CTF 2024 Session 6: Further Explorations in Scripture Interpretation
Confessing the Faith - 2024
Renahan, your wife sent me a text. Make sure to take your pills and get to bed on time. I'm not done. It's cute that you're out this early in the morning. We're proud of you. Cam thought it was cool that you had neither a cane, nor a walker, nor a wheelchair. I'm going to get fired. What's that? I know, he's my boss. Well, since I'm going to get fired. Jim's so old, no. Jim's so old, he once babysat Nehemiah Cox. Acts chapter three, what we're doing is showing you that the apostles interpreted our Lord as the scope of the Old Testament, and we should do the same. Now somebody made a comment earlier that we can't do what Jesus and the apostles did because we're not inspired. No, we can't produce written products that are inert and therefore infallible and inspired by the Holy Spirit. But we can see the interpretive moves of our Lord, the interpretive principles of the apostles, and seek to implement them ourselves. If we don't use theirs, whose are we gonna use? We're gonna smuggle somebody else's in, which we have to do in one sense, because we're creatures with communicative capacities endowed upon us by God, and so we share Language, the gift of language with other creatures and the gift of understanding what a proposition is, a sentence, a subject, a predicate, a verb, an object, a direct, all those things. But I'm talking about how the Lord understood the fulfillment of certain aspects of the Old Testament as terminating on him. You don't get that from outside the Bible. You don't go to a tree and conclude Jesus is the scope of the Old Testament. You go to Jesus and he tells you and then you look at the apostles. So we looked at Peter before Pentecost, just one incident where thou art the Christ, the son of the living God, blessed art thou Simon Barjona for flesh and blood, has not revealed this to you but my father, And now I'm gonna go to Jerusalem and suffer and die and be raised from the dead. God forbid it, Lord. Get behind me, Satan. You know, that was before Pentecost. After Pentecost, we looked at Luke 2. He did something different than Jesus, at least Luke 2, Acts 2. He did something different than Jesus, at least in reference to Luke 24, the two times, and the John 5 passage we looked at. He actually cites, quotes Old Testament texts, Psalm 16, Joel 2. this side of the resurrection and entrance into glory of the Son of God, arguing that this, what I'm talking about, Jesus' resurrection and Pentecost, is that Psalm 16 and Jolt 2. And then, you remember, in both citations, one before and one after, he puts it in a broader Old Testament context. The Joel text, he says, in the latter days, God said this would take place. That's not in Joel, but that's in another place of the Old Testament. So he's saying, hey guys, when you go back there, remember the teaching about the latter days. Joel's prophecy was about the latter days, we're in them, because of the resurrection of Christ. But he did that also with Psalm 16 after Psalm 16 citation in Acts 2. He puts it in a wider context. David, being a prophet, knew that God had sworn to put his son up on his throne, prophesied this. So he puts it in a broader Old Testament context. Acts 3, I wanna look at verses 17 through 26. This'll be, I'll race through this material because I'm gonna skip other sections of Acts where the same thing is done by the Apostle Paul two or three times and go to 1 Peter 1, 10 through 12. cap off this lecture. Acts 3.17, Yet now, brethren, Peter to primarily Jewish audience again, I know that you did it in ignorance, as did all your rulers, but those things which God foretold by the mouth of all his prophets, I think he's referring to the written products of the prophets, that the Christ would suffer, he has thus fulfilled, Repent, therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that he may send Jesus Christ, who was preached to you before, whom heaven must receive, until the times of the restoration of all things, which God, which, the times of restoration of all things, which God has spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets, since the world began. Okay, if he's talking about God speaking through holy prophets, we already know from the red letters, he's talking about their written products, right? So, the times of restoration of all things, God has spoken about them by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began. Where does the eschatology of the Bible start? With the first writing prophet, whoever it is, probably Moses. Moses writes about eschatology? Some of you know that statement by Gareth Artis-Foss. In the revelation of Holy Scripture, the eschatological is prior to the soteriological. That sounds weird. Eschatology comes at the end. Did God offer to Adam a quality of life better than his created status? Could Adam have advanced his created status to a glorified status? better than his beginning status. Most of you are going, yeah, that's the covenant of works. So that before Adam sinned, God offered him eschatology. That's