The goal today is to dive into the OT so you can see how it impacts the NT, and eventually us.

We have to understand that the NT and all that Jesus accomplished was built upon a structure that we find in the OT.

I hope you see today how important it is to develop a structure and live by it so that God’s plan can be realized in your life and family.

1. If you want structure, you need to obey.
Godly advice is worthless if it isn’t heeded. No matter how good a blueprint is, if you don’t adhere to that blueprint, it is worthless.

Last week: The Bible is the blueprint for your life. How? The Bible is more than an instruction booklet (basic instructions…) The Bible itself is two parts fit together to create a house from which our lives can be lived.

Here’s what I mean. Observe the structure of the Bible. Two parts: Old Testament and New Testament. The OT is not mean God and the NT nice God. The OT is the framework upon which the NT fits.

Some Differences:

Law vs Grace
OT - The Law
- The Law was the standard and to show mankind how vastly far he is from God’s standard of holiness.
- In the Old Testament God demanded purity.
- This was done by various ceremonial cleansings.

NT - Grace
- Ephesians 2:8-9 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.What the Law exposed, grace dealt with.The Law could not deal with sin, only expose it.

Atonement
OT
- Leviticus 4:20 And he shall do with the bull as he did with the bull as a sin offering; thus he shall do with it. So the priest shall make atonement for them, and it shall be forgiven them.
- In the Old Testament there was sacrifices made for the atonement of sin.
- The Hebrew word for Atonement is “kaphar” which means “covering.” - Nowhere in the Old Testament does it say that sacrifices were for the removal of sin.

NT
- Hebrews 10:4 For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.
- Hebrew 10:11-14 And every priest stands daily at his service, offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, waiting from that time until his enemies should be made a footstool for his feet. For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.

The Old Testament was repeatedly pointing towards the New Testament, towards Christ who could once and for all remove the taint of sin. The same word kaphar is used to describe the pitch that covered Noah’s ark. The entire ark inside and out had to be covered with pitch to keep it waterproof. And so we need the covering of the blood of Christ to save us from the wrath of God being poured out on mankind.

What is the point?
The point is that we need to see the differences between the OT and the NT because there are very clear themes and ideologies that build the scaffolding from the OT to the NT. Get in your mind in this moment the notion that everything in the OT was simply pointing to the fruition in the NT. Every interaction in the OT was designed to prepare the reader for the revealing of the truth in the NT.

“We can do what we want!” - No, there is a standard.
“What is the standard?” - Here’s the law.
“The law only shows us where we’re wrong.” - Yes.
“That doesn’t make me happy.” - No, but it does make you informed.
“Why is that important?” - Because if you can recognize what is broken in the OT, you can embrace what is restored in the NT.

This is not to say the OT is errant. This is to say that the OT is incomplete without the NT. The OT is identifying what is wrong, what is broken, and it is constantly pointing to the one thing that will fix it - Jesus.

In order for the structure to work, it has to be rooted in godliness, but also, and arguably the most important part, the structure has to be obeyed!

What has God told you to do last, and have you done it?

Planting Freedom: We received a word that God would not show us our next step unless we did one specific thing.

Don’t expect a new word if you haven’t done the last one.

Let’s look into the OT to see how people obeyed.

Noah
God - “It’s gonna rain.”
Noah - “What is rain?”

Abraham
“Go to a land I’ll show you.” “Where?” “I’ll show you.”
Sacrifice your son.
How could Abraham be so confident to offer Isaac? Speculation: What if the two others with the Lord in Genesis 18 were precarnate Moses and Elijah, the law and the prophets, just like those who appeared with Jesus at the Transfiguration? What if Abraham, as Hebrews 11 says “died in faith having seen the promise,” actually saw the fruition of the promise, giving him the requisite faith to offer his son?

Moses
“Go back to the place you fled and tell the most powerful human on earth to give me what I want.”

Esther
Go before the King and ask him to save the very people he was tricked into destroying

Elijah
Challenge and jill all the prophets of Baal, and then prophesy against Jezebel

Jonah
Go to Nineveh

Some of us have been waiting for orders but we haven’t gone to our Nineveh yet…

WHY SO DEEP IN THE WOODS ON THIS?!?!?

I want you to see TWO THINGS HERE
- First, that the OT has constant ties to the NT, and that the NT is built upon the framework of the OT. This is partly why Jesus said he didn’t come to destroy the law, but to fulfill it. When you car breaks down, you don’t just fix it. You have to identify the issue first. Once you identify the issue, you fix it. The OT identified the issue and the NT fixed it through the person of Jesus.

