Overall, big picture. We're going through this book that I wrote called systematic theology. We did chapter on what is theology. We did chapter on the canon, how we got the books of the Bible, and how we know we have the right books, and the Old Testament, New Testament, that was chapter three. And we did chapter four on the authority of scripture, how we know it's God's word. We did chapter five on the inerrancy of scripture and spent two or three weeks talking about are there mistakes in the Bible. Is anything untrue? What about these alleged contradictions? And we dealt with that. And then we came to chapter six. And that was the clarity of scripture. The idea that the Bible is written in such a way that you can understand it. It's written for everyday ordinary people to understand, to be able to read and talk about to their children when they sit down and when they rise up, when they lie down, rise up, when they walk by the way, et cetera, and do dronomy six so that the Bible is written so it's able to be understood. That is a quality of scripture. Now, that doesn't mean that everybody understands it rightly. And there are some principles for right interpretation. So here on chapter six, the clarity of scripture, I got stuck for a few weeks in taking a little detour on how to interpret the Bible. And I'm going to be doing that for another two or three weeks, then we'll get on to chapter seven, the necessity of scripture, chapter eight, the sufficiency of scripture, and then on into the doctrine of the attributes of God and how we know God exists and things like that. So that's where we're going with the whole class. This morning then, we're on part three on how to interpret the Bible. Look at your handout now.
Let's see, two weeks ago, we did some guidelines on the Bible's not a mysterious book. It's written in the ordinary language of the day, and just some general guidelines for interpreting it. Then last week, we did some big picture perspectives on what kind of book this is. Well, number one, it's a historical document. It wasn't written like the Arizona Republic yesterday. It was written between about 1400 BC, 1440 BC, about time of Moses, and about 90 AD when the last New Testament books were written. So it was written during that time period. So number one, it's a historical document. And in order to interpret a historical document rightly, big picture number one, we should ask, what did the author want the original readers to understand by this statement? Just as in constitutional law today, there's a dispute between liberal judges who think the Constitution can mean anything they decide it means today, and more originalist or strict constructionist judges who say the Constitution means today, what it meant, what is originally written. Look at the intent of the authors. Look at what they meant, and that's what it means. Don't change the meaning. And so with the Bible, it meant what it means, what it meant when it was originally written. Look at what the original author intended his readers to understand. That's number one. Number two, the original author is one of the original readers to respond in some way. Just when I send a book order, I want a book to come back. I want a response from the company. I want them to send me a book. And when I send a Christmas card, I want people to say, oh, that's a nice Christmas card. And they smile. So I want a response whenever I send a communication. And the Bible, too, even in the original writings, there was a response expected. So a real good guideline to getting to the right interpretation is saying, why didn't Paul write this? Why did he send this paragraph to the Corinthians? What did he want them to do? And if you start there saying, what did the original author want the readers to do by way of response, then it guides you then to the next step, well, what should I do today by means of response? It's a really helpful way. And even in historical documents, when Samuel recorded the story of David and Goliath, or Book of Per Samuel, probably was Samuel, what was the intent of the author and what was God's intent in these events coming about? How did he want us to respond? How did he want the original readers to respond? And then how should we respond? Number three, big picture, number three, that was last week. The whole Bible is about God. And we went through that story of David and Goliath, saying it isn't just a story of a brave young man, that's moralism, that's just trying to say, he was brave, you should be brave. The Bible is a story about God, and here in the story of David and Goliath, there were many things in the text that pointed out how David came in the name of the Lord of hosts, whom you have despised. He said to Goliath, and you come to me with the sword and Javilan, but I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts. So it's a story about the Lord intervening and powerfully coming to David's help so that, in a way, I suppose it was miraculous, it wasn't just David was a good shot with a sling, he probably was, but to hit right there, penetrate through the one little place in the armor and hit right there and Goliath's head and fell the greatest giant of the Philistines, that was God's intervention, to show that the Lord doesn't deliver with the sword and spear, but it's his own power. And so we should see what is God doing in every text of the Bible. That's big picture number three, big picture number four, the center of the whole Bible is Jesus Christ. And I want to get to more of that next week, but just a kind of review from last time, I said with David and Goliath, yes, it's true, it's a true story, it happened with David, who was going to be King of Israel, and he killed Goliath with one stone and he killed him by depending on the Lord and the Lord intervened for him, but the big picture of the Bible is that God from the time Adam and Eve sinned, God promised that there would be a descendant, an offspring, or a seed of the woman who would bruise the head of the serpent. And so there's an expectation growing through the Old Testament, that