MANIFESTATIONS AND SHADOWS

KEY VERSES:

For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect. (Heb 10:1)

Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days: Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ. (Col 2:16-17).

  Paul understood “the mystery of God” (Col 1 :26-28). The prophets and patriarchs of old did as well! The Law of the Torah (Old Testament) was a “shadow of good things to come.” In the first key verse, the sacrifices to serve God and preserve the Jews year by year were a shadow of Jesus’s sacrifice once and for all, as is written: “By the which will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.” (Heb 10:10).

  I use the words “serve” and “preserve” because they are also an accurate transliteration of Genesis 2:15 (to dress and keep the Garden.) The common thread of the entire Bible is to serve God and preserve fellow living souls so they not perish. I believe that is the intent of “dressing and keeping the Garden.” I see the Garden of Eden as a Garden of Living Souls which are to come of course. Dressing and keeping the Garden, then, is a shadow of Heaven, and of course we know from the Lord’s Prayer: “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven” (Mat 6:10).

What is done in the Garden does not stay in the Garden; it is done in Heaven and in Earth as in Heaven. The Garden, if not Heaven, is a foreshadowing of Heaven, and on Earth, Christians are to shadow life in the Garden as it will be in Heaven. The prophets understood The Law. How can there be grace without The Law? How can mankind be redeemed without crimes from which to be redeemed? How can one know they are not good without metrics to reveal their evil? The Law, then is a shadow of grace! The patriarchs knew they needed redemption and firmly believed in a Redeemer! Do you have that much faith?

  The second set of key verses are Mosaic Laws with the exception of sabbath days. No mention is made of The Ten Commandments, excepting the sabbath. As I have written before, “commandments” are one transliteration from the Hebrew. Just as applicable, if not more so, are “The Ten Words” or “The Ten Prescriptions.” Prescriptions for what? Healing of the nations (Rev 22:2). Jesus – the body of God – is the Healer of the Nations.

  The Law is the Shadow and Christ is the Body of God. When Moses looked at God it was the shadow of God which he saw, but at the Mount of Transfiguration, Moses saw the shadow and body of Christ together! Moses knew the mystery… viewing the transfiguration showed him the mystery!

Jesus fulfilled The Law as he said, “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil” (Mat 5:17). The Law is the shadow of grace, and Jesus the Worker of grace.

  The entire Old Testament is a foreshadowing of Jesus, grace, and inclusion. The mystery of God of which Paul revealed was that salvation was always by faith in Jesus, by grace, and for all. Nothing has changed. When we see Christ, we must also see his shadow. Christ is not complete without his shadow because the shadow of Christ is what saved the patriarchs of the Old Testament.

  Now for The Law: Moses wrote Laws inspired by God to preserve the Hebrew people to be antecedents of Jesus. God wrote with His own finger the Ten Prescriptions as ways to serve God and preserve man. They were written on stone for perpetuity, and Moses demonstrated what would happen when the prescriptions for eternal life were broken (Exod 32:19). Just as Moses interceded with God on behalf of the people for grace, he did for mercy as well. He broke the tablets of stone to demonstrate to the apostates that they dishonored God. Without the breaking of the stone tablets, how would the Hebrews understand the Will of God or the significance and importance of The Words of God?

  The Ten Prescriptions are meant to be kept then and now. Not all the Mosaic Law but what God wrote with His own finger. They are ways to serve (love of Him) God and preserve mankind (love of people).  They are the Greatest Commandment and the Second.

The Ten Prescriptions are the items of all the covenants of the Old Testament (OT) – Adamic, Noahic, Abrahamic, and Mosaic – as well as the Covenant of Grace. That is verified in the following passage: “If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love” (John 15:10). Like the Hebrew word in the OT, the Greek word in the NT means “prescriptions.”

  Think on that; if the translators had used prescriptions for eternal life rather than commandments you must do, then the outlook on the entire “economy” of the Bible would be different. If they had, then the OT would have been considered The Grace rather than The Law! Paul wrote on that, and the prophets and Moses for that matter, understood that! Why is Abraham’s bosom important? Because the faith of Abraham – the epitome of great faith – saved him! When he was willing to sacrifice his own remaining son, he saw Jesus. His sacrifice was a shadow of the crucifixion! That degree of faith saved him in the end.

  Abraham did not obey God because he was coerced. He wanted to please God. The Ten Prescriptions are not to indenture Christians, but to set them free. Salvation of self is at the end of life, but salvation from the bondage of sin is immediate (Rom 6). When those called are born again, they are set free from obedience to The Law, and given the desire to willingly keep The Prescriptions to serve God and preserve their fellow men.

  The first four of The Ten Prescriptions are serving God. The last six are preserving mankind. God’s preserving of the Hebrews, specifically the Jews, was a foreshadowing of Him preserving Christians. When the Hebrew for “chosen people” was used for the Jews, it too meant “peculiar people” – the same thing as Christians are called (1 Per 2:9).

  The Old Testament foreshadows grace, Heaven, and Jesus Christ. It must, then, also foreshadow punishment, Hell, and the Antichrist. The Antichrist is the nature of the Beast after Satan enters in. From scripture, I believe that there are three embodiments of Satan or three instances of the Antichrist. They are not three different Beasts, but the bodies of beings who Satan uses for his purposes. The first appearance of the Beast or Antichrist was the Serpent, the second was Judas Iscariot who Satan also entered, and the third will be the Beast of the Book of Revelation who comes to destroy Christ and Christians.

  Note that Jesus is not a separate divine being, but is God manifested. In the Old Testament, God manifested Himself in various ways. For instance, Jesus is found in the OT as the Voice, the Word, the Angel of God, a cloud, a burning bush, a man in the fiery furnace and also wrestling with Jacob. Likewise, as a dark angel, Satan can also manifest himself in different forms. I believe there are three if not more manifestations of Lucifer in the Bible. The Serpent, for instance, is a shadow of Judas and the Antichrist. Tomorrow, perhaps other shadows of Lucifer and the Law of Sin will be revealed. Manifestations and shadows are different though. The Serpent was how Lucifer showed himself to our forebears. On the other hand, I believe that King Saul was merely a shadow or picture of Lucifer. Be sure and read why the next time.