A Lenten Bible Study: Genesis to Jesus Lesson Eleven: New Moses, New Covenant [Holy Saturday Edition]

Here is the eleventh lesson in the Saint Paul Center for Catholic Biblical Theology's Lenten Scripture study, Genesis to Jesus. By the end of Lent, you'll understand the importance of Easter in light of God's plan for our salvation and his unfathomable love for us. In this Holy Saturday instalment we will see how Christ was put to death for our trespasses and raised for our justification.
_________________________________________________

Over the course of this study, we have been moving through God’s covenant plan for humanity. This has taken us through the covenants of the Old Testament. Now we will illuminate more fully how those covenants find their end in the New Covenant of Jesus Christ. We will see how Christ fulfills God’s plan for humanity through his life, ministry, death, and resurrection. We will also understand why Christ is described as the new Adam, the true son of Abraham, the new Moses.

In our final lesson, we’ll see how Christ comes as the new son of David. The point of all God’s actions is to bring us back into God’s family. That has always been God’s goal. That goal is finally achieved in the New Covenant of Christ. Through the person and work of Jesus Christ in the New Testament, God’s promises to Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, and David are fulfilled. Moreover, in Christ, we have a new Creation, a new Exodus, and a new Kingdom. Christ’s New Covenant is the ultimate realization of all of God’s previous covenants with humanity.

As we saw at the beginning of our study, in the Garden of Eden, Christ fulfills God’s first covenant with creation as the new Adam. His fulfillment of that first covenant is complete on Easter Sunday morning, when the resurrected Christ appears before a woman in the garden. His obedience has undone Adam’s disobedience. Whereas Adam was disobedient in the Garden of Eden, choosing to do his own will rather than the Father’s will, Jesus was obedient in the Garden of Gethsemane, praying, “not my will, but yours be done.”

Remember that when Adam sinned, he triggered the curses of the creation covenant. He was ashamed and naked. His work became toil, bringing forth thorns and thistles, not just fruit. His labor was hard, it demanded sweat, and physical death became inevitable. Jesus, as the new Adam, bears those curses redemptively. He is striped naked and treated shamefully. He is given a crown of thorns. He sweats drops of blood, and he is put to death. On the third day, however, Christ rises again. In his resurrection, God fulfills the oath he swore to Abraham in Genesis 22:18:

18 “…and through your descendants all the nations of the earth will find blessing, because you obeyed my command.”

If you recall, in the opening verses of Genesis 22, God asked Abraham to sacrifice his beloved son, Isaac. Little did Abraham realize than how God was using him and his son to foreshadow the way that covenant oath would later be fulfilled.

According to God’s instructions, Abraham was to sacrifice his beloved son Isaac on Moriah. As they made their way up the mountain, Isaac carried the wood upon which he was to be sacrificed. When Isaac asked his father what they would be sacrificing, Abraham replied, “God will provide himself the lamb.” Abraham was willing to go through with the sacrifice because of his deep faith. After all, Isaac was the son through whom God had promised to fulfill his covenant, and Abraham trusted that somehow it would come to pass. In fact, Hebrews 11:19 tells us that Abraham believed God could even resurrect his son from the dead if he so chose.

In the New Testament, the comparisons between Isaac and Jacob begin in the first verse of the first Gospel. Matthew 1:1 calls Jesus “the son of Abraham.” Like Isaac, he is the beloved Son of his Father. He too offers himself on the heights of Moriah, at a place called Calvary. Like Isaac, Jesus carries the wood of the sacrifice – the cross – up the mountain. There, God provides himself as the lamb. And just as Abraham received his son back from a sentence of death on the third day after it was issued – because it was a three-day journey to Moriah – so God receives his son back on the third day, raising him from the dead.

Through that death and resurrection, foreshadowed by Isaac’s own near death, all peoples receive the opportunity to spend an eternity with God. This fulfills the promise God made to Abraham to bless all nations through his descendants. Galatians 3:13-14 tells us:

13 Christ ransomed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written, “Cursed be everyone who hangs on a tree,” 14 that the blessing of Abraham might be extended to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.

