There is a prophetic depth to The Word, which we have not seen. One of the reasons for our blindness is we think in terms of an old and new testament, instead of a Prophetic Word and an Apostolic Word. Ephesians 2:20 reveals that God's Way is to build upon the foundation of the prophetic and the apostolic.
As we have thought of the Old Testament, we have thought in terms of something that is past and replaced by the new. We therefore have placed ourselves in a new category, and have in fact and in effect exempted ourselves from the Word of God in the Old Testament, even though we say to ourselves "the Word of the Lord abides forever".
This perspective has kept us from seeing that the ways of the people of God, revealed through the Prophetic Record in the experiences of Israel, are in fact prophetic of our own ways. To see in this way makes sense out of the warnings in 1 Corinthians 10, especially in light of the fact that the apostolic age ends with eternal judgment. Since the Eternal Provision of God has entered time in the Person of Jesus, our decisions in time regarding Jesus and His provision in The Gospel set our course for eternity.
Not only does the prophetic-apostolic perspective on revelation make sense of eternal judgment, it also explains why we are where we are. We are where we are so God will get the glory. God has in fact shut us up in disobedience, in order to shut us up, and make us quit boasting against His natural branches.
So many of us who grew up in conservative Churches have marveled at the disobedience of Israel. What God is in the process of showing us is that though we have been given more, we have been even more unfaithful. Israel had been given a Law that was holy, righteous, and good. Yet they turned it in such a way that those who were most committed to it and searched it most deeply were the very ones who resisted most strongly The One who it revealed.
Now we the Church, who have received not just His law of love, but He Himself, have turned even those Gifts to our own selfish ends. Because we have not denied our own souls until they are destroyed, we have taken His most precious gifts - His Spirit, Himself, and ourselves His Body - for ourselves and for our own ends. Most or even all of what we have built has been built on the basis of our souls, what He commanded us to destroy.
We have destroyed everything by doing this. And everything we have built in this way must therefore be destroyed.
The Scriptures are apostolic and prophetic [Ephesians 2:20]. The prophetic precedes the apostolic in time, but the apostolic has the preeminence in regard to being.
All the law and the prophets proclaimed the promises of God. This continued until John the Baptist [Matthew 11:13]. Not even the smallest part of all these words will ever pass away. Absolutely everything contained in the Prophetic Word, what we have called the Old Testament, will be fulfilled. Very much of it already has been fulfilled.
With the coming of Jesus, The Apostle, everything promised is provided. What was the promise in the Prophetic Word - "in the mount of the Lord in will be provided" - has now become provided in the Apostolic Word. Now the Word is "in the mount of the Lord it has been provided". This means, in the offering of Jesus the Lamb of God on the cross, and in His following resurrection and ascension, everything is provided. All has already been done. It is finished. We have it all. We have everything we need for life and godliness. We have always had everything we ever needed to live a godly life.
If we can begin to grasp this revelation, we can see how so many of our prayers have been out of step with God's ways in our age. We have prayed that God would come, that He would "rend the heavens". He has already come. He has rent not only the heavens but the veil, not only the veil, but His Own Flesh, for the Word was God and became flesh!
In doing this great work of salvation and provision, not only has He come down, but He has taken us back up with Him, qualified us to share in His Holiness and sit with Him to rule in The Name. Jesus has in fact given to us through The Gospel the glorious unity He had with The Father.
We're in! We're On! We're One! We have it all! We have the apostolic provision of the prophetic promise, and the potential to be both prophetic and apostolic. We are called to be both. We are called to do the works Jesus did and live just like He lived. And it is provided to us. This is the glory from which we have fallen short. And the Lord says, "Let judgment begin with the household of faith!
So we see, that the existence of the superstructure, which hinders us so severely, is itself a segment in God's wisdom and mercy, a segment to show us from where we have fallen. It is a sign of our selfish and soulish sin, a sign of how seriously we have subverted the Ways of God, yet a sign that is itself a part of those ways. A sign God is waving in our face. A sign with which God is hitting us over the head, that we would repent, cry for mercy, and reveal His Ways.