Author VAUGHAN ROBERTS
Publisher IVP
ISBN 978-0-8308-5364-9
Subtitled “Tracing the storyline of the Bible” this book does exactly that and does it brilliantly. One hundred and sixty pages that could almost be read straight through at one sitting; it reads like an exciting novel. Vaughan Roberts has given us a book hat is ideal for small Bible study groups in that it has notes and questions at the end of each chapter, and these help tease out and enforce the main points underlying God’s big picture. First he shows that the Bible is one book and its central theme is the kingdom of God defined as “God’s people in God’s place under God’s rule and blessing.” So, beginning at Genesis the reader is led through to Revelation under the following headings; the pattern of the Kingdom, the perished Kingdom, the promised Kingdom, the partial Kingdom, the prophesied Kingdom, the present Kingdom, the proclaimed Kingdom and finally, the perfected Kingdom. All this is neat alliteration, it is true, but never the less it provides us with a tremendous way of grasping what God is all about in His purposes. Throughout the book we are constantly reminded of the fact that the Kingdom is God’s people in God’s place under God’s rule and blessing. Obviously this brings into view His place beginning in the garden and culminating in the New heavens and New earth with the New Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God in the book of the Revelation. His people are revealed to begin with Adam and his wife through the Old Testament people of Israel and from them coming the True Israel, even Jesus Who accomplished in Himself all that was necessary for the outpouring of God’s Spirit and the creation of the people of God from out of every nation under heaven, the church and so to the climax of the ages when Jesus returns again. All shall then be fully under God’s rule and blessing and every enemy overcome. Anyone reading this book will begin to see just how the different parts of the Bible fit together and that all points to its supreme subject, which is Jesus Christ and the salvation, that comes through Him. Vaughan Robert’s little volume closes with an epilogue in which he encourages the reader to always bear in mind that within the horizontal dimension of God’s unfolding history and purpose in His creation there must always be the vertical dimension of relationship with God Himself lest the intellectual grasp comes to the fore at the expense of a deepening spiritual life with God and His people. Therefore we are told that we must experience three things, knowing Christ in all the scriptures, teaching Christ in all the scriptures and loving Christ in all the scriptures. All in all this book is well worth obtaining and using diligently, it delivers us from the fragmentary and puts the jigsaw of pieces together admirably so that we indeed see, “God’s Big Picture.”