what the Vos thing means. So the latter days have been spoken about, and the sufferings and glory of Christ have been spoken about by the mouths of all his writing prophets, starting with the first one. which we'll just assume is Moses. For Moses truly said to the fathers, the Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from your brethren, him you shall hear in all things. This is my beloved son, hear him. Remember that language? Whatever he says to you, and it shall be. By the way, do you think the father was teaching us that the sun was fulfilling the Mosaic prophecy of Deuteronomy, or of, yeah, Deuteronomy 18, 15 and 18 there, I think so. and it shall be that every soul who will not hear that prophet shall be utterly destroyed from among the people. Yes, and all the prophets, from Samuel and those who follow, as many as have spoken, have also foretold these days. You are sons of the prophets and of the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying to Abraham, and in your seed all the families of the earth shall be blessed. To you first, God, having raised up his servant Jesus, send him to bless you in turning away every one of you from your iniquities." Note first, those things which God foretold by the mouth of all his prophets that the Christ would suffer, he has thus fulfilled. That this suffering of Christ motif, God foretold by the mouth of all his prophets. When did God start telling us that the Messiah would suffer? way early in the book of Genesis. Most likely, Genesis 3.15 was the first time. Note, second, by the way, Adam was a type of Christ. Did Adam suffer before he sinned? Like something came upon him from the outside that altered his state of being? This is weird. God put him to sleep and took a rib out of him And all the women are going, yeah, and then he entered glory when the rib was formed into a woman. God made Eve out of that rib. God built, some translations I think say that. I was reading some old guys, I don't know who they are, I think it was Gil and Zanki, and they said the Septuagint uses the same word They're translated in English, built, in Genesis 2. In Matthew 16, I will build my church. You go, that's pretty wild. Read Ephesians 5, because Paul gives us license to go look at Adam and Eve and see Christ in the church from Ephesians 5. So you're saying, before the fall of the sin, there was some sort of redemptive stuff being hinted at prior to the lapse, prior to the fall? Yeah, Paul said there was. I'm speaking about marriage and yet Christ in the church and marriage as an institution with its first two partners predates the fall into sin. So even prior to the fall into sin, things can be pointed to redemptive realities. I'm off the note so might as well keep going. What happened on the third day of creation? Stuff started coming out of the ground. Friday, Saturday, Sunday, what came out of the ground? Who likens the resurrection to plants and harvest? Jesus in John 12, Paul in 1 Corinthians 15. Do any of our old heroes say that the third day when stuff was coming out of the ground, now that we have the rest of Revelation, is actually pointing to the resurrection? And you know, the answer to that, yes. Do you believe it? Well, it could be. At my church, when I say, it could be, it means, I think it is. So this is huge. Peter's saying, let me tell you what the prophets were doing from the beginning. by the mouth of, let me tell you what God was doing. He was speaking through the mouths of the prophets, their written products, and he was talking about these days. Is every single verse in the Old Testament a prophecy of New Testament days? No. Is every single reference in the Old Testament pointing forward in the motif of prophecy, foretelling the future? No. Can the Old Testament foretell the future through persons, not them speaking, but their actions and their offices. Yeah, does it do that? Way more than we're comfortable with. Second, the times of restoration of all things, God has spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began. The latter days are spoken about in the Old Testament and have been inaugurated by our Lord's sufferings and glory. Note third, what the prophet Moses spoke about has come. For Moses truly said to the Fars, the Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me, "'from your brethren. "'Him you shall hear in all things "'whatever he says to you, "'and it shall be that every soul "'who will not hear that prophet "'shall be utterly destroyed from among the people. "'God, through Moses, said he would come. "'God, through Peter, says he has come.'" Note forth the days in which this prophet would minister were foretold days. All the prophets from Samuel and those who follow, as many as have spoken, have also foretold these days. What Moses foretold was foretold by all the prophets, though in different words from Moses' words. They're all talking about the same thing using different words. Note finally, the promised seed to bless the earth has come, God said to Abraham, and in your seed all the families of the earth shall be blessed. The days in which we