In his landmark work Jesus and the Victory of God, N.T. Wright asserts,

“What Jesus was offering, in other words, was not a different religious system. It was a new world order, the end of Israel’s long desolation, the true and final ‘forgiveness of sins’, the inauguration of the kingdom of God. This, I suggest, was what was implied when Jesus announced ‘forgiveness of sins’ to particular people. The effect was the same as his eating with ‘sinners’: he was celebrating the coming of the kingdom, and those who shared this celebration with him were benefiting from this great ‘forgiveness of sins’. There is, in fact, no tension, no play-off, between the personal and the corporate at this point.”

Jesus and the Victory of God, 272

Are there ways, however, we try to squeeze Jesus into a new religious system instead of recognizing he was and is the fulfillment of all that had come before?

Could that realization change our perception of the Hebrew Scriptures?

Have we grieved the Spirit’s desire to lead us into a joy-filled Kingdom-bearing life? If so, how could we repent? By fasting? By feasting?