How to read and how to pray
Progressive Revelation of Divine Truth
Blackwood’s Comprehensive Aids to the Study of the Bible · Vol. I, p. 59
The thoughtful student of the Word of God will not fail to notice the elementary character of the Pentateuch, as well as the directness and simplicity of the language and style of the early books of the Old Testament as contrasted with the matter and the style of the Epistles in the New Testament. An ascending scale of progress is very perceptible. In the revelation of doctrine there is a development, just as in the natural world there is a progression from the germ or the seed to the condition of the fully expanded tree.
A peculiarity is observable also in the mode in which Divine truth has been given to the Church. Instead of a stream issuing from the fountain and holding its way onward with a gradual increase, as it keeps to a level plane, the current is suddenly enlarged at distinct periods by new and great additions, which elevate the stream to a higher plane, on which it continues to flow. In process of time another addition is vouchsafed, and on a still higher platform the stream advances, and thus it has continued to grow until in due time the Church has received the fulness of doctrine, which it was the purpose of the LORD to bestow.
From the fall of Adam until the Deluge, the Church was left with the knowledge that in time "the Seed of the woman" would bruise the head of the serpent, that thus a moral deliverer would appear. There was enough here to form a basis for faith and hope. In the expulsion from Eden and in the government of the universe, GOD had indicated His hatred of sin, yet from century to century the human race seems to have disregarded the promise, and to have degenerated into a condition of violence and licentiousness that threatened to dissolve the bonds of society. The long-threatened Deluge came, and thus the LORD asserted His character as the Moral Governor, showing that patience is neither approval nor forgetfulness, and that persistency in evil entails misery and woe.
In the family of Noah the new world entered on its course with all the lessons of the past. The terrors of the LORD had been so unmistakably displayed as to teach men that with Him there was judgment as well as mercy. Yet the tendency of the race soon became manifest, and a system of symbolizing of the powers of nature began to engross the minds of men, which tended to the lowest forms of idolatry, and speedily extended its fascinating influence. In this transition state another important and gracious manifestation took place.
Abraham was called, and the announcement made that in him, according to the flesh, should the Deliverer come. As yet, the Messiah might be of any nation, of any race or family, or in any age. Now, the faith of the Church was directed to a particular quarter, and the descent of the Messiah, in a certain line, was declared, so that this prophetic promise enlarged the spiritual vision and established the faith of the Church. Brought into Egypt and sunk in bondage as the descendants of Abraham were, their condition seemed to be hopeless, and the LORD appeared to have forgotten His promise, but in the depth of their darkness and suffering their lot was suddenly changed to light and freedom.
Under the leadership of Moses the Hebrews went out from Egypt a mighty host. They received at his hands a wonderful system of social and ecclesiastical laws. They were provided with all the details of a complicated churchly system, that tended to keep them separate from the heathen around them, and to perpetuate among them the increased knowledge of GOD and of salvation which their sacrifices and typical institutions contained. The commentary on the Levitical system in the Epistle to the Hebrews shows that all the great fundamental doctrines of the Gospel were exhibited in type and figure in the institutions of the Law, and thus under Moses the Church stands forth in advance of any former condition, invested with privileges such as no former age had enjoyed.
Time rolled on, and the unsettled transition period of the Judges came to an end. The weak administration of Eli and the evil conduct of his sons, and of the sons of Samuel also, led the people to desire the consolidation of the nation; and now Samuel, the last of the Judges, founder of the monarchy, and first of the great prophetic band that from his day indicated the will of GOD to the people, takes his place as a reformer, and stands at the head of another distinct period. As the projector of the Schools of the Prophets and the originator of the other educational institutions that so largely affected the social life of the Jewish people until the captivity, Samuel's influence and policy mark out a distinct era.
