The Self-Donation of God. Jack D. Kilcrease

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The Self-Donation of God - Jack D. Kilcrease


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sin, there would be eschatological renewal and the return from exile: “I will remember my covenant with Jacob and my covenant with Isaac and my covenant with Abraham” (Lev 26:42). St. Paul observes in Galatians 3:13–25, the Mosaic record demonstrates that the Abrahamic covenant of grace (or more properly, his “testament,” as Paul puts it) precedes and in fact stands as separate from the Sinaitic covenant of law. In contrast to the Abrahamic testament of unilateral promise and blessings, the Sinaitic covenant entails a long list of demands and curses. The reception of the two covenants is different as well. Von Rad notes that Abraham is passive and asleep as he receives the unilateral covenant of grace (Gen 15). By contrast, we are told that the Israelites were called upon to actively receive and to perform the works of the Sinaitic covenant: “Moses came and told the people all the words of the Lord and all the rules. And all the people answered with one voice and said, ‘All the words that the Lord has spoken we will do’” (Exod 24:3).36

      Therefore, YHWH’s dealing with Israel takes on a paradoxically dual character. On the one hand, God has pledged himself to Israel and will fulfill his promises to it in spite of every obstacle. On the other hand, the covenant of Sinai is equally valid and demands on the part of Israel a real heartfelt obedience to God’s commandments. Both words from God are valid and therefore the unconditional nature of the former continuously comes into conflict with the conditional nature of the latter throughout the history of salvation. In the book of Hosea, the prophet enacts the sign of this paradoxical situation by marrying a prostitute (Hos 1, 3). As a sign of Israel’s state of affairs, Hosea’s marriage presupposes the validity of the covenant of the law, as well as God’s unilateral and unconditional faithfulness to Israel. Israel is rightly imputed with sin for having broken the law by prostituting itself to the nations, but YHWH must remain true to his promise and remains “married” to Israel in spite of its apostasy.

      Isaiah 40–66 goes further and envisions a universal end to exile. God, who due to Israel’s sin has withdrawn his personal presence from his people and his dwelling place Zion, is said to be returning through a miraculous desert highway (40:3–6). He will do this because he will forgive Israel’s sin (40:2). Not only will Israel return to Zion, the city of YHWH’s presence (Isa 44–45), but the Gentiles who also suffer the universal exile from God’s presence will stream from the whole expanse of creation to worship the true God (Isa 45:23).

      In summary, we therefore may observe throughout the Old Testament a pattern of exile and return, both in the understanding of Israel’s own history, but also forming the background for creation and the eschton. This pattern of divine activity as we can observe is rooted in YHWH’s dual relation with Israel as recorded in the historical accounts of the establishment of the law and gospel.

      Mediators of the Promise: An Introduction

      As previously noted, the Old Testament envisions creation and the history of salvation as existing within a matrix of exile and return. Within the pre-exilic history of Israel both the inspired prophets and the historians recognized YHWH’s patient and persistent attempts to maintain his gracious promise to Israel. In particular, such a gracious purpose takes the form of YHWH’s election of a series of mediatorial figures whose function it was to maintain the relationship between God and his people. Because of YHWH’s own self-donation as Israel’s God, he himself provided means of dealing with Israel’s failure to fulfill the law through his appointed mediators. Throughout the Old Testament such mediators took the forms of prophets, priests, and kings. Since, as the Apostle Paul tells us, there is but “one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus” (1 Tim 2:5), we must view these mediators as deficient in their roles as fulfillers of the law, but nevertheless efficient in prefiguring Christ. Their lack of success at resolving the tension between the law and the gospel creates the context wherein


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