live are foretold days, days inaugurated by the sufferings and glory of our Lord, days foretold by Moses, days foretold by Samuel, days foretold by all the writing prophets from the first one to the last one. So by the time the Old Testament's finished, our Lord comes on the scene, it's all set up. What is the Old Testament in one sense? Setting the world up for this conference? No. The Old Testament is a slow but sure crescendo and drum roll, setting the world up for 1776. Or how about this one, 1677. is Jesus, right? The Old Testament is a slow but sure drum roll. The crescendo of it is outside of it in its fulfillment in the historical incarnation, sufferings, and glory of Jesus of Nazareth. That's the big deal of all the events of the history of events. The greatest one is in the fullness of time, God sent forth his son. God said he would do this, God did it, and then God tells us he's done it. That's the Old Testament said he would do it, the historical incarnation of our Lord is a fulfillment of it, and the New Testament records it and then explains it for us. Everything hinges on that. That's the big thing in the sense creation. What's the biggest thing since creation? The inauguration of the new creation. the whole complex of events we call Sufferings and Glory of the Son of God. The next grand event will be the second coming, which by the way, the first coming prepares for the second as well, but the lecture is off the notes. First Peter chapter one, let's go to Peter writing now. We've gone to Peter preaching twice. Now we're gonna go Peter writing, one, 10 through 12. Peter's a theologian, right? He's probably a little older now. probably been able to think, muse a little more about the hermeneutical lectures he heard from the Lord when he was in Jerusalem in Acts 6, 4. It seems that they were, the apostles didn't want to serve the widows, not because they hated women. That's a butlerism. He would, not because they hated women. I can't preach, I used to preach a little more like Jim. I can't, I put my neck out. He does the, You ever seen his Jim Butler bottle head? He's got one. He sat in the front row. I was going to say I'm sorry, but I'm not sorry. So in Acts 6, 4, they didn't want to serve the women because they wanted to give themselves to the word and prayer. Most people think prayer and preaching, prayer and preaching. But you can give yourself, we gave ourselves to the word yesterday at a studio, I think. We were discussing theological things. So do you think the apostles sat around Jerusalem, all they did was preach and pray? Do you think they ever sat down and said, and I think Matthew was writing, putting together his gospel pretty early, Do you think the apostles sat around and say, I get it, I was reading Hosea, I was reading so and so, and then I remember what the Lord said, and they're writing stuff down and comparing, I think that was going on. They didn't have computers and all that stuff, but I think that was going on. Now we have a mature-minded Peter, okay, so he's gonna reflect on the events. that occurred in light of what the prophet said would take place. Things that I think he probably preached, and maybe other apostles, to the recipients of this letter who were dispersed from Jerusalem. 1 Peter 1, verse 10, of this salvation, the prophets have inquired, this is the writing prophets, and searched carefully who prophesied of the grace that would come to you, searching what or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ who was in them was indicating when he testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow. To them it was revealed that not to themselves, but to us, they were ministering the things which now have been reported to you through those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven. I don't like the rest of that verse, so I'm not gonna read it. It's weird, isn't it? Things which angels desire to look into. Actually, that's one of my favorite sections. I don't think I'll get to explain it much, except if you read the Old Testament, if you allow the Bible to help you interpret the Bible, you have angels looking into Christological things, like typological things, like the mercy seat. You got angels looking down at it. Methinks I can hear Spurgeon. They're looking at it because it's the incarnate Son of God typified. and they learn of the manifold wisdom of God by virtue of what God does in his redemptive plan enacted on the earth. Ephesians 3, angels go to church every Lord's Day and learn things and glorify God in light of it. I think that's what's going on there. But let's just walk through this text real quick. Note first the words, this salvation, at the first part of verse 10. Those words refer to that which Peter's recipients were enjoying. The salvation, this side of death and resurrection of Christ, and Pentecost, and what Peter enjoyed as well. Note second, the prophets are the Old Testament writing prophets. I already made that claim. Third, the prophets were scholars. You ever thought of that? They seem to be students here. You're saying, well, they're just