God promised David, the king of the chosen race, that the fruit of his loins would be the coming Messiah-Christ. Regarding this, Acts 2:30 and 31 say, “Being a prophet and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him that of the fruit of his loins he would seat One upon his throne, he, seeing this beforehand, spoke concerning the resurrection of the Christ, that He was neither left in Hades, nor did His flesh see corruption.” The Greek word rendered “fruit” in verse 30 is karpos, used for Christ only in the sense of offspring here and in Luke 1:42. It is used for the fruit of the tree of life in Revelation 22:2. Christ is the branch of Jehovah (Isa. 4:2) and of David (Jer. 23:5), and the fruit of Mary and of David, that we may eat of Him as the tree of life. To promise that such a Christ would come was a great thing and was a glad tiding. God did this to King David in the old dispensation as a great blessing to His chosen people.
God’s work in His old administrative arrangement included promising the coming gospel of the new dispensation through the prophets among the chosen race. The word “gospel” means glad tidings, good news. The gospel is news that gladdens those who hear it. It is good news from God, from the heavens.
In Romans 1:1b-3a Paul speaks of the gospel which “He promised before through His prophets in the holy Scriptures, concerning His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.” The gospel of God concerns a person, Christ. Of course, such matters as forgiveness and salvation are included in the gospel, but they are not the central point. The gospel of God concerns the Person of the Son of God, Jesus Christ our Lord. The gospel is not a doctrine nor a teaching nor a religion; it is a Person.
This gospel was promised by God through the prophets in the Scriptures. The gospel of God was not an accident; it was planned and prepared by God. The Bible shows us that this gospel was planned by God in eternity past. Before the foundation of the world, God planned to have this gospel. Therefore, numerous times in the Scriptures, from Genesis through Malachi, God spoke in promise through the prophets regarding the gospel. This indicates that if we would understand the content of the gospel as the good news, we need to know the Old Testament. The Old Testament is not merely a record of creation and history. In it are revealed crucial elements pertaining to the gospel.
We have seen God’s work in eternity past. God made the divine economy, chose the believers before the foundation of the world, predestinated the believers unto sonship, and probably made a counsel among the Trinity of the Godhead concerning creation and redemption. We have also seen God’s work in the old dispensation: the work of creating the universe, creating man and determining mankind’s seasons and boundaries, dealing with fallen mankind from Adam to Noah, calling Abraham, promising Abraham that through his seed the blessing of the gospel would come to all the families of the earth, condemning Sodom and Gomorrah to ruin by fire, choosing the children of Israel and making them His people, giving the law and making the old covenant, promising David that the fruit of his loins would be the coming Messiah, and promising the coming gospel of the new dispensation through the prophets among the chosen race.
Now we need to ask why God did all this work in eternity past and in the old dispensation. For what purpose did He work in this way? The answer is that God did all this for the purpose of dispensing Himself into His chosen people. This is the underlying thought in the Bible. The central subject, the underlying thought, in the Scriptures is that God wants to dispense Himself into His chosen people so that He may have a corporate expression that consummates in the New Jerusalem. This was God’s purpose for making the divine economy, His eternal plan. This was God’s purpose in choosing the believers, predestinating them, and making a counsel among the Trinity of the Godhead. This was God’s purpose in creating the universe, in creating man and determining man’s seasons and boundaries, and in doing so many other things in His old administrative arrangement. The purpose of God’s work in eternity past and in the old dispensation was the dispensing of Himself into His chosen people for the producing of the church as His corporate expression consummating in the New Jerusalem as the eternal expression of the Triune God.
These messages on the conclusion of the New Testament are not concerned with mere doctrine, theology, or teaching. The focus of these messages is the vision of the divine dispensing of the Triune God into us. It is not my intention that you simply know all the items of God’s person or all the aspects of His attributes. Rather, my intention is that we would see the rich ingredients of the divine food that we are taking in day by day so that we may participate in the dispensing of the Triune God into us.
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