Can it be said that the Old Testament is New Testament concealed and that the New Testament is Old Testament concealed?
This could be an accurate way of describing what scholars call the intertextuality of Scripture. And there’s a reason for this. The New Testament is built on the foundation of the Old Testament. You cannot understand much of the New Testament without understanding what happens in the Old Testament.
And when you look into the Old Testament, you see the seeds of the New Testament in it. You see God’s grace amidst his judgment. The law is given to judge the hearts of people, but God’s grace is given in the sacrificial system that keeps us from the full penalty of the law.
Even though God judges Israel and takes them out of his Promised Land because they do not follow his covenant as they were supposed to keep up their end, seventy years later he brings them back into their home.
He judges the nations around Israel for their evil and wickedness, their idolatry and mistreatment of his people. He uses these nations to judge Israel in the exile for the same things, especially in the book of Habakkuk.
Though the Bible was written over 1600 years by over 40 human authors, you see the power of the Spirit, his inspiration and breathing all over the text. Even secular scholars admit that the Bible is so well put together and so intertwined from beginning to end.
There’s a reason for this. God himself wrote the book and used human authors’ culture, experiences, language, and even personalities to put together the entire work. It is above all the Word of God, not the words of men.
And because it fit so well together, there are a few who can look at it with an honest eye and not admit that it seems to be to perfectly put together over 1600 years and so many different authors to not be the greatest book on earth.
Because the Old Testament is the foundation for the New Testament, many of the New Testament authors quote from the Old Testament regularly, allude to its pages, and show the final fulfillment of its prophecies.
The same concepts in the Old Testament are found in the New Testament. The context and language are different, from Hebrew to Greek. But the same God of the Old Testament is the God of the New Testament. We can be confident that he is the one who wrote Scripture. And because he never changes, we can see the Old in the New and the New in the Old.
