Many people do not understand God who seems as if He is different in the Old Testament (OT) compared to the New Testament (NT). If the NT calls us to love our enemies, why did God command the Israelites to exterminate entire nations in the OT? Many people ask the following questions: “Is it okay for Christians to be enlisted into the army and kill? Stone someone? Or repay “an eye for an eye” and “tooth for a tooth”? Is God of the OT the same as in the NT? Can we trust the Bible? I have met many people who ask similar questions.
I would like to briefly show the connection between the OT and the NT. This topic is so vast that it would take much time to give a detailed explanation. But I believe that if we see the main idea that God had regarding the first covenant, we would be able to look at the Bible differently as a whole, and many so-called “inconsistencies” or “contradictions” would disappear.
Then He said to Abram: “Know certainly that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs… But in the fourth generation they shall return here, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.” (Gen. 15:13-14,16)
I believe that if we understand what God spoke to Abraham, we will open a deeper meaning and significance of the Old Testament. We can see that God promised to give Abraham the land on which the Amorites, Hittites, Jebusites and other Canaanite nations lived on. But why did God suddenly want to give this particular land to the Israelites? In those ancient times, the land was not as densely populated as today. The vast amount of territory on our planet was uninhabited and undeveloped by man for thousands of years. I think that during the time of the patriarchs anyone could have found a nice place to live where a city was not already built and where fighting was not necessary to become an owner of the land.
To understand the meaning of all this, we need to look at God’s plan of salvation at a global scale. God had appointed a time for the Messiah to come and save the human race. Apostle Paul says, “But when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His You see, when God works with a people, He respects our free will. Before the creation of the earth, God already had ONE and THE ONLY plan, to save humanity. Therefore, Scripture speaks of Christ as the Lamb that was slain before the foundation of the world. God had one way, one law, one covenant, by which He determined to save humanity–Jesus Christ. However, in order to bring his plan into execution, God needed people. He needed John the Baptist, who would prepare the way of the Lord. He needed Mary, whose heart would be ready to accept the young Child. He needed Joseph, who would not leave Mary. He also needed people who would become his disciples, and later the Apostles; God needed a Judas, Pilate, Barabbas, etc. God could not force people to perform those roles, since He respects the free will of man. Therefore, He looked through the thickness of the centuries and saw the right time in which His plan of salvation could be accomplished. This “time” Scripture refers to as the fullness of time when God sent his only begotten Son. I want to emphasize that God, before the foundation of the world, had appointed a time to reconcile humanity through the Son of God, Jesus Christ. However, It took God four thousand years to find people with the right hearts, which would be able to fulfill His plan. Therefore, the “fullness of time” came four thousand years after the fall. When the fullness of time came, God made the only covenant of salvation with humanity. It was the covenant of the blood of Jesus Christ. WHY WAS THE OLD (FIRST) COVENANT NEEDED? “What purpose then does the law serve? It was added because of transgressions, till the Seed (Jesus) should come to whom the promise was made…”(Gal. 3:19) We read that after Adam was banished from the Garden of Eden, mankind began to step away from God and wallow in the darkness of sin and transgression. Then God, in His justice, had to destroy the earth through the flood. He could not do otherwise. The righteousness of God could no longer tolerate such backsliding. Thus, there was Noah in whom God found righteousness. It was a new chance for mankind to begin to live in accordance with God’s will. But after a little time, people stepped away from God again and turned to idols. Their lives were filled with darkness of sin, corruption, evil and hatred. To satisfy His justice, God needed to do something with the corrupt humanity. His holy eyes could not stand looking at all the evil on earth. He had to stop the crazed humanity. That is why He sent fire on Sodom and Gomorrah, and thus destroyed the most wicked cities. Unfortunately, life on earth was still going on and, despite the judgments of God, humanity went further and further away from the Creator. God was well aware that if things went on in the direction humanity was headed, He would have to completely destroy the earth for its lawlessness until the time when the Messiah would come. Then what would come of the plan of salvation? How could mankind “endure” until the fullness of time? It was necessary to do something that would help humanity wait until the time of arrival of the Son of God on earth. That is why God chose people who would become tools in His hands for the salvation of mankind. For life on earth to continue, God had to periodically cleanse it. Therefore, He chose Israel to make it a tool for the judgment of the wicked nations. Through Israel God was cleansing the earth from iniquity. That is why many do not understand the God of the Old Testament. Since the time has not yet come for the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ, mankind could not get rid of sin. In other words, there was no forgiveness of sins; God could not forget the man’s sin. According to the justice of God, sin had to be punished. And God needed a nation through which He could contain sin to a certain degree. That is why the history of Israel is full of bloodshed and wars with other nations. God gave directions to Israel to fight with the surrounding nations and completely destroy them for simply one reason – because their cup of iniquity was full. This is the difference between the Old Testament and the New Testament. When the fullness of time had come, God sent His Son to be the atoning sacrifice for sin, to redeem mankind. That is why Christianity is a religion of peace, which carries a message of love, peace and salvation to the lost world. Christ said, “All who take the sword will perish by the sword”, thus showing that there is a new era, an era in which souls must be conquered with God’s love. Notice, God told Abraham that He would give his descendants the land of Canaan as an inheritance, but before that they will have to be in Egypt for four hundred years. This leads us to a very important conclusion. God could not give Abraham the land on which he stood until it was filled up with iniquity of the Amorites. The primary purpose of God was not simply to give the land to Abraham, but, through his descendants, to destroy the most corrupt nations on earth, so that the earth would continue to exist. As long as God could tolerate the measure of sin of the Canaanites, the Hittites, Amorites, and Jebusites, there was no reason to destroy them and take their land. EXAMPLE OF HAGAR AND SARAH Gal. 4:21-26 Apostle Paul says that what happened to Hagar and Sarah is an allegory and it indicates the correlation of the Old and New Testaments. God originally promised Abraham an heir through Sarah. It wasn’t in God’s perfect plan for Ishmael to be born. God’s promise was to be fulfilled only in Isaac, who was born of Sarah. But as Abraham and Sarah could not wait until the fulfillment of God’s promise, Ishmael was born. Something similar happened with humanity. Because of its sinfulness, mankind would not have been able to endure until the coming of the Messiah. This is why God gave the first covenant, so it would help humanity live up to the fullness of time. It is important to note that the first covenant (Law of Moses) was given 2,500 years after the fall in Garden of Eden. This leaves only 1,500 years before the birth of the Messiah. If the first covenant had been in God’s perfect plan, He would have given it to mankind immediately after the fall. But I believe that the first covenant was not in God’s perfect plan at all. Therefore God gave the first covenant only when, in His justice, He could no longer stand the lawless inhabitants of the earth. In other words, the Old Testament was meant to carry out a role of a preservative, to keep mankind from complete disintegration and premature destruction. The first covenant was not intended to be perfect. God knew that without Christ’s sacrifice humanity would not be able to comprehend His perfect law. It was impossible to fulfill God’s law by any person, for without the cross mankind was spiritually dead. As I said earlier, God could not have sent His Son to the earth, until the fullness of time. Therefore, the first covenant was not capable of displaying the whole nature of God. It’s main purpose was to show God’s justice. However, when Jesus came, He brought the first covenant to perfection. “You have heard that it was said to those of old…But I say to you…” (Matt. 5:27-44) Pavel Gurzhiy
There weren’t any other ways or plans to save us!