D. A. Carson’s scholarship has influenced us from our undergraduate days, where we encountered books like How Long, O Lord? written by a rigorous academic and yet a committed believer. His work has shown us what it looks like for faith to seek understanding in the modern era. And for one of us, Don served as a skillful (and demanding!) Doktorvater, a role he has played for dozens of evangelical scholars over the course of his career. In the field of biblical theology, Carson’s work has been a major part of the discipline’s renaissance among evangelicals in our generation. He has helped define the discipline. And he has shown how biblical theology can be useful to the church through volume after helpful volume of the New Studies in Biblical Theology series. It was a privilege for us to contribute to this series, and this article sums up some of the conclusions of our study, Biblical Theology according to the Apostles.¹Chris Bruno, Jared Compton, and Kevin McFadden, Biblical Theology according to the Apostles: How the Earliest Christians Told the Story of Israel, NSBT 52 (London: Apollos, 2020).

How did the apostles read the Bible? There are many ways to answer this question, but our study attempted to get at the answer by examining the “summaries of Israel’s story” (SIS) in the NT.²We borrow the category SIS from J. B. Hood and M. Y. Emerson, “Summaries of Israel’s Story: Reviewing a Compositional Category,” Currents in Biblical Research 11 (2013): 328–48. There are seven places in the NT where we see a substantial summary of the storyline of the OT: the opening genealogy in Matthew 1:1–17; the parable of the tenants (Matt 21:33–46//Mark 12:1–12//Luke 20:9–19); Stephen’s speech in Acts 7; Paul’s sermon at Pisidian Antioch (Acts 13:16–41); Paul’s argument in Galatians 3–4; his reflections on Israel in Romans 9–11; and the well-known “hall of faith” in Hebrews 11. These SIS give a window into how the apostles did biblical theology before it was a technical discipline. In other words, they give us a window into how the apostles read the Bible. As such, these summaries offer us insight into how we may read the Bible more faithfully.

Our book studies these seven SIS descriptively with an eye toward prescription. How does the biblical theology of the apostles offer us guidance in our reading of the Bible today? Here are some of our findings:

1. There is variation in how the NT authors tell the story. Just as the prophets tell Israel’s story both positively (Psalm 105) and negatively (Psalm 106), so the apostles tell the story with different emphases depending on their different purposes. For example, in Hebrews 11, each of the biblical characters (and there are many) are described in a positive way. This accords with the author’s purpose to encourage his audience to persevere in faith and to show that such perseverance is possible. In contrast, Romans 9–11 reminds readers that the story of the Bible has always been a story of God’s mercy to disobedient characters. This different telling accords with Paul’s purpose to uphold the faithfulness of God to his word and his people even when considering the puzzling fact that the majority of Israel has not believed in the gospel of Christ.

The variety of summaries in the NT teaches us that there is not one way to do biblical theology. The summaries have elements of unity, of course, like the centrality of Christ as the climax of the biblical story. But within this unity, we must allow for various approaches to biblical theology depending on the purposes of the author (or preacher) and the needs of the moment.

2. One point of unity in the SIS is something we call a “covenant substructure.” How did the NT authors decide which of the many people and events of the OT to highlight in their summaries? Often, the SIS highlight the major covenants between God and his people. Matthew’s genealogy, for example, presents Jesus as the fulfillment of the covenantal promises God made to Abraham and especially to David. Stephen’s speech focuses on the eras of Abraham, Moses, and David. Why? Among other reasons, he is following the major covenants God made with his people. Paul’s argument in Galatians 3–4 is about the promise of the Abrahamic covenant, its fulfillment in Christ, and its relationship to the later law covenant. And in Romans 9–11, the apostle labors to show how God has not abandoned his covenant people.

This focus on the covenants in the SIS should affirm and shape our own approaches to the OT that focus on the covenants. It should also lead us to consider the importance of “covenant” as a critical category in biblical theology. It is often observed that explicit statements about the covenants are rare in the NT. But even where the covenant is not mentioned explicitly, the SIS teach us that it should be assumed as a major part of the structure of biblical theology.

3. A major conflict in the SIS is sin. Matthew’s genealogy alludes to David’s adultery by speaking of “Uriah’s wife” (Matt 1:6).³Scripture citations are from the New International Version (2011). Further, its focus on the exile reminds readers of the idolatry of Israel and the downfall of the Davidic dynasty. Jesus’s parable of the tenants recounts Israel’s rejection of the prophets, foreshadowing the rejection and murder of God’s Son. Stephen’s speech in Acts 7 similarly highlights Israel’s rejection of the deliverers whom God had sent to them, like Moses. And Paul explains the role of the law in this conflict. The law did not bring about the blessing of Abraham but the curse of exile, the very curse from which Christ has redeemed those who believe. The law was never intended to justify sinners but rather to point sinners to the cross of Christ. God’s plan was always to grant mercy to the disobedient in Christ (Gal 3:22; Rom 11:32; cf. Acts 13:39).