a Messiah, an anointed one, Messiah means anointed, and an anointed one is coming, he's going to bruise the head of the serpent. In other words, he's going to defeat the enemy, the spirit deep spiritual in me, Satan himself, they're going to defeat him once for all, is David that Messiah? No, he does in the physical realm defeat the physical enemies of God's people, but there's a greater fulfillment coming, and all of the Old Testament narratives give us hints about that. And so I think when we read the story of David and Goliath, we should see not only that God intervened to help David triumph over Goliath, but also now with the New Testament knowledge of Jesus having come, we can look at the story of David and Goliath and say, oh look it's foreshadowing a greater anointed one, a greater one anointed by the Lord who would put his own life on the line for the sake of God's people, who would come not in the strength of the flesh, but in the power in the might of the Lord, who would defeat not Goliath, but ultimately would defeat Satan himself, and who would set God's people free, not just physically, and not just the Jewish people, but all God's people throughout the earth would be set free, and he, this greater Messiah coming, will reign as King of Israel, in fact King of all God's people forever. So someone greater than David is coming, and what those Old Testament passages do is they point us to the fact that this is good. Yes, God is working, but it's God's way of giving hints that he's going to be doing something far, far greater in the future. When a greater anointed of the Lord will bring a greater deliverance for a greater number of people, and he will be the one who is truly a man after God's own heart, and by putting his own, by actually sacrificing, laying down his own life, he will bring a wonderful salvation to all of God's people. So that was big picture number four. The Bible looks forward to Christ. Number five, this is new now this morning. Big, oh, so that was big picture number one. It's a historical document. I forgot to be working through this. Big picture number two, the author is wanted the readers to respond in one way, so ask that. Big picture number three, the whole Bible is about God. So I asked, what does the text tell us about God? And big picture number four, the center of the whole Bible is Jesus Christ. Old Testament leads up to him. So those were where that's where we were last week. And these are just kind of guidelines to say, here's some help in interpreting the Bible. I remember one time when I had been teaching at Trinity Divinity School in Illinois for a number of years, some people asked some graduating students, what's the one thing you wish you had gotten from seminary that you didn't get? With all your Greek and Hebrew courses and your theology courses and your pastoral training and exegesis and all that. And number of students said, what we didn't get was anybody telling us how the whole Bible fits together. Huh, we got all the little parts where it's all fit together. So that's what I'm trying to do this morning by saying, it's all about God. It's all about Jesus. And now here's another really important thing. This number five, big picture number five, is what I would call salvation history or some people call it redemptive history or history of redemption. It's a major factor in how to interpret the Bible rightly. And that's what I want to spend some time on right now this morning. Anybody need everybody have this outline? Okay, in the back, Rick and Debbie, we need, oh, back though, white outlines didn't get to the back. God, or somebody stole them all from the back. God has them here. Just keep your hand up in the air. Anybody else? Okay, big picture number five, salvation history. No, what I'm saying here is that there are different ways of looking at history. Maybe I took a course in college art history, history of art from ancient Chinese and that kind of art and all the way up to modern art. That was an art history course. I took another course in the music, history, western music. But this is not, or you could take a military history course, Bob McCain, where are you? Where's Bob? Do you do military history at West Point? Oh yeah, quite a bit. Okay, you could take the whole history of the world and say, well, what's military history going back to ancient Greek wars? Or you can do art history, or you can do economic history, or history of science. But that is what we're doing today. The Bible is the most important history of all. It's salvation history. That is, how was God relating to mankind at various periods in history? And that's really, I mean, that's really the way the Bible is arranged, isn't it? You know, when you think about it, how are the books of the Bible put together? Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, alphabetically? No, you'd start with Amos, I suppose, or Acts, I guess. And then Lezeka, right, it's not alphabetical. Is it put together? How's it put together? Is it put together by size? No, they need to put the Psalms first. Psalms is the biggest book. Not put together by size, although probably Paul's epistles are arranged by size. Now, the Bible basically is arranged historically with some big sections like history and then wisdom and then prophets. But the overall outline is historical. Genesis is the first book because it's the beginning. Revelation is the last book because it tells us way out into the future. And so in between that, the whole arrangement is historical. So that means it's good to keep our focus on the fact that there's historical development going on. And therefore, we should read every passage of the Bible with a salvation history timeline in your mind and keep in mind where each passage fits on the timeline. That's the main thing I want to say this morning. And then grow and understand what God was doing in each period and how He related to people at each time or each period in that timeline. And so now to do that, I want to and don't look at your hand out here for a minute. We're going to try to do this.