going, hmm, and receiving, what was that? Okay, or have their secretary write it down or whatever. I think there's something more going on here. The prophets were scholars, they were students of the scriptures. I think I said this already, that searched carefully. I think it best to take that second verb, searched carefully, to refer to inquiring into holy scripture concerning specific content. Here's what Gill says, and searched diligently in the use of means. By prayer. What a novel idea. The prophets pray to understand their own products and the products of other prophets. By prayer and supplication. Now watch this one. By reading the prophecies that went before. The first time I read that, I'm going, finally, somebody said what I was thinking. Then I'm going, bummer, somebody said what I was thinking. Because I am that proud. By the way, I used to preach things I'd never heard anyone say before, like a long time ago. I try to never do that now. And I tell young guys, so nobody said it, don't say it. Because it's most likely not true. But he said it. By reading the prophets that went before, and watch this. By observing the types, shadows, and sacrifices of the law. And by waiting upon the Lord for the inspiration of his spirit. Note fourth, the prophets wrote about Christian salvation. Fifth, the spirit of Christ was working in the prophets of Christ, indicating the sufferings and glory of Christ prior to the incarnation of Christ. You had mediatorial activity by the pre-incarnate son going on, revealing, saving knowledge to men, by virtue of which they were saved, because they believed it, and others would be saved in the future, because when Jesus came on the scene, people believed the scriptures, but not of the New Testament. And they were saved by virtue of the revelation of the New Testament and the earthly witness of our Lord. The prophets, six, knew they were speaking about the future salvation to be accomplished by our Lord, that's in verse 12. Seventh, what was reported to Peter's recipients through preaching is that which the prophets foretold and that which Jesus told his apostles to preach. And then lastly, elect angels are students of the sufferings and glory of our Lord. Now what I have next is quotations from both Matthew Poole, John Gill, and I think John Brown. But I need to ask Pastor Butler, it's 1011, when do you want me to finish? So basically, that means 1045-ish, okay. Now, I just want you to listen to some of these old timers because I don't wanna, some of this might seem novel, like, I've never heard this before. Maybe you haven't, okay. Maybe you haven't heard just those observations on 1 Peter 10 through 12. But I didn't make the theology up. I got help, and see, these are some of my friends that have helped me the most. Here's Matthew Poole's commentary on verse 10. The prophets, those under the Old Testament, out of whose writings the faith of the New Testament believers is to be confirmed. Okay, before the New Testament was written, that's, I think that's what he's getting at. How could you confirm what you were believing to be according to truth, revealed truth by God? Well, you had to see if it was in line with the Old Testament, because it's the only testament that existed. He says, and whom this apostle therefore mentions that he might strengthen the faith of the Christian Jews by assuring them that the doctrine he had delivered to them was no new invention, but the very truth of God revealed of old to the prophets. This is that. The apostles and Jesus didn't spin the Old Testament to mean something new. They didn't reinterpret it in light of Christ. By the way, you know how we say we need to interpret the Old Testament in light of Christ? Christ interpreted it himself in light of the Old Testament. And I think the apostles did that as well. This grace, he goes on, revealed under the gospel the prophets foretold, but in a more dark way, the sun of righteousness not being yet risen, the shadows were not gone, and the light was but obscured. Now notice these words. The faith of the New Testament believers is to be confirmed out of the writings of the prophets of the Old Testament. This is that Irenaeus on the apostolic preaching. Has anybody read it? Isaac's humbly putting his thumb up. Isaac's read it, and you guys haven't read it. This conference is over, thank you for having me. What does he do in there, in part? He does exactly what they do in the book of Acts. He says, let me prove Christianity to you Jews, and he goes to the Old Testament. He hardly ever cites the New Testament. I don't know what the ratio is, but he goes to the Old Testament. How did Jesus prove himself to be the scope of the Old Testament? He interpreted it. He didn't read the New Testament and say, see, Right? So, this will assure them that the doctrine he had delivered to them was no new invention, but the very truth of God revealed of old to the prophets. Hey, Dr. Beale, what's new in the New Testament? Members answer, not much. Hey, Dr. Augustine, what's the first book of the New Testament? The Old Testament. This means that the events