the point of such ideas is that Israel’s scriptures as a whole tell of the covenant; of the exile as the result of Israel’s god punishing his people for their sins; and of the great ‘return’ that will happen when that dark period is finally over and done. What the early church is saying, when telling the story of Jesus’ resurrection and announcing it to the world as the summons to obedient faith, is that the history of, and promises to, Israel had come true in Jesus, that in his death he had taken the exile as far as it could go, and that in his resurrection he had inaugurated the real return
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