Just kind of say, okay, here's the whole history of the world in terms of salvation history. And I'm going to put Jesus death right there. So we start out and we have this is Old Testament. And this is New Testament. If you've never even done anything about the Bible before, you could probably do that, right? Old Testament New Testament. That's kind of general cultural knowledge. All right. Now, what else can we put in? Well, we can put in Genesis 1. That's creation.
Creation right there. And then Genesis 3, hmm, something really bad happened. The fog. That is Adam and Eve sin. And then everything changed after that. Okay, so there's a big, big picture item. Now, here's the thing that a lot of people can't do. I'm going to give you without looking at your paper. Moses, David, Abraham, if you had to say in what order they came, could you put one, two, and three on Moses, David, and Abraham? If you can do that, you have a huge start on how to put the whole Bible together historically. Moses, David, Abraham. Oh, I wish I had those little, you know, those little voting things that they do on. What's that final answer question game? But yeah, who wants to be a millionaire? So we get the audience and we need some audience help on this. What's your, all right, who is first out of Moses, David, and Abraham? Abraham is first. Who's second? Moses. Okay, and then David. So we're going to put here Abraham, Moses, David. So here's Abe. I'll put ABR for Abraham. Just not to make too much fun of him. Okay, Abraham, and then Moses, and then David. Now, see, well, David, he's king over Israel. You've got, but now you've got to get a people of Israel first, right? Well, they've got to come out of Egypt under Moses before they become a nation. And before they come out of Egypt, they've got to go down into Egypt, and that's Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and then Jacob's sons, and they go down there for the famine. So it's really Abraham that God calls first. Genesis 12 says, come, I'm going to make you great nation, and that's the beginning of the Jewish people. No, now if you have Abraham, Moses, David, and Christ, you've got a huge start on timeline for the whole history of the Bible. Here's the challenge without looking at your sheet. Just to kind of keep perspective. You want to get some ballpark dates on those? Oh, well, let's try. Let's try, because if you can get these ballpark dates, then it kind of gives you a general picture. Abraham, 2000 BC. Now, Old Testament people give me a more accurate number, but that's ballpark number. Moses 1440 BC and David 1000 BC. Okay. Now, that's on your sheet. So that's Old Testament. We've got one more event in the Old Testament, and that is after David, then there was Solomon, and they had all these kings. You get the divided kingdom, the northern kingdom, the southern kingdom. They go from bad to worse to worse. They keep sending and rebelling against God. Finally God says, enough, and he takes, let's them be carried away by the Babylonians into exile. Now, we're just going to put 586 for that. exile. 586 BC. It's really 587, 586. I just had to choose a number, so 586 look good, just to make it simple. Okay. Now, we get Jesus and Jesus death, and then I'm going to put this for a resurrection, and I'm going to put this for Jesus ascending up into heaven, and then I'm going to put this arrow for Jesus pouring out the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, and that's Acts 2. Now, once the Holy Spirit comes at Pentecost in new power, then we have an entire period of history called the church age. I'll put it here, church, church, church age, and that lasts until Jesus comes back to the earth, and we have a thousand years here of Jesus' reigning as King in Jerusalem, and we call that the millennium, which is the Latin word for thousand years, and when is that? We don't know, so I'm going to put a question mark on that date, and then after the millennium is over, and there's some other stuff that happens, some battles and things, then we get FJ, his final judgment, and then we get new heavens and new earth, or what people call the eternal state. That's when everything is finished, and we're with God in heaven forever, and we have resurrection bodies. All right, there we are. No, this period right here, the church age, this is where we are. Here's 2005. That's us, okay? And I put 30 AD because there's a change of calendar. I know Jesus was about 33 when he died, but just for a round number there, and people get precise questions about to put 30 AD for the beginning of the church. Now, that's the whole picture. That's the whole timeline. If you could have that as your default kind of, right, just mentally put that on the top of your page of every Bible, just like when you open up a computer document, it's got default tabs and default margins. If this could be your default perspective, it will help a huge amount in reading the Bible. And then we just have to grow and understanding each of those periods. So big picture number five, all history can be divided into several major ages or epochs in salvation history. And here's the chart that I put on your handout. Okay? You want to talk about that for a minute and then I'm going to take six or seven or eight different passages and say, where do they fit? And what does different, this difference doesn't make. The church began at Pentecost. Well, there were God's people in the Old Testament and there's a dispute over whether to call it, sometimes there in Acts even talks about the church and the wilderness Ecclesia. So there's some foreshadowing of the church anywhere, God's people in the Old Testament, but the church aged particularly began at Pentecost. Yeah. And a lot of stuff happened and the