Next, we come to God’s covenant with Israel through Moses. Here the parallels continue. Starting from his birth, Jesus’ life is reminiscent of Moses’ life. Both are born during the reign of a ruthless king; Moses under Pharaoh, Jesus under Herod. Shortly after both Moses and Jesus were born, the ruling tyrants cruelly ordered the murder of all Hebrew baby boys. Pharaoh did this because he saw the growing number of Hebrew slaves as a threat to his rule. Herod did it because he feared one of those baby boys was to be the promised Messiah who would reign as king.

However, both Moses and Jesus as infants find safety in Egypt – Moses in the care of Pharaoh’s daughter, Jesus when his foster father Joseph smuggles him and his mother away from Herod and his soldiers. Both eventually come out of Egypt, pass through the waters, and are led into the desert. Moses crossing the sea and leading the Israelites to Mt. Sinai – Jesus through the waters of baptism in the Jordan, and out into the wilderness to be tempted. In the desert, Jesus fasts for forty days and forty nights, just as Moses did when he ascended Mt. Sinai. Jesus is tested by Satan during his time in the desert, just as the Israel was tested during their wanderings through the wilderness.

Even more important, Jesus repels the devil’s temptation by citing passages from Deuteronomy 6 and 8. Those are the passages in which Moses explained to Israel why they failed their tests in the wilderness. In other words, Jesus succeeds exactly where Israel failed. Where the Israelites failed to trust that God would provide for their physical needs, particularly their need for food, Jesus knows better. Quoting Deuteronomy 8:2-3, he tells the Devil that man does not “live by bread alone” [Matthew 4:4}.

Similarly, while the Israelites failed to trust that God would provide them with water while they were in the wilderness, Jesus understands that he must not “tempt the Lord your God” [Matthew 4:7] a reference back to Deuteronomy 6:16. And where the Israelites fell into idol worship, first at Sinai and then at Beth Peor, Jesus tells the Devil that man is to serve God and God alone [Matthew 4:10 in which our Lord quotes Deuteronomy 6:13].

After Moses spent his forty days fasting on Mt Sinai, he came down to give Israel the laws of the covenant. After Jesus completes his forty day fast, he begins his public ministry declaring the law of the New Covenant from a mountaintop in the Sermon on the Mount [Matthew 5-7]. By giving the laws of the New Covenant, however, Jesus doesn’t intend to abolish the law of the Old Covenant. Instead, he says in Matthew 5:17 his mission is to fulfill it. One way he does this is by internalizing and intensifying the law of Moses. For example, Moses commanded Israel not to commit adultery. Jesus takes that command to the next level, declaring that anyone who even looks lustfully at a woman commits adultery in his heart. Thankfully, Jesus doesn’t just give us a new law, but a new power to fulfill it through the Holy Spirit. It is because of these new commandments and power that John 1:17 says:

17 because while the law was given through Moses, grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.

It is also why Jesus directs the Israelites back to the writings of Moses. He knows full well they don’t contradict what he teaches. He basically says, “You don’t believe me? Go read it for yourselves and you’ll see that Moses bears witness to me.” In John 5:39, 46-47 Jesus teaches:

39 You search the scriptures, because you think you have eternal life through them; even they testify on my behalf… 46 For if you had believed Moses, you would have believed me, because he wrote about me. 47 But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words?”

The similarities between Jesus and Moses continue with the signs and wonders Christ works during his time on earth. John 2:1-11 records that Jesus’ first “sign” is turning the water that filled stone vessels into wine. Likewise, Moses first sign was turning the water in Egypt, including the water in stone jars, into blood [Exodus 7:19]. In John chapter 6, we see Jesus miraculously feed the crowds who come to hear him preach. He multiples a few loaves of bread into enough food to feed thousands. Similarly, while in Moses care, God feed the Israel with manna, the miraculous bread from heaven [Exodus 16]. Shortly after Jesus feeds the crowds, he tells us something important. He tells us what the manna in the desert was meant to point to in John 6:32-35:

32 “So Jesus said to them, “Amen, amen, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave the bread from heaven; my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. 33 For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” 34 So they said to him, “Sir, give us this bread always.” 35 Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst.”

Despite their power, neither Jesus nor Moses attempted to carry out every aspect of their mission alone; both chose co-workers to assist them in caring for God’s people. In Matthew 10, Jesus appoints twelve apostles. Later in Luke 10, he chooses seventy others to assist him and the apostles. Moses also sent out twelve men to enter the Promised Land and access what awaited them there. Likewise, he appointed seventy elders to assist him in proclaiming the word of God.

