Preaching Christ from history

1. A perennial issue in Christian theology is how to preach Christ from the OT. There's no consensus among evangelical scholars in that regard, viz.

http://equip.sbts.edu/category/publications/journals/journal-of-theology/sbjt-223-fall-2018/

One of the dangers, or perceived dangers, is that we're shoehorning OT passages into a preconceived grid that can't be justified by the passages themselves. This is germane to Jewish evangelism and apologetics, because many Jews don't recognize our interpretations as authentic reflections of original intent. And there's the attendant danger that a Christian pastor or scholar might lose his faith if he begins to suspect that Christian exegesis of the OT is a projection or artificial overlay. Are we fooling ourselves? 

2. I'd hasten to add that the objection cuts both ways. For one thing, the NT is just as Jewish as the OT. The NT is a continuation (and culmination) of the OT. You can't amputate the NT from the OT without killing the OT patient. 

Likewise, the OT, considered in isolation, loses plausibility. That's why many Jews have given up belief in a personal messiah. They lost hope. How long must you wait before it's impossible to distinguish a prophecy that's unfulfilled because it still lies in the future from one that will never be fulfilled? Don't many Jews suffer from nagging doubts in that regard?

Put another way, loss of faith in a personal messiah is a backdoor admission that the OT does prophesy a personal messiah, but because Jews don't think Jesus was the right candidate, and there's no other plausible candidate in sight, they are forced to either abandon Judaism altogether (secular Jews) or reinterpret the OT messianic expectation (e.g. Reform Judaism). 

So this isn't a challenge unique to Christianity. Ironically, Christians are picking up where many Jews gave up. 

It's important to work through these issues and come out the other end before undergoing a crisis of faith. It may prevent a crisis of faith or enable one to get through it with your faith intact and emerge stronger on the other side.

3. It might be objected that Christians are in the same boat regarding the Second Coming. How much time must pass before that becomes implausible? But there's a crucial difference. If the first advent is partial fulfillment, then it's evidence that we are on the right track. 

Moreover, God makes himself manifest in the lives of some Christians. So it's not just about ancient writings. 

4. In Christian theology, the traditional way of preaching Christ from the OT is to seize on certain messianic prooftexts. And that remains a legitimate approach.  There are passages very suited to that exegesis. However, a limitation to that approach is that it's very atomistic. On that approach, most of the OT isn't specifically messianic. 

5. A more recent way, inaugurated by Vos, is to trace out messianic motifs through a series of OT books. (I'm not saying Vos did that. I'm referring generally to the redemptive-historical hermeneutic.) That's a legitimate approach. An important supplement to the traditional approach. In some respects an improvement over the traditional approach. However, it's still rather limited. 

6. By contrast, it's easy to preach Christ from the NT, right? Yet there's a sense in which the OT has a counterpart in the inter-adventual age. Both the OT and NT contain as-yet outstanding prophecies about the future. The church age and the return of Christ. In reference to the second advent, Christians are in a position analogous to the position of OT/Intertestamental Jews in reference to the first advent. 

7. The first two approaches are text-based approaches. That's legitimate and necessary. But is there another way of broaching the issue? What about an event-based approach? 

Suppose you are God. In your master plan for human history, Jesus will be the messiah–with all that represents. It would make sense to arrange history to include emblematic events that signal the need for a messiah. Likewise, events that signal the nature of the messiah. That approach doesn't sidestep the Bible, but uses the sacred text as a window into events behind the text that point to the nature and necessity of messiah. Not only does God send prophets who predict messiah, but in addition, there's a world behind the text, a world which, by design, symbolizes the human plight and kind of messiah required to save us. That has affinities with typology, but is broader. Consider Bible history and church history:

Creation

If Messiah isn't merely an agent sent by God but God coming to his people in person, then the creation account is, among other things, a setup to identify messiah. 

Fall 

The inaugural human pair are banished from the garden. Their exile forecloses immorality via the tree of life to their posterity. Is the prospect of (biological) immortality forever lost? Or will messiah restore that?

Flood

Evil is so pervasive by this point that God adopts a scorched-earth policy. God wipes out all evildoers as well as the younger generation. He makes a fresh start using Noah's nuclear family. Yet despite that, moral evil comes roaring back. What kind of messiah can save us from that?

That illustrates the depth as well as breadth of evil. Like eradicating tumors from a cancer patient. The cancer appears to be gone, but tumors resurface a few months later. Turns out the treatment didn't reach the cancer itself, but only effects of the cancer. It keeps coming back. The underlying cause is vigorous and virulent. 

Abraham/Conquest

Unlike the scorched-earth policy, this time around God adopts a containment policy. Quarantine a subset of humanity from humanity in general. Put them in a separate country with purity codes. Yet Israel repeatedly commits national apostasy. Israel repeatedly reverts to paganism. Once again, that illustrates the depth of evil. What kind of messiah can save us from that?

Egyptian bondage/Exodus/Wilderness 

God delivers Israel from Egyptian bondage. Yet the act of removing external oppression exposes the inner moral failure of the Israelites. Outwardly liberated, they suffer from inner bondage. Their fickle character was there all along, but easy to shift blame for their plight on oppression. The source of the problem is more fundamental. 

We might say these divine policies are calculated failures. Their purpose is not to solve the problem of human sin, but to show the radical nature of human sin. That, in turn, indicates the kind of messiah that will be required to save us. 

The Cultus

The tabernacle, priesthood, and offerings are enacted parables to graphically illustrate divine holiness and human guilt. Sin has a forensic dimension (culpability, blameworthiness) as well as a psychological dimension (propensity to evil). A relation between God and man as well as something wrong with man. What kind of messiah is needed?

The Monarchy

i) There's no political salvation. Even the best Jewish kings have moral blind spots.

ii) At the same time, this lays the groundwork for Messiah as king over all. Heir of David as well as God's coregent. The heavenly crown prince. 

Assyrian deportation/Babylonian Exile

Despite their spiritual advantages, the Jews repeatedly and defiantly break the covenant. What more must be done to save wayward humans from themselves?

Demons

Not only does Jesus face human opposition, but opposition from the Devil and demons. That peels back the curtain to reveal another layer of evil behind human evil. That was already touched on in Dan 11. In addition to human evil there's angelic evil, which animates idolatry and polytheism. 

Jewish opposition to Jesus

Ironically, many Jews, steeped in the OT scriptures resisted the prophesied messiah when he comes. Once more, that demonstrates the need to address sin root and branch. 

Church age

The church age is characterized by external persecution, ecclesiastical corruption, and manmade substitutes for the Gospel. On the other hand, it's also characterized by the tenacity of faith and the overcoming power of grace. 

The upshot is that we can preach Christ (or Trinitarian salvation) from history. OT history, NT history, and church history. That complements a text-based approach. The Bible provides a roadmap for preaching Christ from history. And I think this is a neglected approach.