depicted for us by the New Testament concerning our Lord are to be interpreted in light of the writings of the Old Testament prophets. Events transacted. Things happened. And the apostles are saying, you see these things that happened, the incarnation, the sufferings, and the glory of Christ, and the endowment at Pentecost? All of that is contained in the writings of the prophets from the beginning of the world. All the prophets we're talking about these days, inaugurated by that one. The scope of the whole, which gives all glory to God. How? The incarnation, sufferings, and glory of Christ. Also, that which the prophets foretold they did in a more dark way, the sun of righteousness not being yet risen, the shadows were not gone, and the light was but obscure. But you know what happened? Subsequent revelation made explicit what was implicit in antecedent revelation, right? When you read, if you just started Genesis 1, you start reading. Get all the way through the law, you get through the writings, you get through the prophets. At some point you're gonna go, there's themes and concepts that are woven together in different words by later writers. Then when you go to the New Testament, you're gonna go, oh man, he's saying he's the target, the goal, the bullseye of that. And then you go, after you read the New Testament, you go back and read the Old Testament, what happens? Aha! I didn't see that the first time, or the fifth time, or the 50th time, or the 100th time I read that. I didn't see it. But the more you see it, have you ever seen that meme that's got all those, whatever you call those things, all the connections of the Bible within the Bible? It starts in the Old Testament, and some of those go from the Old to the New. Some of them are in the New. Do you know that the New Testament alludes to the New Testament? That sounds weird. The New Testament alludes to the New Testament? Yeah, remember when Peter acknowledged Paul's writings, plural, were hard to understand, like Pastor Butler's preaching sometime? You're in the front row. I only have one more opportunity, so. Subsequent revelation makes explicit what is implicit and antecedent revelation. Matthew Pool again on 1 Peter 1.11, this shows that not only Christ had a being under the Old Testament before his coming in the flesh, for if Christ were not, there could be no spirit of Christ. Interesting, Christ had a being under the Old Testament according to his divine nature. but likewise that Christ is God because of his inspiring the prophets with the knowledge of future things which none but God can do. The Son of God had a being under the Old Testament before his coming in the flesh and was exercising his mediatorial office by revealing redemptive knowledge to the prophets by the Spirit of God from the beginning of the world. On 1 Peter 1.12, we read, the prophets under the Old Testament did by the Spirit foresee and foretell Christ's passion, resurrection, ascension, the effusion of the Spirit, the enlargement of the church by the calling of the Gentiles, but did not live to see their own prophecies and God's promises fulfilled. What the prophets foretold would happen, the apostles have proclaimed to us, has happened. Poulon, verse 12, the angels desire to look into. It seems to be an allusion to the cherubims that stood above the ark with their faces toward the mercy seat, which was a type of Christ. The angels thus look into mysteries of the gospel as desirous to see the accomplishment of them, admiring the manifold grace and wisdom of God in them, Ephesians 3.10, and rejoicing in the salvation of sinners, which is the end and effect of God's revealing them. Here's John Brown on 1 Peter 1. These prophetic oracles were but imperfectly understood by those who uttered them. We are not to suppose, however, that in uttering them their minds were entirely passive and that the Holy Spirit only employed their organs of speech but to express words to which they attached no idea. They understood the meanings of the words. They were the expression of thoughts communicated to their minds. They knew that they referred to great blessings to be bestowed on the church, but as to the precise nature and extent of these blessings, and as to the period of time, when, and the manner in which they were to be bestowed, the prophets were much in the dark. The prophecy came not by their own will. It was not of self-interpretation. Either the event referred to, or another explicatory revelation was necessary to unfold fully its meaning. The whole quote for that last sentence. Pastor Butler's probably saying, get out of there, I'd like to preach that. Either, okay, so they're dark, it's shadowy, it's not substance. In one sense, the Incarnate Son of God's shadow is cast backwards on the Old Testament. It's shadowy information, it's typological, it's forward-looking, a lot of the doctrinal richness of it is implied by the narratives but not explicitly spelled out for us. When the event prophesied comes, And he says, another explicatory revelation along with the fulfillment of the event, remember? Sometimes God