Cornerstone Curriculum, Official Certification Edition

LESSON 3 | THE OT WITNESS TO CHRIST AND HIS KINGDOM: THE PROMISE GIVEN / 143

Please take as much time as you have available to answer these and other questions that the video brought out. In this lesson we explored the relationship of the Old Testament to the New Testament in the ideas of progressive revelation , as well as the promise-fulfillment motif. The idea of progressive revelation affirms that God has revealed himself progressively and definitively throughout the history of his people, and finally through Jesus Christ. Likewise, the motif of promise-fulfillment suggests that the promise God made to redeem and restore his creation and people, made in the OT, is fulfilled in the person of Jesus of Nazareth in the NT. Explore these and the other ideas covered in this lesson by reviewing the material through the questions below. Include Scripture in your answers, where appropriate. 1. What is the meaning of progressive revelation , and what does this idea affirm regarding God and his determination to make himself known in the world? Be specific. 2. How does the concept of progressive revelation help us understand how God has revealed himself to humankind before Christ? Now that Christ has come, what further revelation can we expect from God about himself and his purposes for his universe? 3. What saying of Augustine nicely summarizes the relationship between the two testaments? Explain its meaning. 4. What are some of the ways in which the OT and the NT are complimentary to each other, that is, explain and reveal one another? Be specific, and highlight what each concept means. 5. What does it mean to say that the OT serves as the shadow (prefiguring) of the person and work of Christ embodied in the NT? Give examples. 6. How can it be said that the OT is the ineffective former revelation of God’s salvation, of which the NT is the consummated latter of that same salvation in Jesus? 7. In what sense does the NT make available for all people what was particularized to Israel in the OT? Explain. 8. How does the motif of promise and fulfillment affirm how the entire Bible can be understood as God making his promise for salvation which is fulfilled in the person of Jesus of Nazareth? Explain. 9. What are the central texts which affirm how the OT’s theme and subject is the person of Messiah fulfilled in the person of Jesus Christ? How is this theme developed and laid out in the OT?

Student Questions and Response page 87 & 5

3

B i b l i ca l S tud i e s