1
“Live such good lives among the nations…”
The missional impact of Old Testament ethics in the New Testament.
Christopher J. H. Wright
International Ministries Director, Langham Partnership
Biblical scholars are familiar with debates over the place of Old Testament law in Christian theology and practice – debates that are as old as the New Testament itself. All would agree that Jesus himself and his first interpreters, being Jews shaped by their own Scriptures, inevitably used those Scriptures extensively and in depth as they hammered out what kind of life was mandated or prohibited,permitted or simply inappropriate, for followers of Jesus of Nazareth as Messiah, Saviour and Lord. The positions taken in such debates have been strongly influenced by various hermeneutical preferences, often linked to strong systematic theological traditions. The old question, for example, as to whether Old Testament commands are still binding on Christians unless abrogated in the New, or whether they are all abolished unless affirmed in the New, still rumbles on in various forms.
This paper, however, approaches the matter from just one angle (without any suggestion that it solves all the issues raised in other approaches). What light might be shed on the matter by a missional hermeneutic? If we seek a missional reading of the texts (in both Testaments), how does it affect our understanding and appreciation of their ethical dimensions?
In the first major section, I will comment on how one particular form of missional reading of the Bible makes strong connections between ethics and mission across both Testaments. Then in two much shorter sections, I will observe how the Old Testament lays the foundation for the missional impact of Christian ethics that we see in the New Testament, and how the Old Testament also provides a substantial portion of the ethical content of our mission.
GOD’S PEOPLE IN GOD’S STORY
What is a missional hermeneutic? Those who have been endeavouring over the past couple of decades to develop one have produced various answers – with a lot in common, of course. George Hunsberger surveyed the field some years ago and produced a highly-acknowledged fourfold scheme of the major ways in which the term is being used.[1] For our purposes in this paper, for the sake of simplicity and limited time, we will consider only his first (which also happens to be the one which I have adopted and explored more than the others).[2]
A missional hermeneutic seeks to interpret biblical texts (short or long) within the overarching narrative of the biblical canon as a whole. That whole Bible story is affirmed as the product of, and witness to, the great mission of God for the renewal of his whole creation, to be populated by a redeemed people from every nation. That mission of God (his ultimate goal and purpose) is announced in the Old Testament, in the form of the promise made to Abraham (though first hinted to Adam and Eve), is accomplished by the central mighty act of God in Jesus Christ, through his incarnation, death, resurrection and ascension, and will be completed through the ongoing mission of the church in the power of the Spirit until Christ returns to usher in the new creation.[3]
God is the principal actor and director of this whole Bible narrative, from creation to new creation. But within the drama, God has a partner whom God has called to participate with him in this great project – ‘co-workers with God’, as Paul said. That covenant partner is the people of God, Old Testament Israel and New Testament believers in Christ, both Jews and
Gentiles.
So, going right back to Abraham, God called into existence a people to participate in God’s own mission for the sake of all nations. ‘Mission’ did not begin on the Mount of Ascension. It began when God announced his intention to Abraham, made him a compound promise, and called him to believe and obey. The mission of God’s people, then, is that they should fulfil the purpose of their existence, to be the vehicle of God extending his blessing to all nations. Mission is God’s people participating in God’s story, for God’s purpose and for God’s glory. Missional hermeneutics means reading the Bible from that perspective.
If that is a quick sketch of what is meant by missional hermeneutics, then missional ethics fall into place. The term reflects the simple conviction that how God’s people behave in their personal and social lives should be governed by the purpose of their existence as revealed in the Bible. And that purpose is to respond to God’s saving grace by glorifying God for eternity, and by serving the mission of God within history. In that sense, biblical ethics (in both Testaments) is intrinsically missional, for all our life is shaped by being called by God to belong to his people and to fulfil the mission for which that people were created.
The story of Old Testament Israel has some key moments which are picked up in the New Testament as applying also to all those in Christ. And in relation to those moments, there are texts that connect the ethical demand on God’s people to their role in God’s mission. Three such moments in particular shaped Israel’s narrative, and strongly impacted the way New Testament writers conceptualized the nature of the salvation accomplished by Christ,[4] election, redemption, and covenantal sanctification. We shall look at each in its Old Testament context first, and then observe how all three have ethical and missional impact in the New as well.
Election
God's election of Abraham was explicitly for the ultimate purpose of blessing the nations (Gen. 12:1-3). This fundamentally missional intention of the election of Israel echoes through the OT at almost every level. There was a universal goal to the very existence of Israel. What God did in, for, and through Israel was understood to be ultimately for the benefit of the nations. But that impacted their ethics strongly. What God ethically required of Israel served the same universal mission.The quality of Israel as a whole society was an integral part of God’s missional purpose for the rest of the world.