does something, then he raises up a penman and he explains what he did, and later authors tell us more about the event that's narrated. Well, sometimes God says he's gonna do something, like sufferings and glory, then he does it. Then he asked Penman to explain it. So what John Brown's saying is, through the prophets, God said he was gonna do something, the biggest thing ever, become one of us, to repair us and bring us back to glory. Then God did it, the event prophesied. Then God gave us an explanatory revelation, the New Testament. Let's note a few things about Brown's comment. These prophetic oracles were but imperfectly understood by those who uttered them. Not utterly misunderstood or not understood, but imperfectly understood. They would scratch their heads, not knowing the full intent. Now, if they were on the scene in the first century, I think we'd be going, whoa, this is better than we ever thought. We wrote, we knew it was going to be great, but now I see all kinds of connections. But they weren't alive. But I think there would have been something like that. These prophetic oracles were but imperfectly understood by those who uttered them. is what Brown says. Though the prophets had real knowledge of the meaning of their oracles, their knowledge was partial, shadowy, obscure. Second, ponder the last words by Brown. With the coming of our Lord, we have both the event referred to and another explicatory revelation in the form of the New Testament. So, I'm gonna finish, maybe even early, some implications for interpreting scripture in light of our study of 1 Peter. 1 Peter 1. First, since the prophets studied the written products of other prophets and their own writings, since they compared Scripture with Scripture in order to better understand Scripture, guess what? We should do the same, right? The principle of the analogy of scripture and the analogy of faith, invented by the Protestant reformers, true or false? False. Where'd that come from? The Bible. Who did it first? The Old Testament prophets. The prophets were students of the prophets. Though they produced texts, they also relied on other texts for the understanding of their own texts. Maybe they could have written and had a modicum of understanding in terms of the typology that was going on. And then they could have read, just could have. They were just thinking out loud here, trying to fill in some time. And then they could have, subsequent to their written product, read something they've already read and go, oh my, there's a connection there I wasn't really conscious of. There's something larger than my written product that's going on here, like God's ultimately in charge of the world and of revelation and God can have events. God can enact events, do things, and the meaning of those events are first, well, not explicated, but the narration of the act of the event is given, and then subsequent writers of scripture pick up on the first narration and draw out a bunch of theology that's not contained in the first narration of the event, But the theology was always embedded in the event itself, but we wouldn't know it unless God told us. By the way, how do I know that Luke was the first creaturely son of God on the earth? God told me. Did you hear it? Luke 3.38. Adam, what did I say? Luke. Luke wasn't the first created son of God. I do that sometimes just to see if people are listening because Four people, I'm not going to look at you, but four of you were asleep, and that woke you up. Steve just woke up, by the way. Second, Steve writes the checks. I better watch it. Second, there's a built-in obscurity in the writings of the Old Testament prophets. What they wrote is true, though details of its fulfillment remain dark until further revelation comes. This is clearly the case with the typology of the Old Testament, the sacrificial system of the Old Testament, and the messianic prophecies of the Old Testament. When that to which the Old Testament comes, comes, it sheds light on the meaning of the that to which, of the that to which document of the Old Testament. When the antitype comes on the earth, it illumines the function of the type. It helps you understand how the type, like when Christ comes, we understand Adam a lot better. We go, okay, now I get it. Types, antitypes, tell us more about the function of their types. So further revelation has come in the incarnation, sufferings, and glory of our Lord, along with the divine recording of these events and the divine explanation of these events in the New Testament. The dark sayings of the Old Testament now have the light of the coming of the Son of God incarnate, Pentecost, and its recording and explications in order to make explicit what was implicit in them. Once the event foretold comes and an explicatory revelation along with it, then we can go back and go, aha, aha, aha, wow. Though subsequent revelation makes clear what is contained in antecedent revelation, it does not reinterpret it, making it mean something it did not mean, but now does mean. In the words of John Brown, with the coming of our Lord, we have both the event