The New Testament
1 – The Intertestamental Period
One of the senses from the New Testament itself is that of fulfilled expectation. For example, The Gospel according to Saint Matthew,[1] entails approximately sixty direct quotes or allusions to the fulfillment of Old Testament predictions. This period is the “pleroma,” a Greek word meaning “fullness,” or fullness of time.
For the men here, you'll remember the long, anxious and nervous drive to the hospital upon the birth and delivery of your children. Of course, it was more traumatic for our wives. "The moment had come."
There is a keen sense in the New Testament that this is the fulfillment for which history was created. There is “fruition,” a “coming to pass,” a sense of the pregnant moment yielding to the requirements of time. It’s not as if this came “from out of the blue” or “dropped unawares out of the sky.” God had been preparing history and His People for the long-awaited Messiah.
St. Paul gives the sense of it in his immortal and most necessary[2] Epistle to the Galatians. He says at 4.4-6:
But when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption as son. And because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying out, `Abba, Father!’”[3]
But when the fullness of the time had come points to the predetermined moment when God would send for His Son. 4.2 contains a similar statement with respect to timing. “…but is under guardians and stewards until the time appointed by the Father.”
The Galatian context is that the administration of the Old Covenant...akin to a prison warden, a school master, or a trustee’s function, as it were, with a preparatory, educative and disciplinary role over a minor until the time of maturity, release and adoption.
This is the pleroma or fullness of times and it had come. God had been in command and time was at hand for His Son to be born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem us and to send forth His Majestic Spirit into our hearts.
In the interests of time tonight, we close. However, we will be surveying the 400-year period between the closing of the last book of the Old Testament, Malachi, until the thundering prophet opens the New Testament period, John the Baptist, a man whom Jesus would say was the greatest amongst those born of a woman. John the Baptist also was a fulfilment of Old Testament prophecy.
More later
[1] We shall say The Gospel according to Matthew as is found as the title in the King James Bible, as a note of historicity. In terms of references, we shall use St. Matt., etc.
[2] This Epistle of Galatians almost needs to be memorized, for several reasons, but notably for the insistence that all biblical teaching—anywhere by anyone at any time--conform to the Apostolic Gospel. If not, away with it! The obvious conclusion is that Joel Osteen, Robert Schuller, Pat Robertson, Joyce Meyer, Paula White, Bishop T.D. Jake and a long line of other cowboys and cowgirls—they simply—have to go. “The Litany,” The Book of Common Prayer (1662), offers this salubrious and timely prayer on the matter: “Good Lord, deliver us! From all sedition, privy conspiracy, and rebellion; from all false doctrine, heresy, and schism; from hardness of heart, and contempt of thy Word and Commandment. Good Lord, deliver us!” [italics in the original] We explicitly pray this with respect to the aforementioned in all seriousness.
[3] We italicize the Biblical quotation for contrast and emphasis.
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