Genesis 18:19 makes this connection very explicitly. Having repeated the divine agenda in v. 18, "all nations on earth will be blessed through him," God goes on,
For I have chosen him, so that he will direct his children and his household after him to keep the way of the LORD by doing what is right and just [Heb. "doing righteousness and justice"], so that the LORD will bring about for Abraham what he has promised him [italics added].
God wanted Abraham to be the starting point of a community that would be different from the world of Sodom (in which this chapter is set). ‘The way of the LORD’, and ‘righteousness and justice’ are among the most prominent concepts in the law (and in the whole Old Testament). And here they are the middle term between election and mission.
Syntactically and theologically, then, Genesis 18:19 binds together election, ethics, and mission, with ethics as the middle term, and with two expressions of purpose (‘so that’). There is a driving sense of intentionality flowing from God’s choice through to the keeping of God’s promise, via the ethical quality of life of God’s people. The text has a programmatic nature, all the more powerful by being in the form of direct divine speech. The very election of Israel, in all its particularity, not only has a universal missional goal but also leads to a clear and distinctive ethical agenda for God's people in the world as part of the condition of that goal being accomplished.
Redemption
The exodus was the great act of divine redemption, celebrated in those terms from the beginning. God redeemed his people out of slavery, injustice and state-sponsored genocide in Egypt, and brought them to himself at Mount Sinai. That brings us to another pivotal text:
Exodus 19:3-6
3Then Moses went up to God,and theLordcalledto him from the mountain and said, “This is what you are to say to the descendants of Jacob and what you are to tell the people of Israel:4‘You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt,and how I carried you on eagles’ wingsand brought you to myself.5Now if you obey me fullyand keep my covenant,then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession.Although the whole earthis mine,6youwill be for me a kingdom of priestsand a holy nation.’These are the words you are to speak to the Israelites.”
God first points to his own initiative of saving grace (v. 4). The priority of God’s grace, and its motivating power for ethics, is seen in many places in Old Testament law (e.g. Ex. 23:9, Lev. 19:33-36; Deut. 15:12-15). People whom God has redeemed from slavery and death must behave towards one another in ways that are consistent with the story they are in - the story of God’s salvation. They must reflect the character and actions of God in their own behaviour.
But the text moves on from that backward-looking motivation (what God had done already), to the forward-looking motivation – what God planned for them to be in the midst of the world of nations. This is a missional perspective that we see in verses 5 and 6. God’s plan is that the people he has redeemed should be a priestly and holy people. In the context of ‘the whole earth’ and ‘all nations’ (Ex. 19:5; very Abrahamic echoes), Israel as a nation was to be God’s priesthood. Priests in Israel stood between God and the people, operating in both directions. They were to teach God’s law to the people (Lev. 10:11, Dt. 33:10), and bring the people’s sacrifices to God. That is, through the priests God would be known to the people and through the priests the people would be brought to God. In both ways, they would also bless the people in God’s name. So, says God to Israel as a whole community: you will be for me to the nations of the world what your priests are for you. Through you I will teach the nations my law (ways, character), and through you I will ultimately draw the nations to myself in redemption and covenant. You will be the priestly agent of blessing the nations.
If priesthood among the nations is missional, then holiness is certainly ethical. Both were necessary to fulfil God’s purpose in having chosen and redeemed them. In the immediate context of Exodus, that required obedience to God’s law, which would shortly follow. However, it is vital to see that such obedience was a response to grace. It was not a condition of salvation (God had already saved them). But obedience is certainly a condition of mission. Only if they ‘obey me fully and keep my covenant’ could they be for God what he wanted them to be in the world.
Covenant Sanctification
‘A holy nation’, said God in Exodus 19:6. What that meant is spelled out much more fully in Leviticus. Holiness is essentially a fact and a task. The factwas that God had set apart the Israelites for himself (Lev. 20:26) - they were in that sense sanctified. The taskwas that they were to live as a contrast society – with clear distinctiveness from the surrounding cultures.
3You must not do as they do in Egypt, where you used to live, and you must not do as they do in the land of Canaan, where I am bringing you. Do not follow their practices.4You must obey my lawsand be careful to follow my decrees.I am theLordyour God (Lev. 18:1-5).
Be holy because I, theLordyour God, am holy (Lev. 19:2).
Both dimensions (fact and task) are included in this single verse:
Consecrate yourselvesand be holy,because I am theLordyour God.8Keep my decreesand follow them. I am theLord, who makes you holy (Lev. 20:7).
