“The New Testament is hidden in the Old, and the Old is made manifest in the New”.
(Second Vatican Council, Dei Verbum, 16).
God’s purpose for his Creation is expressed in one of the most repeated phrases in the Old Testament:
“I will be their God, and they will be my people.”
You’ll find that phrase at least 30 times in the Old Testament, and six more in the New Testament. It forms the second part of what is called the New Covenant, found in Jeremiah 31 and Ezekiel 36.
“This is the covenant I will make with the people of Israel after that time,” declares the LORD. “I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people”.
Jeremiah 31:33
I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. Then you will live in the land I gave your ancestors; you will be my people, and I will be your God.
Ezekiel 36: 26-28
God can’t be our God in all the ways he wants in the fallen world as it currently exists. So he is actively involved in the process that will redeem Creation from sin and death, and we’ve been given a role in that process. Os Guinness explains in Carpe Diem Redeemed:
“Things have gone wrong, badly wrong, and things are still going wrong. The world needs to be put right, and those who know and love God become his covenanted partners in repairing and restoring the world to the state it was designed to be and one day will be again.”
Carpe Diem Redeemed, by Os Guinness
At the end of Revelation, the story of the Bible reaches its consummation. God has finished building his permanent home, and the promise of the new covenant has been fulfilled.
And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God“.
Revelation 21:3 NIV