Yesterday, on the Church calendar, is the day when the “Slaughter of the Innocents” is remembered. Matthew’s Gospel records this event as being continuous with OT anticipation as he connects the lamentations of the Bethlehem mothers with the lamentation or Rachel as recorded in the book of Jeremiah (31:5).
Matthew is informing us that Rachel’s weeping was a type of the weeping that was present in Bethlehem when Herod ordered the slaughter in an attempt to kill off any King that might arise to replace him.
Interesting enough, Rachel was known to have been buried in Ramah, a town not far from Bethlehem. Jeremiah’s prophecy, in its immediate context, spoke of the sorrow that would arise surrounding the Babylonian exile. Matthew, by reaching for this prophecy, informs us that the mourning and lamentation had a dual fulfillment. First, what Jeremiah speaks of was fulfilled when Israel went into captivity, but there is a deeper and greater fulfillment in the weeping surrounding the slaughter of the innocents. In doing so, Matthew, as he does throughout his Gospel, teaches us to read the Bible, as one book, with one overarching narrative. This in turn reminds us that all attempts to read the Bible in terms of discontinuity and dispensations except when explicitly informed by Scripture is a misinformed way of reading Scripture that leads to no good results.
Moving from reading the slaughter of the innocents exegetically we consider the theological significance. Theologically we find the slaughter to be consistent with the promise found in Genesis 3:15 that there would be constant conflict between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent. Herod is the seed of the serpent making war on the seed of the woman. Much like Pharaoh ordering the extermination of the seed of Israel, Herod likewise takes up the attempt to extinguish the seed of the woman. Matthew gives us Jesus through whom Israel’s story is retold, with the difference being where Israel failed as God’s Son, Jesus is God’s faithful son who does not fail.
Teasing this out, we would notice that the slaughter of the innocents puts on display the ongoing conflict that continues between the children of their father the Devil, and those who have been swept up in the train of Christ’s blessed redemption. Herods exist even now who continue to seek the death of those who champion the Redeemer King’s truth.
Reading the Bible as one book, where continuity is in effect unless explicitly fulfilled and superceded by a greater reality. This is most clearly the lesson of the Book of Hebrews. All the “ceremonial laws” (sacrifices, temple architecture, the religious calendar, the priesthood) were pedagogical until the time “when Christ the substance” was revealed. (Col 2:17, Heb 9:10) But the Moral Law, the Ten Commandments, is the transcription of God’s character, and as the created purpose of Man is to be God’s representative, created in “knowledge, righteousness, and holiness” with dominion over the creatures, the Moral Law “doth forever bind ALL, as well justified persons as others, to the obedience thereof; and that not only in regard of the matter contained in it, but also in respect of the authority of God the Creator who gave it. Neither doth Christ in the gospel any way dissolve, but much strengthen, this obligation.” (WCF 19:5) So, our ethical duty, to actively bear his image and likeness, never changes. And how could it since God never changes? This is the delight (Psalm 1) of every child of God born from above but it is seen as “chains” (Psalm 2) by every unregenerate man “who WILL not have this man [Christ] to rein over him.”
This is our Father’s world and He commands ALL, even pagan kings, to keep the entire Law, even and especially the “first table”. Thus it is particularly galling to hear those who claim to be adherents of Abraham “every square inch” Kuyper to be at the foremost of those that advocate for a “common realm” where Christ does NOT have dominion. Rather Christ is King, even of kings. “For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him.”
The time is coming, whether tomorrow or five centuries hence, that R2K will be scorned with the same contempt, yea, even with the same anathema that the early Church held out for Arians, Nestorians, Docetists and other Christ denying heretics, for to deny Christ’s reign over ALL is to deny His deity.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen, amen.
Thanks Chad.
Excellent words.