Aftershadowers

I have been thinking and reading a lot about the church in the past few years, and I have been praying that our local church would be a shining example for our community and world. I have also been thinking about relationships lately, including and especially the marriage relationship. Today, I was reminded of a prophecy that helps me see another link between these categories.

In the Old Testament, Psalm 34:20 says, "He keeps all his bones; not one of them is broken." According to the subtitle in the ESV, this psalm is "of David, when he changed his behavior before Abimelech, so that he drove him out, and he went away." In writing this psalm, David is probably rejoicing that God protected even David's bones in this confrontation with his enemy, but he is also extrapolating from his circumstances to the circumstances of the righteous, making many proverbial statements leading up to this declaration of protection as he reminds the reader that "the Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit," delivering the righteous out of all their afflictions.

If I read this Psalm on its own merits, I am encouraged to "taste and see that the Lord is good" (Psalm 34:8), but I miss another level of meaning revealed by Jesus in John 19:36, where he quotes Psalm 34:20. John is describing the crucifixion of Jesus, when, at the request of the Jews, the Roman soldiers broke the legs of each of the thieves who were crucified with Jesus so that they would die in time to be removed before the Sabbath. When the soldiers approached Jesus, he was already dead, so they did not break his legs. John claims that Psalm 34:20 prophesies this event, but, without John's insight, I would certainly have missed that connection. In fact, in retrospect, my initial instinct is that John was grasping for meaning beyond the original intent of David in writing that psalm. After all, David does not explicitly identify his statement as a prophecy, and the context feels more like an exhortation to God's people to enjoy the benefits of their salvation from God as they live righteous lives.

In making this assessment, I am too near-sighted and too self-focused. I am reading the text to look for a personal application. I have forgotten that Jesus came "that the scripture would be fulfilled." All of the Old Testament is preparation for Jesus, looking ahead to Jesus, the Messiah who would save his people. In particular, Jesus was declared to be the son of David (Matt. 22:41-46) while also being David's Lord. Thus, David was a particularly important "type" of Jesus, his life and words foreshadowing Jesus. David's entire life was intended by God to foreshadow the coming Messiah, including the seemingly small detail that David's bones were not broken in his escape from Abimelech.

Now, I want to connect these concepts to the concept of marriage. In Ephesians 5:23, Paul writes that "the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior." Paul has provided us with an analogy, stating that the husband is the Christ-figure in the marriage relationship. Thus, just as David was used as a type, an example, a foreshadower, of Christ, so husbands are called to be examples or "aftershadowers" of Christ. David's example was not one of sinless perfection, but God used his life and circumstances to prepare his people for the coming Messiah and to explain the Messiah to those of us who live in the present age. In the same way, then, husbands are called to be "aftershadowers" of Christ, reverse prophecies that point back in time to Christ while also pointing to Christ in eternity, loving our wives as Christ loved the church so that the world will see our living examples and thereby "taste and see that the Lord is good."