While Jesus has an inner circle of three close friends, Peter, James and John – so too did Moses have a close inner circle of three men – Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu. Both Moses and Jesus were transfigured on a mountaintop. If you compare Exodus 24:1-15 with Luke 9:28-31, you see that both Jesus and Moses go up a mountain with three companions and are enveloped in the glory of God’s presence. While Jesus is divinely transfigured the three apostles witness him speaking with Moses and Elijah. Christ talks to them about his own departure – his exodos in Greek.

Just as the Israelites had to celebrate the Passover before Moses could lead them out of Egypt in the Exodus, so too does Jesus have to celebrate the Passover before his own exodus. Remember, the Last Supper takes place during Passover. But Jesus doesn’t just celebrate that Passover; he transforms it into the Eucharist. In Luke 22:7-13, Jesus tells Peter and John to, “Go and prepare the Passover for us that we may eat it.” So they do as he asks. He then institutes the Eucharist as a memorial, directing the disciples to, “do this in remembrance of me,” in Luke 22:19. As Exodus 12:14 points out, the Passover was itself a memorial. It is also important to point out that during the celebration, Christ calls the cup of his blood, “my blood of the covenant” [Matthew 26:28].

This calls to mind Moses’ words at the foot of Mt. Sini, when he sealed the covenant by throwing the blood of sacrificed animals on the people and on the alter. He called it “the blood of the covenant” [Exodus 24:8]. In other words, when Jesus institutes the Eucharist, he transforms the Passover. And when he goes to his death on the cross, he fulfills it.

In the first chapter of his gospel, John directly calls Jesus, “the Lamb of God,” drawing an obvious parallel to the sacrificial Passover lamb. Just as the lambs acceptable for the Passover had to be without blemish, Jesus is without sin. Likewise, John points out that during his crucifixion, Jesus’ legs are not broken. This fulfilled the prescription that Passover lambs were to have no broken bones. Typically, those crucified died of asphyxiation on the cross. They literally suffocated to death. Soldiers would break their legs so you couldn’t hold yourself up and you would suffocate faster. But that didn’t happen to Christ. He was already dead when they came to him.

Now at this Passover, Christ isn’t only the sacrificial offering, but also the priest who makes the offering. John tells us this by noting that at his crucifixion Jesus wears a seamless linen garment – the kind of robe the high priest wore at Passover [John 19:23]. John also tells us that when the soldiers raise a sponge of vinegar to Jesus’ mouth, they use a hyssop branch. Why is that important? Because that was the kind of branch used to sprinkle the blood of the Passover Lamb in the original exodus [Exodus 12:22-23].

What the transformation of the Passover in the Upper Room and the fulfilment of the Passover on Calvary show us is this: The Eucharist and Christ’s death on the cross are inseparable. They are one and the same sacrifice. What Jesus begins in the Upper Room, he concludes on the cross. As Jesus himself tells us in Luke 22:19-20, the bread offered becomes Jesus’ body, “given for you,” just as the wine offered becomes Jesus’ blood, “poured out for you.” Christ is clearly evoking the image of the Levitical priests who, at Moses’ instruction, poured out the blood of the sacrifice [Exodus 29:12, Leviticus 4:7].

Finally, just as Moses’ work was not complete with the Exodus, because he still had to lead his people to the borders of the Promised Land – neither is Jesus’ work of salvation complete with his death on the cross for our sins. In order for us to be saved, the resurrection had to take place. Paul tells us this in Romans 4:25, saying Jesus, “was put to death for our trespasses and raised for our justification.” It is important to understand that the resurrection was more than just Christ being resuscitated from the dead. In his resurrection, Jesus’ humanity was transformed and glorified. By uniting ourselves to him, we are able to share in his glorified humanity. As we proclaim in the mystery of faith at Mass; “Save us, Savior of the world, for by your cross and resurrection you have set us free.”

God’s love for us is so overwhelming. Even after all the rejection, all the broken covenants, all the sin, he lovely offers himself to save us. It is nothing short of astounding. In our final lesson, we will complete our study of how Jesus comes to restore and transform the kingdom of David.