Sufficient and Efficacious Old Covenant Types
The covenant of grace was administered in the time of the law “by promises, prophecies, sacrifices, circumcision, the paschal lamb, and other types and ordinances.” The phrase, “other types and ordinances” shows that typology functions as a general rubric to summarize the symbols and ordinances of the old covenant. The standards remind us that those types were “sufficient and efficacious” for the time of the law and by them believing Israelites enjoyed the “full remission of sins, and eternal salvation” (WCF 7.5). Yet this is true only because they were more than symbols for that covenant administration. They also functioned as types of the fullness to be unveiled with Christ’s coming. Their ultimate efficacy is dependent upon their functioning as types. The tabernacle, ritual sacrifices, priesthood, mercy seat, annual feasts and the Sabbath were the means by which God communicated the spiritual realities, which they pre-figured. But the level to which that substance could be received was not the same. This is the nature of the case with types. The type comes “on a lower stage of development in redemption,” and its anti-type comes later “on a higher stage.”[39] Continuity relates them, degree distinguishes them.