gospel went through the Gentiles. Okay? Okay, so that's the picture. All right, let's take some examples and try to put them on this line. Try this one. Leviticus 117 and the pig. The pig, because it parts the hoof and his clove and footed, but does not chew the cut is unclean to you. No bacon, no ham, no pork sausages. That's in the Bible, but we don't follow it today. Why not? The answer has to do with where it fits in salvation history. It is back here between Moses and David. You know what? I'm going to, it's right here between Moses, well after Moses. So what I'm going to do right here is put a big green line and say, starting with Moses, and there were 10 very important things that God said to the people starting with Moses. What was that? 10 commandments. All right, and then you get all the giving of the law and Exodus, Leviticus, starting with Moses and all the way through here, you've got this mosaic covenant, this way of God's relating to his people, and you know what? It continues through into the life of Jesus right up to here. So, and the Bible calls this the old,
the old covenant. And it isn't with Abraham, it isn't with Noah who's before it starts with Moses, and it ends with the death of Jesus. The book of Hebrews talks about this in a lot of detail. And the book of Hebrews explains that we're not under that old covenant. So when we're not under that old covenant, the book of Hebrews explains that Jesus taught in his own life as well. In the gospel of Mark, he declared all foods clean. And the book of Hebrews says that can't purify those sacrifices and those things can't purify our consciences, it was just outward. And so we're freed from those food laws, from the Old Testament. So, salvation history says, let's put it right here. And it isn't a rule that we have to follow anymore because the food laws are taken care of according to questions, according to Hebrews. Okay, the Vedic is to one. When anyone brings a grain offering as an offering to the Lord, his offering shall be of fine flour. He shall pour oil on it and put frankincense on it and bring it to Aaron's sons, the priests. And he shall take from it a handful of fine flour and oil with all of its frankincense. And the priest shall burn this as a memorial portion on the altar at the information booth in the courtyard of Scottsdale Bible Church, a food offering with a pleasing aroma to the Lord. No, they're not doing that this morning. Why not, dear? Yeah, it's part of that, it's part of the ceremonies and the sacrifices of the mosaic covenant. And so this timeline says, all right, it's interesting. I can learn from it. I can learn that God required the people to give some sacrifice of their well to him. I can learn that the sacrificial system taught the people, especially with animals, that life had to be given to pay for sin, but it also wasn't adequate. It was preliminary, it was provisional. And so these things fit back here and they are not for us today. Okay, let's try this one. Genesis 156 talking about Abraham. And he believed the Lord and he counted it to him as righteousness. Now where is that? That fits here. Abraham. All right, all right over here, Abraham. He believed the Lord and the God counted it to him as righteousness. Now in the book of Romans, in the New Testament, Paul takes this. He quotes it. He gives an example how people are justified by faith, not by works. In fact, Paul likes to go back to Abraham. But wait a minute. Somebody might say, I thought that was old Testament. I did. But the Bible doesn't say the whole Old Testament is done away with for us. It says those sacrifices and those laws about unclean and clean foods. Those are done away with but there's some other stuff there that still applies because it tells us about how God always relates to people. He relates by faith and here he believed the Lord and this principle of faith goes all the way from Genesis to Revelation. In fact, way back in Genesis 3 or 4, 4. Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain. The book of Hebrews chapter 11 tells us that I was by faith. So we've got faith in God being the way that God wants his people to relate through the whole Bible. And the New Testament doesn't tell us that any of that is done away with. That's still good teaching material for us. We should believe God and he will count it to us as righteousness. All right. So what I'm saying is we need to keep on learning more about how God was doing age period, how we related to his people each time in some ways it's different in some ways it's the same. Making sense? It's not as easy as just saying, hey, that was old testament, so he doesn't count for it. Okay. Now Genesis 9 and 6, this is God speaking to Noah after the flood. So we're way back here before Abraham, whoever sheds the blood of man by man shall his blood be shed for God made man in his own image. That is God speaking to Noah after the flood. There are only eight people left in the world. They're setting up the beginning of human society and human government and God lays down a foundational principle here. Shed the blood of man. That's an Old Testament expression we could do kind of a word study or a phrase study searching that it means to pour out somebody's blood till they die. So whoever kills someone or murders someone by man shall he be put to death. God is saying to Noah, from now on Noah, here's the foundation of human government. It has the right to take life in the case of murder. It doesn't give you all the laws but it gives a foundational right delegated to human beings to human government I think is implied that it has the authority even to take life in some cases. No, we say, oh that's Old Testament, doesn't count for a well I'm a little I'm hesitant to do that because