From Shadow to Substance: Living in God's New Covenant
The contrast between old and new runs throughout Scripture like a golden thread, weaving together God's redemptive plan for humanity. Nowhere is this more powerfully illustrated than in the comparison between the old covenant established through Moses and the new covenant inaugurated through Jesus Christ. The Old Covenant: A Shadow of Things to Come Under the old covenant, the Israelites lived with a complex system of laws, rituals, and sacrifices. Every year on the Day of Atonement, the high priest would enter the Most Holy Place with the blood of animals to make atonement for the sins of the people. This annual ritual served as a constant reminder that sin required a price—and that price was blood. The tabernacle itself was filled with symbolic objects: the lampstand, the table with the bread of the presence, the golden altar of incense, and the ark of the covenant containing the golden urn of manna, Aaron's staff that budded, and the tablets bearing the Ten Commandments. Eac...