superiority of what Jesus did over the old Mosaic plan. Read backward,
these provisions are seen to be vivid illustrations of what Jesus did do,
not in form, not actually, but in fact, in spirit, in a way vastly ahead
of the Hebrew ritual. The truth underneath the old was fully fulfilled in
Jesus, though the form was not.

One needs always to keep sharply in mind the difference between God's
_plan_ and that which He clearly saw ahead, and into which He determined
to fit in carrying out His purpose. There is no clearer, stronger
statement of this than that found in Peter's Pentecost sermon: "Him being
delivered up by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye by
the hands of men without law did crucify and slay." God knew ahead what
would come. There was a conference held. The whole matter talked over.
With full knowledge of the situation, the obstinate hatred of men, the
terrific suffering involved, it was calmly, resolutely advised and decided
upon that when the time came Jesus should yield Himself up pliantly into
their hands. That is Peter's statement.

This in no way affects the fact that Jesus dying as He did is the one
means of salvation. It does not at all disturb any of Paul's statements,
in their plainest, first-flush meaning. It does explain the kingdom plan,
and the necessity for Jesus finishing up the kingdom plan some day. For
though God's plan may be broken, and retarded, it always is carried
through in the end. It explains too that evil is never necessary to good.
Hatred, evil never helps God's plans. The good that God brought out of the
cross is not through the bad, but in spite of the bad.

The preaching of the Acts is absorbed with the astounding, overshadowing,
appalling fact of the killing of the nation's King. But through it all
runs this strain of reasoning: the kingdom plan has been broken by the