The Old Testament Witness to Christ and His Kingdom, Mentor's Guide, MG09

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T H E O L D T E S T A M E N T W I T N E S S T O C H R I S T A N D H I S K I N G D O M

• Identify the central texts in Scripture which affirm how the OT’s work is to provide a compelling and definitive witness to the person of Messiah fulfilled in the person of Jesus Christ (cf. Luke 22.25-27, 44-48; Matt. 5.17-18; John 1.45; 5.39-40; Heb. 10.5-10 with Ps. 40.6-8). • Describe the implications of the promise-fulfillment motif for OT study, especially the way in which it suggests that a clear picture of Messiah can be seen in the history of the patriarchs, the nation of Israel, the Messianic prophecies, and the moral standards of the Law. • List the ways in which the promise and fulfillment motif affirms the unity of the Old and New Testaments, in terms of God’s intention to reveal himself, to redeem his people, and to do this through the promise made to Abraham and his descendants fulfilled in the person of Jesus of Nazareth. • Define and explain the concept of the protoevangelium , the first telling of the Gospel in Genesis 3.15, laying out the specifics of the promise including hostility between the serpent and the woman and their respective “seeds,” the bruising of the heel of the woman’s seed, and the crushing of the serpents head by the seed. • Recite the theological implications of the protoevangelium , namely that God would provide humanity with a Savior through the woman’s lineage who would destroy the serpent, albeit having his heel bruised; Jesus of Nazareth is this divine seed commissioned to destroy the devil’s work. • Trace the covenant promise of Yahweh with Abraham as the continuation of this divine promise, including the fact that Abraham and his “seed” would be the means whereby redemption and restoration would come to God’s people as well as to the nations of the earth in him; Jesus of Nazareth is declared to be the seed of Abraham in the NT apostolic witness.

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The Original Promise Keeper

Devotion

Gen. 3.15 - I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel. Do you keep your promises, or do you renege on what you say you will do? A popular men’s group have given themselves the name of “Promise Keepers,” laying out seven areas in which they pledge to the Lord and to each other their fidelity to

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