But second, and possibly more importantly, OBEDIENCE was the singular action, driven by faith, that moved these people of renown from potential to purpose.

Jesus didn’t do his own thing. He built upon the structure. He didn’t try to create a new way to deal with sin. He simply built upon he structure.

Noah, Abraham, Moses, Esther, Elijah, Jonah, they were given a specific thing to do and that thing to do always moved the ball along the structure
that structure being the thing God has been doing since we bit the apple:

RESTORING HUMANITY TO A RIGHT RELATIONSHIP WITH HIM

These character had no clue what God was doing in so many moments.
We see the extreme highs and lows
We see their failures and successes
We see moments of utter brilliance and complete and total ignorance
YET THEY OBEYED

HOW?

While they didn’t have the written structure like we do, they did have a relationship with God (many of them specifically through Jesus).

They learned who God was in the process and because of that revelation of who he was, they OBEYED!

Have you figured out yet that God it first and foremost a father who loves you, his kid? Or is he still that mean guy who is ready to destroy you because you did that sin again?

What can we learn from their journey in the OT
Major Themes/Stories
Creation, the fall, and pre-Noah
The flood
Abraham and faithfulness
Abrahams sons to Joseph and the captivity
Moses and the exodus
The 10 Commandments
The Promised Land
The Judges
The period of the kings
Major and minor prophets
All of these stories are designed to teach you holiness, righteousness, godliness, to warn you, to encourage you, to point you to Jesus. All designed for you to encounter and embrace his LOVE for you.

Sprinkled in are power verses like:
- Psalm 23
- Isaiah 53
- Jeremiah 29:11
- Genesis 50:20 - what you meant for evil God meant for good

Psalm 19:7-8
The law of the Lord is perfect, refreshing the soul. The statutes of the Lord are trustworthy, making wise the simple. The precepts of the Lord are right, giving joy to the heart. The commands of the Lord are radiant, giving light to the eyes.
- The only people who hate the law are the ones who are breaking it.

The entire Bible provides structure for our lives, a framework of what is good and right, created by identifying what is wrong and evil, so that we can properly build our house upon the person of Jesus Christ. But if you are going to have that structure in your life, it will require you to embrace obedience.

What is obedience? It is better than sacrifice. Sacrifice requires action, but obedience requires faith and action. You know what you’re getting with sacrifice, but you might not with obedience. Defined: comply with the command, direction, or request of (a person or a law); submit to the authority of.

Here’s a good question for you:

ARE YOU OBEDIENT TO GOD?

Or have you limited your submission only to those things that you’re willing to relinquish.

It is easy to submit the afterlife because we have no control over it, but obedience means submitting entirely, and submitting now!

Psalm 127:1 Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain.

How is he building your house? It begins with the Word.

Just like the OT provides the scaffolding for the NT, the Word provides the scaffolding for your life

IF YOU OBEY IT!

Verses
Isaiah 1:19 If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land
Luke 11:28 But he said, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it!”

All of these OT men and women encountered and embraced God’s love.
This is a big deal and here’s why:

2. If you want obedience, you need love.
Ok, so you want to obey. Great! Here’s the issue: Romans 7:22-24
I love God’s law with all my heart. But there is another power within me that is at war with my mind. This power makes me a slave to the sin that is still within me. Oh, what a miserable person I am! Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death?

Have you ever felt like that? You try hard to obey and you can do it for a few weeks or months, but it seems you alway fall back into that sin! Why can’t you obey?!?!?!

John 14:15 If you love me, you will keep my commandments.

Now, I always read this “if you love me you will keep my commandments, but what I believed what I will sho you I love you by how I keep your commandments. It bred a works-based theology in me. If I obeyed, I loved him. If I didn’t, then what? And worse, if I obeyed, he loved me, but if I didn’t… The love I experienced with God, both to and from, was at the mercy of my level of obedience.

But that is not what this verse is saying. How could Jesus obey so well? “Well he was God.” That isn’t the reason.

John 14:16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you foreverThe same level of God that Jesus had we have access to as well.So “he was God and we aren’t” is neither accurate nor sufficient as an excuse.He obeyed because he was loved.

Your obedience is not a proof of your love, it is the result of you being loved.

