Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas
Jeremy approaches Bible teaching with a passion for getting the basic doctrines explained so that the individual can understand them and then apply them to circumstances in their life. These basic and important lessons are nestled in a framework of history and progression of revelation from the Bible so the whole of Scripture can be applied to your physical and spiritual life.
Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas
NT Framework - History Creates Context
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History doesn’t wander; it aims at glory.
More information about Beyond the Walls, including additional resources can be found at www.beyondthewalls-ministry.com
This series included graphics to illustrate what is being taught, if you would like to watch the teachings you can do so on Rumble (https://rumble.com/user/SpokaneBibleChurch) or on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLtV_KhFVZ_waBcnuywiRKIyEcDkiujRqP).
Jeremy Thomas is the pastor at Spokane Bible Church in Spokane, Washington and a professor at Chafer Theological Seminary. He has been teaching the Bible for over 20 years, always seeking to present its truths in a clear and understandable manner.
Welcome to Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas and our series on the New Testament framework. Today, a smaller, bite-sized piece from the larger lesson. We hope you enjoy it.
SPEAKER_01:The glorification of God is the underlying goal of history. As we I've kind of mentioned this, but I'm going through it again. So you have other major themes in the Bible, and I think this is what a lot of theologians, well, I know it is. It's what a lot of theologians down through church history have been trying to figure out. Usually, the way that the Bible is approached by people who really want to understand the whole thing has been to ask themselves, what is the one unifying factor of the whole Bible or unifying theme of the whole Bible? Covenant theology came up with the idea of covenants. Okay, that's that's what they did. Okay. And they use that as a rubric for interpreting the text. Because this is a is this a big book? Well, I mean, yeah. Is it hard to understand? Well, I mean, yeah. I mean, if you became a believer and you started reading in Genesis and you read through Revelation, I mean, I don't know what you'd think. Um, I mean, a lot of stuff. I mean, you'd be making some progress, but still, you know, you'd probably have a whole lot of questions. Um, so people have tried to simplify it to understand it, like back away from it and say, now, wait a minute, how do we understand it? So they come up usually with a unifying theme or goal of the whole thing. And again, as I've mentioned, I think the unifying theme of the whole thing is the glory of God. But through it, if you read the story, you're gonna see some major themes, right? You're gonna see the seed that God promised the woman in Genesis 3.15, right?
SPEAKER_02:This seed would defeat the serpent's seed.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, so this is a major theme that is threaded through the Bible and leads from then creation, let's just say the fall to the cross, right? That's a big one. That's huge. W. A. Criswell, the old Baptist preacher, used to call it the scarlet thread of redemption. It's tracing the seed and the sacrifices that led to his sacrifice for us. So that's a major theme. Uh another one is the unconditional cov or I'm sorry, the kingdom. I missed missed that one. Why did God create man in Genesis 1.26? What did he say? All right, let's let us create man and our image to rule over the fish and the birds and sea and sky and all these things, right? To rule, rule. So this concept of that God created man to be a king, the dwelling concept comes later in the concept in the Psalm 90s, where you've got God is gonna rule as king and man's gonna rule as king. You say, How can God and man rule as king?
unknown:The God man.
