The Coming King

When you read the Old Testament, how would you describe your experience? Should we see it as separate from the New? Is it less than Christian? Should we moralize it, meaning the stories are helpful but only to teach us moral lessons? Sidney Greidanus writes of this last option, “It imposes an interpretative grid on the story that equates biblical characters with the people in the pew and then inquires how we ought to imitate or learn from their examples.”

In Jeremiah 23 we see how we should read the Old Testament…. in light of the covenants that God made with Israel, it’s all pointing to the New Covenant. Both testaments are one single line of history with God graciously pointing to the coming of Messiah, the covenant-fulfilling King/Shepherd/Groom/Servant/Priest. Why is this important? Jon Lunde wrote in his book, “Following Jesus, the Servant King”, that unless we see Jesus as the fulfillment of everything that Israel was looking for, our following Him will always suffer from a lack of appreciation of who He really is and ultimately boredom with Him will set in and salvation becomes just about fire insurance with no connection to anything else in life.

Here is a great example! Jeremiah points us to the ultimate King, the One who would come in the line of King David. He will reign as King! And He will be the height of wisdom and justice. But to top it all, this King will not only be righteous but this King will be our righteousness. What can this mean but His righteous life will be credited to our account? The life He lives is given to us as our life! His robes of righteousness are put upon us!

Have you ever sat and thought that this is our King? For those of us who live on this side of the cross, If you have been born again, has this sunk deeply into your heart such that it’s stirred? Just as the new covenant was supposed to capture the imagination of Judah, so Christ’s work on our behalf is supposed to capture our hearts. Let’s come to the King today with the attitude of, “Because you have done this for me and my heart is melted, what is your bidding for me today, Lord?”