Thus, we biblical interpreters are not wrong to highlight sin in our own tellings of the biblical story. Sin, the cross, and forgiveness are central elements in the Bible’s story. The exile, such an important era in OT history, is not only a story of the oppression of God’s people by foreign enemies but of the deeper conflict between God and sinners, which has been resolved in the cross of Christ. We must also be cautious about replacing the cross with the law in our tellings of the story. The law was never meant to justify but rather to lead sinners to God’s mercy in Christ.

4. Another conflict is the unfulfilled promises of the OT, and specifically the land promise. In Hebrews 11, we learn that God’s people have always been waiting for the eschatological fulfillment of the land promised to Abraham. OT believers were waiting for a heavenly homeland to come, just as we are. Paul’s argument in Galatians speaks similarly of our true mother as the “Jerusalem that is above” (Gal 4:26), a promised home we have not yet reached. And in Romans 9–11, Paul has hope that God will yet fulfill his promises of mercy to his people Israel, for “God’s gifts and his call are irrevocable” (Rom 11:29). In the promise of the land in particular we begin to see the typology of the NT authors. Things in the OT foreshadow the eschatological fulfillment to come.

This means we should not look for the ultimate fulfillment of God’s promises in this world. The OT saints were looking to the world to come, and so are we. This is not to say there is no fulfillment in the NT. Rather, it is to say that suffering comes before glory.

5. A major prophetic type in the SIS, in fact, is the suffering of Christ. In the parable of the tenants, Israel’s rejection of the prophets foreshadows the murder of God’s Son. And in Stephen’s speech, Israel’s rejection of Joseph and Moses similarly anticipates the crucifixion: “Was there ever a prophet your ancestors did not persecute? They even killed those who predicted the coming of the Righteous One. And now you have betrayed and murdered him” (Acts 7:52). Thus, the climax of the Bible’s story is not only Christ’s rule but also Christ crucified. He fulfills biblical typology not only in his person but also in his work.

Following the apostles, then, we should search the Scriptures for those things that point us to Christ and his suffering. Warranted typology should be a part of faithful biblical theology.

6. A closely related type in the SIS is the suffering of God’s people. In Stephen’s speech, the rejection of Joseph and Moses not only foreshadows the crucifixion of Jesus but also the stoning of Stephen. In Paul’s sermon at Pisidian Antioch, Hosea’s warning about unbelief anticipates the synagogue leaders’ rejection of the apostles’ message. In Galatians, Paul appeals to Ishmael’s mistreatment of Isaac as foreshadowing the Galatians’ own mistreatment at the hands of those who were misleading them. In Romans 9–11, Israel’s rejection of the apostolic message is anticipated throughout the Scriptures, as is Paul’s hope for Israel’s future: just as there was a remnant at the dark time of Elijah, “So too, at the present time there is a remnant chosen by grace” (Rom 11:6). And in Hebrews 11, believers of old persevered in the faith through difficult circumstances just like those experienced by believers today.

Thus, we should look not only for types of the crucified Christ in Scripture but also for types of the suffering people of God. After all, “everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through the endurance taught in the Scriptures and the encouragement they provide we might have hope” (Rom 15:4).

7. All this is to say that the biblical theology of the apostles is profoundly gospel centred, as Carson might put it. The story of the old covenant finds its fulfillment in the gospel of the new covenant. It finds its climax in the gospel of Jesus Christ. It is a story that continues in the church, the people of the gospel, who have found God’s mercy in Christ. It is a story that offers the hope of good news to the disobedient. And it is a story that gives encouragement to believers to finish the race and obtain the gospel promise.

There are various ways of telling the story of the Bible, but they must all be the same story of the gospel. We are grateful that this gospel story has been perhaps the primary emphasis in Carson’s variegated ministry as well as a focus of the New Studies in Biblical Theology.

We see from the SIS in the NT that the apostles read the Bible in a gospel-centered way. Their reading was built on God’s covenants that point forward to their fulfillment in the new-covenant gospel of Jesus Christ and his people. Christ has died for the sins of his people and fulfilled all God’s promises, resolving the conflicts in Israel’s story. And that story foreshadows the era of fulfillment by prefiguring the suffering and vindication of Christ and his followers.

We learn to read the Bible by reading the Bible, and then by reading it in the way that the Bible reads the Bible. What we have attempted to do in our book is to outline a kind of biblical-theological “rule” for interpretation—not one that competes with the ancient and revered rule of faith but rather one that supplements it for the modern era. And this work goes on as we continue to read and study the Bible together.⁴As an outgrowth of our NSBT volume, we are beginning a new series of books with Apollos called “Reading the Bible with the Apostles” (RBA). D. A. Carson has given us an exemplary model of biblical scholarship in service to the church. May the Lord give us all strength to follow in his footsteps.

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