SPEAKER_01:That would be like right on target. That would be like just nailing it, right? So God is gonna dwell with man and rule as a king, and guess what? We'll be kings with him. We just read it in the Psalm of Redemption, Song of Redemption here in Revelation 5, 9 and 10. Uh they will reign upon the earth. That's us. We will reign. So there's this whole concept of kingdom that God set up in the garden, what some consider to be like a again, like a temple or tabernacle, a garden temple. And then this kingdom was to build and grow out from that as Adam and Eve subdued the earth and so forth. But of course they failed. But God still has this purpose in mind, and in the kingdom, the messianic kingdom, it will come to fruition. He will rule from sea to sea. He won't rule from one side of the garden to the other. In fact, Ezekiel says the whole earth will be like the Garden of Eden, Ezekiel 37. So you can only imagine where things are going. See, history is going somewhere great. God has a great purpose, and he's the center point of it all. So the seed concept, that theme, the kingdom theme, the unconditional covenants. I mean, this is what did God covenant when he says, I will give you a land? Well, a land is the boundaries of a kingdom, right? I mean, a nation, like a place to rule, a sphere of rule. Um, I will give you a seed. Well, the seed turns out to be the king, the god man, right? And the blessing. That's the blessing that will go out from the God man who rules this future kingdom, right? So the covenant, the unconditional covenants of Israel really are talking about how God is going to bring about the kingdom. Dispensations, these are stewardships, these are this is a major theme of the Bible. Um, if I say, what is the purpose of the church? What is the church supposed to do in history? What does God want the church to do? Most of you probably say, Well, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit, teaching them all that I commanded you, and lo, I'm with you to the end of the age. And I'd say, Amen. Those are our marching orders. Dispensations are about the marching orders that God gives certain people during certain periods of history. Did he give that to Israel? Did he say, I want you to go to all nations and make disciples? No. He said, I want you to stay in the land and I want you to obey the uh Mosaic law, and through that you will become a light to all nations. They were like a light post set in the middle of the nations. The church is not a light post. The church is a bunch of people who are tiny light posts who run around the world and go out to the rest of the world and all nations. But Israel is just one lamppost, see? And so it's a different mission or stewardship that's given to church and Israel. Okay. But so that's a major theme, but it's the it all the major theme. The major thing is the glory of God through all of this. Of course, salvation, the plan of salvation. There's only one plan of salvation. You can only be saved in Christ. There's only one way, right? By grace through faith in Christ. Okay. So, but not everybody's saved. So, but that's a major theme. Okay, and all these again coalesce to the glory of God. Now, this is why history is important. I mean, I'm sure you've heard of missions organizations, you know, that for decades and decades would go out, and the first thing they translate when they went into a culture was the gospel of Mark. Okay, this was very common for decades and decades. Why Mark? Well, it's the shortest gospel. Um, it talks about Jesus and the cross. Okay. And for the most part, they were highly unsuccessful at convincing people. So then you have other groups like New Tribes Mission, which is now Ethnos 360. You have Good Seat up in Canada with John Cross. And these guys said, wait a minute, this isn't working. We just go in there and we start telling about Jesus and the cross. Why aren't people getting saved? Why are they believing in Jesus, but they're just putting Jesus alongside all their other gods? Why are they syncretizing Jesus? This was the problem they they kept running into. People might believe in Jesus, but they're like, oh, he's a magic, he's an amulet, he's like a magic charm, you know, and we just use him that way, and they just syncretized Jesus into their pagan cultures, and you know what nothing ever happened, no change of life, because they didn't understand who Jesus was or what he had ever done. He was just another amulet or magic charm, right? So new tribes and and other groups like Good Seeds said, wait a minute, we're missing something here. Oh, wait a minute, maybe we should go back and tell them who God is. So they went back to creation. They said, Oh, the God who made everything. Now, is the tribe going to understand that? Well, that this changes everything. Because now you're talking about this God who created the whole world around us, the world that we live in, he created us in his own image. We fell, we're in rebellion against him, we've created false religion. And this was able to ultimately through their sequence of events leading up to the cross, when people, when they when they would see Christ and what he did on the cross, it all it all clicked. They understood. And then they rejected all their paganism, all their pagan gods, and they just believed in Jesus Christ, see, and he's the one true God, and let's worship him. And so this is why history is so critical to understanding truth.
SPEAKER_00:Thank you for joining us on Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas. If you would like to see the visuals that went along with today's sermon, you can find those on Rumble and on YouTube under Spoke and Bible Church. That is where Jeremy is the pastor and teacher. We hope you found today's lesson productive and useful in growing closer to God and walking more obediently with him. If you found this podcast to be useful and helpful, then please consider rating us in your favorite podcast app. And until next time, we hope you have a blessed and wonderful day.