The rulers and the people, both in Israel and in Judah, seemed unable to comprehend the folly and the wickedness of their idolatrous departure from the service of Jehovah, and to realize the fact that those judgments would overtake them of which their prophets so plainly spake, if they did not repent and turn to the LORD. Their captivity served to humble those who had been carried to the Tigris and the Euphrates, and the oppression endured by those who had been left in the land prepared them for recognizing the mercy of GOD in their restoration under Ezra and Nehemiah. As a statesman and a patriot, perhaps Nehemiah never had a superior. Great as Moses was as a legislator, Nehemiah was as eminent as a restorer of the civil and religious polity of his countrymen. There is little doubt but that during the captivity the spiritual necessities of the people led them when separated from the temple to form associations for religious objects, and after the Restoration, under the administration of Nehemiah and his immediate successors, the synagogue system rapidly spread, and ere long it extended over the land. The advantages of parochial or congregational worship were thus enjoyed by the people in their "meeting-houses," where the Law was read. Hearkening to the Scriptures in such assemblies, the people were warned against the sins of their fathers, and the old tendency to idolatry was successfully opposed. Such a system of parochial or village worship was really a framework for the Christian Church, as the rulers and members of these synagogues had only to recognize the Messiah when he appeared, and forthwith they became Christian organizations.
In the fulness of time the SAVIOUR came, according to the sure word of prophecy. As the paschal lamb was slain in the eve of the Jewish day, so the Great Antitype died for our sins in the eve of the Jewish Church's existence and at the close of the national day. The sceptre was departing from Judah. The power of Rome was rapidly turning Palestine into a mere province of the empire, and every vestige of Jewish rule was about to disappear. That which in Jewish sacrifices and symbols was exhibited to the Church during ages of expectancy was now realized in the person and work of the SON OF GOD. On the cross He could utter, "It is finished," and then bowing His head, He gave up the ghost.
This section, however, has not so much to do with our LORD in His office of a Priest atoning as in His prophetical office as a Great Teacher. The Jews did not fall into actual idolatry after the captivity, but so far as spiritual worship and right views of the MESSIAH'S kingdom were concerned they had sadly degenerated. The priesthood and the chief priests had become political, and they desired a MESSIAH mainly in order to beat back the power of Rome and consolidate the Jewish rule. The sect of the Pharisees had extended a spirit of formality and superstition among the people. They had set "the traditions of the elders" not only on a level with the Revealed Word, but on many points they had made the Word of none effect by their traditions. On the other hand, the Sadducees had fallen into a cold, degrading scepticism, rejecting immortality and all the sanctions of a future life, thus striking at the very basis of moral obligation. Now, our LORD, as the GREAT TEACHER, opened up the character of the Law of GOD, showing the spirituality of its nature, the universality of its demands and the sanctions by which it exacts obedience. He unveiled the utter sinfulness of the Pharisaic spirit, and showed the inutility of mere external obedience while the heart was corrupt, and the life in aim and motive was opposed to GOD. He taught by precept and example what it was to be good, and merciful, and benevolent, and kind, how to sow in this life, and what to expect in the future harvest.
Against the Sadducean errors He established the great doctrine of immortality, which He illustrated and confirmed by His own Resurrection. Over evil spirits, over disease and death, over the kingdom of nature, as well as over the souls of men, He showed His lordship and sovereignty, and so with signs and wonders manifold He established the divinity of His mission and showed that He was the SON OF GOD with power. Thus teaching, He called sinners to Himself to receive and rest in a full salvation. By fervid appeals and earnest supplications, by illustrations drawn from Jewish rites that told of safety and of healing, He proclaimed His mission and called sinners to Him, that in Him they might enjoy eternal life.
- Plain though our LORD'S teaching had been before His death, and still more clear after His resurrection, yet His Apostles were slow to learn. They clung to the idea of a great Jewish kingdom under the sway of a MESSIAH whose reign would be more powerful than that of David, more magnificent than that of Solomon, and more permanent than that of any judge or monarch of all their line. The teaching of our LORD after His resurrection impressed their minds, and as they waited in Jerusalem they in some measure recognized the truth that His kingdom was not to be of the fashion of this world, that in its nature it was spiritual—a dominion over souls—and that earthly boundaries were not to limit its extent, and that earthly monarchs themselves would become its citizens and recognize the ascended SAVIOUR as LORD and RULER over all. At the Pentecostal effusion of the SPIRIT their minds were opened to discern the Gospel message in all its fulness, and then a Peter, a James and a John could preach and write, as their Epistles testify. A mightier intellect—Paul, the Pharisee, humbled and taught by the risen SAVIOUR—goes forth at His command as the herald of salvation, and in his Epistles the Church has the full completion of doctrine which was the purpose of the KING OF ZION to bestow. The promise in the garden was simple, but it was enough for faith. When Peter and Paul and John laid down their pens, nothing more profound, more elevated or more extensive in their range could be required for the Church's use than the truths which these servants of the LORD had proclaimed!