this is not the old covenant. This is not the mosaic covenant. This is way back before Moses. I think this has to do with human society generally and that's why this verse when you look in ethics texts about Bible teaching this verse is hotly discussed in discussions of capital punishment and discussions of police authority and discussions of killing in war because if it is in fact a principle that God laid down then it gives validity the basis for capital punishment. God delegates that authority to human beings. And then some people will say well they get into technical arguments about the meaning of the sentence and is it prediction or is it command and all of that and I'm not going to get into that today but I'm just going to say that the fact that it's there way back in the old Testament doesn't mean it has no relevance. In fact the fact that it's the beginning of human society probably indicates that it is very relevant and it's just dispute about whether what it means. Yeah, what's your name? Lover or no yeah, hi Lover. That's not homerabi. Homerabi was a king in a related period back around the time of Moses and he had a related language called Akkadian or Old Babylonian and there were laws like this so people look and say hey there are some similarities and differences. Yeah. Okay whoever sheds the myth so there's Genesis 9.6. Well okay the timeline helped us there by saying you know where it is anyway okay here's another one. These 12 Jesus sent out 12 disciples instructing them go nowhere among the Gentiles and enter no town of the Samaritans but go rather to the law sheep of the house of Israel. Now this is the New Testament. Oh it's the New Testament. Does this mean we shouldn't share the gospel with any Gentiles? Gentiles are all people who aren't Jewish. Aha. Here I am. I'm one. I'm a Gentile. Oh wow. Here's Jesus teaching. What's the deal here? What's going on?
Okay. Okay. Where is this on our timeline? Where is it fit? It's right here during Jesus lifetime okay. Okay. In fact Sandy is saying what covenant are they still in? Still in the old covenant. Okay. And go nowhere among the Gentile. That was what Jesus did at first. But if we read what happened at Pentecost what happened? Jesus said you'll receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you and you'll be my witnesses in Jerusalem that's Jewish people and Judea that's Jewish people and Samaria that's mixed Jewish and Gentile and to the ends of the earth or the uttermost parts of the earth. So all of a sudden at Pentecost the the gospel changes and pow it explodes going to all nations. So this command though it's in the New Testament our timeline tells us it's still before the church age and it's before Pentecost and it isn't the restriction that we should follow today. Let's try another one. Well to use scribes and Pharisees hypocrites for you tithe mint and dill and cumin and have neglected the weight of your matters the law justice and mercy and faithfulness these you ought to have done without neglecting the others these you ought to have done ought to have done you need to tithe on your spices you do that you buy some mint at the store and you take 10 a one-tenth of it and bring it to church on Sunday morning put it in the offering bag
sprinkle a little bit of mint in the offering no you don't do that no no no no while well there were specific laws about tithe again I would say this is still old covenant and Jesus giving restrictions and he's saying you should have done this you need to do this but I think those laws about tithing all those spices and things those are part of the laws that were no longer applicable to us okay I'm going to go on let's see you shall let's see you've heard that it was said you should love your neighbor and hate your enemy but I say to you love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you now this Darrell just got done preaching on the sermon on the mount love your enemies that's still Jesus is he's teaching here in the old covenant but all I was hard for me to find some passages that don't apply to us almost all of Jesus teaching is looking forward he's saying yes this is how you should act now but he's looking forward to the age to come and so of course this applies today oh let me see here's a hard one you're ready for another one okay Psalm 139 do I not hate those who hate you O Lord and do I not love those who rise up against you I hate them with a complete hatred I count in my enemies search me oh God and know my heart try me and know my thoughts and see if there be any grievous way in me and leave me in the way of everlasting what this is just said love your enemies do I not hate those who hate you and do I not love those who rise up against you I hate them with complete hatred I count them my enemies this is David who how do we do that there are a couple of things going on here first during this time Moses David except God was working so much in the physical realm that the the Philistines later the Babylonians the Assyrian those people who were the enemies of God's people were really enemies of God and there were real battles where what would be worked out today in the spiritual realm battles against spiritual evil that was worked out in the physical realm and that was just the way God worked with the people at those times and so David