That’s why you can’t shake that sin. It isn’t because you are incapable. It is because you’ve tried to put the cart before the horse, obedience before love.

What would change in your life if you realized that obedience was a byproduct of God’s love, not a prerequisite for it?

So how does this help us with our structure?

Three Truths
1. God isn’t mad at you if your structure is bad. He’s here to fix it.
You can’t do it on your own, so how messed up would it be if God wanted to blast you for not fixing something you are incapable of fixing on your own? He knows so many of us haven’t been raised with godly structure, but because we weren’t raised that way doesn’t mean we can’t have godly structure. So he gave us his word as a path, and he used the OT and the NT to help us understand the power of a structure and its fruition, and he surrounds you with people who are following that path like you want to.
And if you’ll obey, you’ll see that come to pass.

2. God isn’t mad because of your disobedience. He just wants to help you correct it.
He knows you want to be obedient, that you want to do the right thing, so rather than responding with hate and anger, he responds with love and support. He isn’t okay with the disobedience, but knows that obedience only comes when you embrace how much he really loves you. Kindness leads you to repentance. Not his forgiveness. Not his love.

Obedience doesn’t unlock love. Love unlocks obedience.

3. God isn’t sick and tired of you. He realizes you are in a process.
This is the point where he can only do so much to and for you. He can love you, give you his Spirit, lead and guide you, but at some point you have to make the decision to do what is right. If you are having a hard time obeying, stop focusing on you obedience and start focusing on his love.

A thought from this week: Are you working to get God’s approval, or are you working to avoid his disapproval?"

Working for his approval ignores his love. Avoiding his disapproval is embracing his love.

Keeping God’s commands is easy when you see him primarily as a God who loves rather than a God who punishes.

3. If you want love, you need to surrender.
For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten so that whosoever believes in him will not perish but have everlasting life.

Think about what comes with surrendering. Defined: cease resistance, to completely give over to. The problem is that surrender has ben more common to us as a military term. To surrender is to lose, to give up, to be taken prisoner. Is that really what Jesus is asking of us?

Man with shriveled hand. Matthew 12:13
Then he said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” So he stretched it out and it was completely restored, just as sound as the other.

Military surrender means losing your kingdom. Surrender with Jesus means gaining his!

What does it mean, then, to surrender to Jesus?

Luke 9:23-25 And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself?

Deny yourself and take up your cross and follow me.
Does this mean starvation and poverty? pain and sorrow, forced servitude and unhappiness? Of course not!

Denying taking and following
Jesus is telling us that all the things in us that make us want to feed our cravings, flee the cross, and go our own way are not what it takes to experience your best life.

In fact, these things are how you experience your worst life.Your flesh is corrupt and will never lead you down the right path.Your heart is deceitful and fickle and will always drive you to the path of how you feel.

Following your own path gives you independence but also self dependence. That means you are alone. That is not God’s plan for you.
He made you to NEED people. So this denying yourself, taking you cross, following him, it requires you engaging God and his people in the intentional act of surrender. Not surrender because you lost, but surrender because you’re found!

One more part of surrender…

Last week I said: While God always used families in the Bible with drastic issues, it always took one person who was willing to be faithful.

Let me bring this entire message together with this idea:
What we learn from observing the structure of the OT and the fulfillment of the NT is that there are some things God has to have out of us if we are to become everything he made us to be.

Things like:
Holiness - without which we cannot see God.
Righteousness - not through works but through Jesus Christ
Faithfulness - the kind that believes when there’s no reason to
Trust - not just hoping he’ll come through, but confident expectation based on his character we’ve learned through reading the Bible and experience
Lordship - it is all or nothing

So what am I asking of you today?

The Word is the blueprint, but you have to obey it.
Obedience is the byproduct of being loved, but you have to receive it.
God’s love is here and ready to be received, but you have to surrender to it.

I want to see what God wants to see in your family. I want you to see today the bridge between the OT and the NT. The structure of the law and truth in the OT, and the beauty and flexibility of the NT

They are not mutually exclusive. Just the opposite. One can’t be understood without the other. In fact, I’d be willing to say that the NT can’t fulfill without the structure of the OT.

In the EXACT SAME WAY, you cannot possibly be everything you were created to be without structure.

The important thing is where you’re getting your structure. When you get it form the world, its a mess. But when you get it from God, it is satisfaction.

Where are you in all of this?

What is the Holy Spirit saying to you through this message?