The Shadow of God's Plan Part 1

There is an old saying among students of the Bible that says “The Old Testament is the New Testament concealed and the New Testament is the Old Testament revealed.” One of the things that drove home the integrity of the Word of God was learning all the “types” or “shadows” of the Old Testament and then seeing how they were fulfilled in the Blessed Mother, the Lord Jesus, the Church and perhaps even in the eventual return of the Lord. I have italicized certain key points to bear in mind as we move forward.

There are five Covenants found in the Old Testament and we’ll look at each of them. I should mention here that some people count the words of God to Eve promising a Messiah in Genesis 3:13-15 as a covenant. But that is not universally agreed upon. The five that are universally accepted are:

1. The Noetic
2. The Abrahamic
3. The Mosaic
4. The Davidic
5. The New Covenant.

The Promise to Eve

In Genesis 3 is recorded the Fall of Man from our state innocence and fellowship with God to a state of sin and enmity with God. It’s important to start here because in Eve we have the woman of disobedience that we will contrast with Mary in the New Testament…the woman of obedience. God gave a promise to Adam and Eve in verses 13 through 15 of this chapter that one day her descendent would crush the head of the serpent…representing Satan.

The Noetic Covenant
Genesis 9

After the Great Flood of Genesis 9 wiped out all of humanity except for Noah and his family God gave both commandments and a promise to Noah. He told him that he was allowed to eat the animals now, but God commanded him not to eat the blood of the animal. This is a common theme that shows up later in the Law of Moses and even in the Jerusalem Council’s instructions to the gentile Christians in Acts 15. God also established a covenant with mankind through Moses that He would never again destroy the world by water. The sign and seal of this promise is the rainbow. This is the first time that it’s recorded that God gave commandments to man…basic as they might be. Bear in mind this ‘sign and seal” aspect later when we examine the New Covenant.

The Abrahamic Covenant
Genesis 12:1-3, 17:1-14

God’s dealings with Abraham was the beginning of God separating a people for Himself. In Genesis 12 God commanded Abram, as he was then called, to leave the land of his father and travel to a new land that God would show him. Abram obeyed the Word of the Lord and after a side trip to Egypt and a little war that he participated in we arrive at Genesis 17. The Covenant that God makes with Abraham is different than the Noetic. In the promise to Eve nothing was required but God’s faithfulness. Then in the Noetic nothing again was needed on Noah’s part except not to eat blood. But the Abrahamic is the beginning of God’s Covenants being two sided.

First, God gave Abram a new name: Abraham. Then he promised him that he would be the father of many nations. This is important to note! Not the father of one nation but of many. He also promised to give him and Sarai (whose name now changed to Sarah) a son of their own and told him to name him Isaac. God also promised Abraham that Ismael, who he had with Hagar Sarah’s handmaiden, would be taken care of and would become a great nation.

Remember in the Noetic Covenant that God provided the sign and seal, requiring nothing of man but to refrain from eating meat with the blood in it. But now for the first time we have a two sided Covenant. The sign and seal of this Covenant is circumcision. Any male either born into the house or a slave was to be circumcised on the eighth day after they were born. Anyone who wasn’t was to be cast out from among the people for God said, “They have broken my Covenant. All Covenants after this would be two sided… the Davidic being the exception since it was a Covenant with an individual. This “two sided” concept is important to remember when we arrive in the New Covenant.

In Part 2 we’ll look at the Mosaic Covenant and move on to the New Covenant under which we live today. In the promise of the New Covenant and it’s fulfillment in the Blessed Mother and the Lord Jesus we’ll see how many of these rituals, these “shadows” find substance in that fulfillment.