really as king over Israel you know I said this is David I've just got to be sure that I'm right for this Psalm 139 as David yes some of David David is saying those Philistines who are continually trying to destroy us they are really the enemies of God's people they were not redeem people now there were just very few hints of salvation to the Gentiles but in general David's enemies the enemies of Israel were God's enemies and they were just evil and David wanted to destroy them because it wasn't God's time for redeeming them it's a different situation and and the parallel today I think is only Satan and demons that we should think of when we when we would pray something like this because for all other people who are non Christians we should seek to bring them to know Jesus and the God off of the gospel is to them but here it was God working in the physical realm in the Old Testament where the physical enemies of God's people were in fact God's enemies a little different situation that's those are one of the hardest questions how we understand those Psalms but I put it in that category God worked in a different way at that time Sandy it's possible yeah yeah okay I don't want to think about that somewhere Sandy it's a good part where David is where Sandy saying David's recording what's in his own heart but it's really not what God wants to be in his heart it's just describing not for describing the problem with that is there's no hint of disapproval here in the Psalm I know when David committed adultery with Bathsheba the whole narrative says this is wrong Nathan comes and rebukes him and because that's his sin but the Psalms are the words of someone after God's own heart and so it's it's possible but I I'm not as persuaded by that okay that's hard all right there's another one here Joshua the city of Jericho it falls down they destroy the whole city I think what's happening here I tell you what there's another maybe this will be helpful in both David with his enemies and in Jericho and some other cases what we have is and this is kind of a historical perspective you see final judgment over here final judgment that's right here there are four tastes of final judgment that God enters here with Noah and the flood where he destroys much of the earth here with Sodom and Gomorrah fire and Rimstone from heaven here with Jericho where the whole city is destroyed with fire and the conquest of the Canaanites I think those are four tastes of final judgment and they're not patterns for us to imitate today they're just God's warnings that this is going to happen to everybody someday and so I put the destruction of Jericho there but this history this salvation history timeline helps me get a perspective on which to see that all right let's see what I'm doing on time it's 915 let's see oh let me let me go Ephesians 4 1 I therefore prisoner of the Lord urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you've been to which you've been called is this for us today walk worthy says Pastor Daryl sure walking a manner worthy with humility gentleness patient all right how about this one put away falsehood let everyone speak the truth with his neighbor we are members of one another be angry don't seem let the sun go down your anger give no opportunity to the devil let the thief no longer steal let him lay well where is this this is right here in the church age these commands of course are for us and because there's directed to Christians in the church age and what I wrote here on the bottom of the sheet is I put the church age here in yellow church age we are at the same point in salvation history as the people in the early church therefore there are more differences between the way the Bible applied to the church in Corinth or Thessalonica or Ephesus and the Jewish people during Jesus ministry a few years earlier go nowhere among the Gentiles for instance then there are between us in 2005 and those first century churches in Corinth that's the lack of Ephesus we're at the same point in salvation history as all Christians have been since Pentecost and so what what I want to say here is look when Paul wrote Ephesians you can put it on the timeline right here and we're 2005 right here but we're the same this is the church age we're at the same stage in history and they are and we are like the Ephesians the Corinthians of Thessalonians so much different from people right here a few years earlier just 20 years earlier or so 25 years where they were still under the old covenant okay is that that making sense so this salvation history helps us a lot here because we say wait it's in the New Testament it's written for New Covenant churches it it applies to us all right where am I going here I think well let me see where I'm going topical studies trace through the whole themes oh boy oh I just wanted to do this so much today but I'm afraid I think I'd better be content with what we've done because I have to get out to Chandler and hear this student preach so what we're going to do next week is we're going to talk about doing topical studies we trace them from Genesis to Revelation and there are themes and so and so what I want to do if you remember this timeline and bring it back what I want to do is hey look about the the wise men coming and they're bringing gold and frankincense and murder is there any pattern of the wealth of the nations coming to the king of Israel let's trace that through the Bible and look that's just a hint of where we're going how about heradrag to destroy the baby Jesus there okay we'll either hints of the evil rulers of the world trying to destroy the promised offspring of the woman who's coming and where's that going in the Bible oh okay let's let's look at this are there any themes of a miraculously born child who's preserving God's promise and keeping it alive and the child's going to be raised up to rule over the people oh we might see some themes here in Matthew 2 well let's bring that for next week okay we'll we'll come back come back come back let me see where we are here oh it's going to do all that let's sing joy to the world and and we'll leave I pack up I'll start this and then by the last verse I may be absent okay