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     God, the sovereign of the universe, initiated the Mosaic Covenant with ancient Israel, a covenant which promised death for sin and not life, except the promise to live in the promised land if the people were obedient to God.  The Israelites only escape from immediate death for some sins was the substitutionary animal sacrifices.  The covenant promised God’s chastisement and death for disobedience and eventually, when His patience ended, the unleashing of His wrath — destruction of the nation and removal of the people from their cherished land (Deuteronomy 28:15-68; 2 Kings 24-25:21; Jeremiah 52), He had promised to Abraham (Genesis 17:8).  And never escaping the greatest enemy of man — death (temporal and eternal separation from God in hell — 1 Corinthians 15:20-26).

     If one only had the Old Testament (OT), in his wildest imagination, he would never think God would descend to earth in human flesh to save man from his sin by giving Himself as the sacrifice to pay the penalty of our sins — death (Hebrews 7:26-27).  Nowhere in the OT is there a clear statement that God would suffer for our sins (the epitome of love for us).   Even the very prophets who uttered God’s message to us understood the message — “Of this salvation the prophets have inquired and searched carefully, who prophesied of the grace that would come to you… it was revealed that, not to themselves, but to us… .” (1 Peter 1:10, 12).  No wonder the NT refers to this mystery 26 times.  That this mystery was truly a secret, mystery is not mentioned once in the OT!

     In past articles we have considered the unfolding of the mystery:
     (1) God coming in flesh to pay the price of sin (Philippians 2:5-8).
     (2) The 1500 years of the Mosaic Covenant would be ended (Colossians 2:13-14).
     (3) Not only Jews, but Gentiles would be saved by Jesus death on the cross (Ephesians 2:14-16; Colossians 1:27).

     But there was more to this mystery.  Near the beginning of His 3 years ministry, in explaining the reasoning for using parables in His preaching, Jesus stated to His 12 disciples, “To you it has been given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God; but to those who are outside, all things come in parables” (Mark 4:11).  What mystery? What kingdom? The 12 were Jews, born into the 1500 year covenant given to Moses.  They would reckon that was God’s kingdom.  Now Jesus says this kingdom is a mystery??? Next we will consider Jesus unfolding the revelation of the mystery kingdom.

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