The author Ronald Youngblood observed the preface of the Old Treatment in the book, The Heart of the Old Testament by demonstrating the basic outline of the Scriptures is to trace the development of certain key ideas from one end of the Bible to the other. This book serves a great purpose that lays out nine themes that constitute the heart of the Old Testament. The nine themes are monotheism, sovereignty, election, covenant, theocracy, law, sacrifice, faith, and redemption. Dr. Ron Youngblood has achieved his purpose in an admirable layout before us the heart of the Old Testament in a careful and practical manner. Dr. Youngblood links the key theological strands of the Old Testament to the New in a style that is biblically sound, highly readable,
God makes a covenant with Moses called the Mosaic covenant, which is the covenant between God and the nation of Israel. The covenant was made at Mount Sinai, where God makes Moses the leader of Israel. This covenant is conditional because its organized in the form of blessings and curses. God states “I will set my Dwelling among you, and will not disdain you.
Perseverance helps push a person past their limits to reach their goal. Throughout the book, Odysseus faces many problems he must solve in order to return home to Ithaca. He must escape the Cyclops’s cave, figure out a way to get past the sirens, and dodge the dangerous sea monsters. His determination will help him get back home to see his wife Penelope and return to rule Ithaca. In The Odyssey, Homer presents the idea that perseverance can make a person stronger when they overcome many obstacles and have a goal to work towards.
This covenant is conditional and would set Israel away from all other nations. Cross justifies this with a quote from Exodus “Now, if you obey me completely and keep my covenant, you will be my treasured possession among all peoples, though all the earth is mine. You will be to me a kingdom of priests, a holy nation” (Cross 114). This quote means that the people must comply with God or else it is invalid.
This emphasis on a generational covenant theology can be seen in the way that the Lord refers to himself in verse ten and also throughout the rest of the Pentateuch as the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. However, we see in verse ten that a twist is put on this common phrase in order to make it more personal than just a tradition for people of the past. God’s covenant is also for your fathers and is meant to be passed down to you. The style of the point of view in which Deuteronomy was written serves a compelling rhetorical purpose. It would have made sense if this text would have been written from the third person point of view in the past tense, saying “Moses told the Israelites that God said they should do this.”
The Mosaic Law is very influential on present day law for a number of reasons. During Moses’ time God gave the Ten Commandments to him at Mount Sinai. These commandments or ‘laws’ are designed in a way that guided and molded the way our laws are shaped today. Not only does the look and structure of the Ten Commandments show similarities with our present day law but so do the rules or commandments actually stated. Many of the ‘rules of God’ are comparable to laws we have today.
President Donald Trump built his presidential campaign on promise to make America great again. However, with his presidency going into his first year in office, I still have to see those promises come into fruition. Instead, he is rescinding or changing the policies that former President Obama created during his tenure in the White House. Trump, in my opinion is very obsessed with Obama. This dislike of Obama started when the current president questioned the legitimacy of Obama’s constitutional right to run for presidency.
Thus, the central storyline of the New Testament is the salvation of all of God's people.
Hence, Paul introduces the good news in the following verses by revealing God’s righteousness apart from the law, thus providing salvation to those who indeed believe. However, Paul, does not in any way devoid the law from its use. In fact, Paul exhorts the Gentiles to know its essential requirements (v. 2:14-15) and that they must be doers of the law (2:13, 26-27), but a law that; “requires conformity with its commandments cannot provide the basis by which sinners can be declared righteous.” Paul, then proceeds to use Abraham as the perfect example of one who “believed and was counted to him as righteousness” (v. 4:3). Nevertheless, the statement “that Abraham’s faith was credited to him for righteousness was made not for his benefit alone but also for the benefit of all who believe in him who raised Jesus from the dead.”
The Bible is separated into two main sections, the Old and New Testaments. The Old Testament tells of the time before Jesus Christ comes into the world. On the other hand, the New Testament tells of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Many people view the Old and New Testament as being totally separate parts of the bible. The view point of these two different sections may be somewhat true for certain subjects, such as the list of unclean animals and the covenant associated with circumcision.
Lessing describes the Old Testament as an educational primer a student had outgrown, after which a more suitable instructor was required. As shown in his statement “That is, this portion of the human race had come so far in the exercise of its reason that it required, and could make use of, nobler and worthier motives for moral action than the temporal rewards and punishments had hitherto been its guide. The child becomes a boy.” , when human reason was finally ready for the second step of its education, Christ became the first practical teacher of the immortality of the soul and the New Testament came to serve as the second primer which was better suited for the second step of revelation.
A Throne for All Ages The biblical covenants that God makes displayed in Piper’s Article, all of which fulfilled by Jesus, invite mankind to the Kingdom of the Father. Throughout the Bible, these covenants are made between God and people like Abraham, Moses, and Noah. They serve as a spectacular source of faith and help people on earth to realize the Father’s wisdom, power, and love he has to share. His covenants with man can be referred to as His own “self-written job description,” how He works to keep people on a good path in life.
There are 2 things that we see in both the Old and New Testament that never change; the fact that the bible tells us to love God with all of our heart, soul, might and mind, and to love our neighbor as we love ourselves (Deuteronomy 6:5, Leviticus 19:18, Luke 10:27). The best thing we can do is love with our all, as Jesus did when he died on the cross for us. Despite our imperfections, Jesus still displayed unconditional love toward us; unconditional meaning as wide as it is deep. What I mean by this is that our love unconditional should always remain-it should be never-ending. The word of God says that “love covers a multitude of sin” (1 Peter 4:8), and the same love that Christ used to cast our transgression “as far as the east is from the west” (Psalm 103:12), this is the same love we are expected to show to our brother and sister when they offend us.
This covenant is found in Exodus 19-24 and Deuteronomy. These books are the structure for the Judicial law which the Israelites follow even to this day. In Exodus 20 is where we find the Ten Commandment. These are the basic few out of the 613 laws that God requires the Israelites to follow. I have a hard enough time remembering the Ten Commandments yet alone the 613 laws required to be holy before God.
The regulations God provided in the Ten Commandments represented the covenant God made with the Israelites in relation to Salvation Grace. God presented the route his people would follow to attain Salvation through this commandments. Through the Covenants God made with Moses during the era, He provided the Ten Commandments to Israelites. Moses performed various sacrifices that would cleanse the people of Israel from their sins. However, observance of the law was not the way to salvation in the Old Testament.