referred to and another explicatory revelation in the form of the New Testament. Note that the event referred to is the event that has happened, in the words of the Apostle Paul, when the fullness of the time came. And the explicatory revelation is what we call the New Testament, which Jesus promised in the upper room to the apostles. This means that in light of subsequent revelation and the seeding revelation may now reveal to us more than we first thought possible. If this is so, and I think it is, the theologians call it sensus plenur, fuller meaning, Persons, places, institutions, and events, and prophecies depicted for us in the Old Testament may contain a surplus of meaning which often awaits further revelation to unveil. See what I'm saying? Not new meaning. The meaning was always there. But the meaning, the surplus of meaning, that there is the meaning that's not on the surface, but it's entailed in the act, gets unveiled for us later. So we live in very privileged times. We're on this side of the cross resurrection of Christ in the New Testament. This also means that the intent of these Old Testament phenomena is not limited to the conscious intent of the human authors. I don't think if Moses and the prophets lived during the days of our Lord, they would sat there going, that's not what I meant, that's not what I meant, that's not what I meant. I think they would have said, the Bible's the written word of God. God's in charge. God does things, and they're pregnant with theological meaning more than I ever thought. Hallelujah, this is utterly in line with what I was writing, but it transcends it as well, because this is a God thing. So 1 Peter 1 10 through 12 is an important text to ponder. It not only relates the prophets of old to the accomplished salvation now enjoyed by believers, but it also has within it principles of scriptural interpretation applicable to present-day interpreters. So I hope that's been helpful. Scope of the whole is to give all glory of God through what he does in the incarnate Son of God. who suffers and enters into his glory and brings many sons to glory against all enemies and all odds and nobody's gonna stop him. I'm a preacher. And how do we know that? The prophets have been telling us from, when? From the beginning. Lo, in the beginning of the book it is written of me to do thy will, O God. Paul tells us in Hebrews 10 that those words were on the lips of our Lord when he was on the earth. That's Psalm 40. Psalm 40, go read it, David wrote it. Lo, it is written me in the scroll, or in the beginning, Geneva Bible, in the beginning of the book, to do thy will, O God. David's speaking on somebody's, David's writing, but somebody, it's talking about somebody else who is speaking in Psalm 40. Who is it speaking? I think it's God the Son about himself. And what is he saying? In God's book, toward the beginning of it, it's written about me to do God's will. Of course you know what John Owen, John Gill and John Owen, how they interpreted that. Genesis 3.15 is the first place it's written that the incarnate Son of God would do the will of God by both suffering and triumphing. and entering his glory. By defeating the devil, and that defeat of the devil has entailments or implications for our well-being as well. Because he beat him, by the way, you ever read Luther on the irony of the curse? You got to the man through a woman. I'm gonna get to you through a woman without a man. Is the virgin birth there in 315? All our old heroes said yes. And all the Genesis 3.16 through the end of the book of Revelation is just a footnote to all that, teases it all out. Okay, remember, Revelation is organic, because it comes from God. Diverse human authors, but God is its ultimate divine author, so he holds the whole story in a cohesive oneness. That's why the old guy saw unity between the Old and New Testament, because God is ultimately, scripture is a written word of God. And then it's progressive, It's going somewhere, it's setting the world up. God does things that end up setting the world up for greater things, and then it's consummative in the fullness of time, and then it's explanatory, the New Testament. So I hope that has helped you. Christ is the scope of Scripture. The infallible rule of interpretation of Scripture is Scripture itself. The Bible's the written word of God. We have the Bible to repair the damage that sin has brought in, and the Bible does that by virtue of the sufferings, telling us about the sufferings and glory of Christ. When the scripture interprets scripture, you have the word of God on the word of God, and therefore, an infallible interpretation, and subsequent revelation often makes explicit what is the implicit and antecedent revelation, let's pray. We thank you, Lord, for this last night, this morning, time to think together and to be challenged and learn new things and have old things brushed off and cleaned up and hopefully our minds are sharper and we'll better be able to both read scripture, hear it preached, and sing it. Bless our time in the next session as well, we ask in Jesus' name, amen.
