"The young Christian movement was recognisably Jewish. It pressed all the buttons, though in a totally unexpected way: the royal leader had won the decisive battle; the Temple was destroyed and rebuilt; Daniel's long exile was over; freedom and forgiveness had arrived in the present; the covenant had been renewed, creation itself was restored, and the One God had returned in a shockingly new kind of glory."
"They were saying, in a thoroughly Jewish way, that the symbols and stories of Israel had been fulfilled in a shocking and decisive manner; that in this all too human story---hence the choice of the biological genre, however modified---not only the promises of a coming Messiah but also the promise of the returning creator and covenant God had been realised. Jesus had truly joined together God's space and human space, heaven and earth. In him God's planned future for the whole cosmos was truly anticipated in the present. In him, so the early church claimed, we see revealed the true Image of God."
I think the church needs to recapture these themes in all aspects of our lives in order to reflect God's glory in Jesus Christ to the world.
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