In this first study we lay down a few principles and then look at the pattern for the Kingdom of God that was established in the creation.

Background

How do we know what the Bible means? People avoid difficult bits of the Bible such as Revelation or large parts of the Old Testament. And how do we apply the story of David & Goliath, for example?

Why read the Old Testament? Some reasons people don’t (or avoid it or benefit little from it) are:

• Seen as pre-Christian or sub-Christian

• Seen as completely irrelevant to modern Christian

• Find it dry and boring: it is wordy, cumbersome, confusing

Problem “solved” simply by reading the New Testament – or is it? We cannot fully understand the NT without understanding the OT. Terms such as "the lamb of God", "law and grace", "temple" and "election" can only be understood if we understand how they are introduced and presented in the Old Testament.

What is the OT all about? How can/should we understand it?

Is the Bible one book or two (or 66)? What unifies the Bible? Is there a common theme or message of the Bible?

Principles:

1. The Old Testament is the Word of God (2 Timothy 3:16)

2. The Old Testament is the Word of God about Christ (Luke 24:27)

3. The New Testament interprets the Old Testament

4. Jesus is the divine-human Word of God (John 1:1,14)

5. The Bible is the divine-human Word of God (2 Timothy 3:16)

6. Jesus is God’s fullest and final revelation (Hebrews 1:1)

7. We begin and end with the gospel of Jesus Christ

The unifying theme of the Bible is the Kingdom of God; although the term is not used in the OT, the concept is present throughout. (The Kingdom of God is expressed in covenant and in redemption.)

Understanding this theme will help us to understand any part of the Bible correctly.

God’s plan is to establish the Kingdom of God – the Bible is the account of what God has done, is doing and will do to bring that about.

God has always had only one plan - it is not the case that he had a Plan A and that somehow something went wrong so he then had to switch to Plan B. There is no Plan B with God!