GREENVILLE PRESBYTERIAN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY THE BACKGROUND AND ENVIRONMENT OF THE NEW TESTAMENT BY THOMAS BOOHER In Galatians 4:4-5 Paul tells us that God sent Christ His Son to redeem and adopt His people “when the fullness of time had come”. It was no accident that our Lord and Savior came when He did. It was part of God’s perfect plan for Christ to come in the 1 st century; He was orchestrating all of history prior to that time to make way for the incarnation of the God-Man. Because of this, it is necessary that serious students of God’s Word know the setting in which Christ came. The historical setting did not produce the thought and teaching of the New Testament, but it did serve as the molding in which the gospel entered into history. The centuries leading up to the coming of Christ provide us with reasons for the patterns of thought and life in the New Testament. [1] While
Thoughts on the Reformed faith, preparation for ministry, and doing all to the glory of God.