Passages of the Old Testament cited and referred to as they are in all parts of the New, link the whole of God's Word together and give it a character of unity and completeness. The contents themselves of the book do the same. They give unity and completeness to it, for they are a series of events which stretch from the beginning to the end, from the creation to the millennial kingdom. Prophecies in the Old Testament of events in the New appear as quotations in the New of passages in the Old. In the mouth of several witnesses of the highest dignity, then, we have the oneness and the consistency of the divine book from first to last fully set forth and established. Thus the divine original of the Book, as well as its unity and consistency, is established. We hold to these truths in the face of all the insult which is put upon them by unreasonable and wicked men. Oppositions of criticism only spend themselves in vain like angry waves upon the seashore. God Himself has set the bounds, and these things only return upon themselves, "foaming out their own shame." Jude 1313Raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever. (Jude 13).
Quotations are found abundantly throughout every part of the New Testament, and they are taken from every part of the Old from Genesis to Malachi. So we have, in the structure of the divine volume, nothing less than the closest, fullest, and most intricate interweaving of all parts of it together, the end recalling the beginning, and the beginning anticipating the end. In a certain sense, we are in all parts of the volume when we are in any part of it, though the variety of communications in disclosing the dispensations of God is infinite. Surely it is marvelous! But the Spirit of Him who knows the end from the beginning accounts for it; nothing less can. "The Book, " as has been said, "is a greater miracle than any which it records."
Citations out of His own writings from the Old Testament by God Himself, first in the Person of the Son in the gospels, and then in the Person of the Holy Ghost in the Acts and epistles, are beautiful. God sent forth these writings from Himself at the beginning-being the source of them. So after they have come forth and have been embodied in human forms and accepted of men, He Himself comes to accredit them. He has inspired them and sealed them. We receive them thus introduced to us by Himself, and we ask no more.
We may say of the Scriptures from the beginning to end, that one part of them cannot be touched without all being affected. To use inspired language: "Whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with it" (1 Cor. 12:2626And whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with it; or one member be honored, all the members rejoice with it. (1 Corinthians 12:26)), God has so tempered all of it together. And I may go further in the same analogy, and say, The uncomely parts have been given more abundant honor-as for instance, in the book of Proverbs, we get as rich and blessed a witness of the Church of God in His mysterious glories as we find anywhere.