The Gospel According to the Minor Prophets

This past Sunday, we came to the end of my class on the Minor Prophets. To try to summarize what we covered in the previous twelve weeks, I focused on two key concepts and four key themes.

Two Key Concepts

1. The Covenantal Context. After discussing things like author, date and historical context we quickly moved to what we called the covenantal context. We did this because the respective covenants were the governing structure of how God interacts with his people throughout the Old Testament. So in looking at each Minor Prophet, we paid careful attention to how they drew upon the Abrahamic (Genesis 12:1-3), Mosaic (Exodus 19), and Davidic (2 Samuel 7) covenants.
2. Initial & Final Fulfillment. Although we tend to think of the relationship between promise and fulfillment as a simple one-to-one correspondence, we have seen that in the Minor Prophets that is often not the case. The various promises made in the Minor Prophets often have an initial fulfillment in an event in the near future of the prophet while at the same time having a final fulfillment in the distant future. Nowhere was this clearer than in our discussion of the Day of the LORD. Each of the various “Days of the LORD” are only an initial fulfillment of the final Day of the LORD at the end of human history.

Four Key Themes

Although there were a number of themes that we could have highlighted, the following four were particularly important in light of their prominence in the New Testament:

1. Temple. As we have seen, the rebuilt temple was puny compared to Solomon’s original temple and the temple prophesied in Ezekiel 40. But God reassured his people that this rebuilt temple was a sort of “down payment" on fulfilling his promises (Zechariah 4:8-11). In perhaps the last OT book written, God warns his people of his impending visit to his temple (Malachi 3:1-4). That promise finds its fulfillment in the NT. John the Baptist is identified as the messenger sent to prepare the way of the LORD (Mark 1:2-4). He prepares the people for the incarnate Christ to visit his temple (Mark 11:15-18). Of course, we have also talked in here about the fact that the NT identifies Jesus as the true temple of God (John 2:13-22), and we as the church are God’s eschatological temple (Ephesians 2:11-22; 1 Peter 2:4-10).
2. Torah. Although the promise of the Law being written on his people’s hearts is found in Jeremiah and Ezekiel, we do see a related promise in Micah 4:1-8. The Law of the LORD will go out from Zion and rule over a restored people of God. To properly understand this promise we have to combine it with the promise of the gift of the Spirit in Joel 2:28-32. The giving of the Spirit enables God’s people to obey God’s Law. The promise of the gift of the Spirit is fulfilled on the Day of Pentecost in Acts 2. He enables God’s people to live in step with God’s Law.
3. Turf. As we noted above, God promises to restore his people to the land in several places (Hosea 2:21-23). This promise is rooted in the Abrahamic and Mosaic Covenants. Building upon hints in the Minor Prophets this promise of restoration to the land is expanded into the hope of a new creation. In the NT this hope is most clearly articulated in Romans 4:13, where Paul claims that God promised that Abraham would inherit the world, and Revelation 21, where the new heavens and earth are described.
4. Throne. In the aftermath of the devastation of exile, God kept alive the hope of a Davidic king. But when that royal dynasty never materialized after their return to the land, the hunger for a Son of David (Micah 5:2-5; Amos 9:11-15). Of course, in the NT it is obvious that Jesus is the promised Son of David who will rule over God’s people (Mark 10:46-52; Romans 1:2-4).

Summary List of the Theological Big Idea for Each Minor Prophet

As a final review tool, I have provided a summary chart on your handout for each Minor Prophet and the Theological Big Idea I identified.

Want to hear more? Check out the links below:

Week 13 – Conclusion (Audio)

Week 13 – Conclusion (Handout)