While there is a lot in the Old Testament about God
forgiving Israel, I was surprised that I could not locate a single verse
directing the Israelites to forgive one another.
Yes, there is a lot about Israel’s responsibility to care
for the alien and even their enemies. For example:
·
“If you meet your enemy’s ox or his donkey going
astray, you shall bring it back to him. If you see the donkey of one who hates
you lying down under its burden, you shall refrain from leaving him with it;
you shall rescue it with him.” (Exodus 23:4-5; ESV)
·
“When a stranger sojourns with you in your land,
you shall not do him wrong. You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you
as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were
strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the LORD your God.” (Leviticus 19:33-34)
However, not a word about forgiving one another as God had
forgiven them! How amazing! It is as if God purposely left this essential
provision out. But why? Perhaps because the basis of true and complete forgiveness
- the Savior – had not yet come.
However, God did forgive Israel before Jesus, right? In the Book of Leviticus, we often read about
God’s promise of forgiveness in conjunction with animal sacrifice:
·
“Thus the priest shall make atonement for him
for the sin which he has committed in any one of these things, and he shall be
forgiven. And the remainder shall be for the priest, as in the grain offering.”
(Leviticus 5:13)
However, the New Testament consistently taught that this
forgiveness was not the same as the forgiveness that came through the Cross:
·
For since the law has but a shadow of the good
things to come instead of the true form of these realities, it can never, by
the same sacrifices that are continually offered every year, make perfect those
who draw near. Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered, since the
worshipers, having once been cleansed, would no longer have any consciousness of
sins? But in these sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year. For it is
impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. (Hebrews 10:1-4)
Instead, of an eradication of the sin, the Old Testament
forgiveness merely covered over sin:
·
[Jesus] whom God put forward as a propitiation
by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness,
because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. (Romans
3:25)
Because their sins were merely “passed over,” Jesus’
atonement had to work retroactively to cleanse the sins of the OT saints:
·
For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the
sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the
purification of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through
the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our
conscience from dead works to serve the living God. Therefore he is the
mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the
promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from
the transgressions committed under the first covenant. (Hebrews 9:13-15)
It is only through Christ that our sins are cleansed and
purified so that we can confidently enter into the presence of God (Hebrews
10:19-22). Instead, OT forgiveness was only a matter of God passing over sins,
not purifying them:
·
Blessed is the one whose transgression is
forgiven, whose sin is covered. (Psalm 32:1;)
·
Who is a God like you, pardoning iniquity and passing
over transgression for the remnant of his inheritance? (Micah 7:18)
The OT saints would only experience a “passing over
transgression,” but they were also promised a New Covenant through which God
would “remember their sins no more” (Jeremiah 31:34).
Meanwhile, even the OT saints who had died could not come
into the presence of a God whose righteousness had not been satisfied by the
Cross:
·
And all these, though commended through their
faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something
better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect. (Hebrews
11:39-40)
Consequently, after Jesus proclaimed that “It is finished”
and the veil of the Temple was torn in two, symbolizing the fact that the way
to presence of God was now opened, there was a great earthquake to reinforce
this lesson:
·
And behold, the curtain of the temple was torn
in two, from top to bottom. And the earth shook, and the rocks were split. The
tombs also were opened. And many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep
were raised, and coming out of the tombs after his resurrection they went into
the holy city and appeared to many. (Matthew 27:51-53)
Do you see the way that the Old and New Testaments gradually
unfold and reveal God’s one plan for humanity, which culminates in our being
made one with our Savior? It’s a puzzle with Christ as the center piece. It is
not a hodge-podge, constructed by 40 different authors over 1500 years, but a
single vision that moves irresistibly to take hold of eternity. I think that
this says something about Divine authorship.
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