The distinctiveness of Israel from the nations is a theme in Deuteronomy. It may not sound particularly ‘missional’, but it is clear that Israel was to be visible, and that the quality of their worship and social life should arouse curiosity among the nations.
Deuteronomy 4:6-8
6Observethem [God’s laws] carefully, for this will show your wisdomand understanding to the nations, who will hear about all these decrees and say, “Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.”7What other nation is so greatas to have their gods nearthem the way theLordour God is near us whenever we pray to him?8And what other nation is so great as to have such righteous decrees and lawsas this body of laws I am setting before you today?
The covenantal nature of this ‘national sanctification’ is expressed in Deuteronomy 26, where the mutual covenant commitment of YHWH and Israel is linked to a quotation from the key text, Exodus 19:6.
17You have declared this day that theLordis your God and that you will walk in obedience to him, that you will keep his decrees, commands and laws—that you will listen to him.18And theLordhas declared this day that you are his people, his treasured possessionas he promised, and that you are to keep all his commands.19He has declared that he will set you in praise,fame and honor[5] high above all the nationshe has made and that you will be a people holyto theLordyour God, as he promised (Deut. 26:17-19).
The New Testament impact
The narrative of Old Testament Israel was the framework within which Christ and the apostles understood the gospel, the saving work of God not just for Israel but also for the world. This can be seen at what might be described as a ‘sub-conscious’ level. That is to say, there are times when Paul lists the blessings of salvation that his readers have experienced, and they emerge in an order that reflects the Old Testament story. He encourages the Thessalonian believers, for example, in this way.
13But we ought always to thank God for you,brothers and sisters loved by the Lord, because God chose you as firstfruitsto be savedthrough the sanctifying work of the Spiritand through belief in the truth.14He called youto this through our gospel,that you might share in the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ (2 Thess. 2:13:14).
Notice the sequence: loved, chosen, saved, sanctified – glory: the story of Israel from Abraham, through exodus, Sinai and tabernacle/temple. Significantly, the reminder of their election, redemption and sanctification immediately leads on to ethical exhortation, to ‘stand firm’, and to be strengthened in ‘every good deed and word’ (vs. 15-16).
The work of salvation is, of course, the work of the one, single, living God - YHWH God of Israel in the Old Testament. The New Testament, however, without using the word invented later, involves the whole Trinity in the great divine purpose and accomplishment.
Several New Testament texts give particular emphasis to electing by the Father, redeeming by the Son and sanctifying by the Holy Spirit. Two texts in particular connect all three together:
- Eph. 1:3-14, where we are chosen by the Father, to be adopted as sons through Christ, and are sealed with the Holy Spirit
- 1 Pet. 1:1-2, where we are chosen by the Father, sanctified by the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and sprinkling by his blood.
So, the same sequence (election, redemption, sanctification) is clearly at work – echoing the Old Testament story in the New Testament’s theology of salvation.
What is also very clear is that, just as those great moments of the Old Testament story flowed from God’s missional intention and generated ethical imperatives for God’s people, so these great facts of our salvation have strong ethical and missional implications for Christian believers.
In Ephesians, Paul links our election, both to itsethical purpose that we are to be holy and blameless and live to the praise of God’s glory, and also to God’s great mission to bring the whole cosmos into unity under Christ (Eph. 1:4, 10, 12). So the ethical and missional implications of Paul’s gospel flow through the whole letter. God’s plan is ultimately cosmic unification under Christ (ch. 1). That is foreshadowed in ethnic reconciliation between Jew and Gentile in one new humanity, which in itself is a proclamation (to the nations and to the ‘powers’), of the wisdom and glory of God being manifested ‘through the church’ (ch. 2-3). That in turn requires the ecclesial unity that Paul pleads for (ch. 4), and the ethical integrity that should characterize those who are living out the ‘new humanity’ (chs. 4-6). So Ephesians is not just a treatise with a doctrinal half followed by an ethical half. Gospel reality and ethical implications are woven together throughout, as Paul expounds what it means to live as God’s new people in the post-Messiah part of God’s great story. The ethical life of God’s people as a new humanity in Christ is itself part of the gospel and a vital part of God’s mission and ours in the world.
1 Peter builds the same strong edifice of missional ethics on the foundation of God’s work of election, redemption and sanctification, with repeated Old Testament support.[6] Chapter 1 inter-weaves all three with the ethical responsibility of Christians to live consistently with the story they have now become part of (see especially 1 Pet. 1:2, 13-16, 17-19, 22).