Nancy Guthrie - The One Year Book of Discovering Jesus in the Old Testament

INTRODUCTION

I grew up going to Sunday school... and vacation Bible school and church camp and training union (which was our Sunday night version of Sunday school). Along the way, I learned my share of Old Testament Bible stories. From the story of Adam and Eve I learned that I should not listen to the devils lies. From Noah I learned that I should be willing to stand alone against an evil world. From Abraham I learned that I should be willing to sacrifice what is most precious to me. From Jacob I learned that I should expect to experience the consequences of my deceit. From Joseph I learned that I should run from temptation. And it goes on from there.

Most of my life I have read and been taught the Old Testament as a series of life lessons or faith lessons. Its chief characters were held up as heroes to emulate or villains to disdain. I knew that the Old Testament spoke of Christ, but in my mind that was limited to the prophecies about the coming of the Messiah. I did not see that, in fact, all of the Old Testament is preparing us to understand who Christ is and what he came to do. I did not understand that the people in the Old Testament were not true heroes. In fact, the Bible takes care to expose their flagrant flaws. Their imperfections and limitations serve to point to the need for a true hero, a perfect son, a better provider, deliverer, savior, judge, prophet, priest, and king.

What I did not see is that the Old Testament tells a story that only finds its completion in Jesus Christ. I did not see that Jesus is the offspring of the woman who will crush the head of the serpent. Jesus is the ark that protects the faithful remnant from judgment. Jesus is the fulfillment of all the blessings promised to Abraham. He is the greater Isaac, the beloved Son of his Father, offered as a sacrifice, who was not spared from the knife. Jesus is the stairway Jacob saw in his dream on which God comes down to earth. Jesus is the greater Joseph, the One whose suffering put him in place to become Savior to all who come to him for food amid the famine of this world.

And those are just a few highlights from Genesis.

Jesus is the reality to which all of the sacrifices and offerings and festivals point. He is the fulfillment of the Tabernacle and Temple, making his home among us. He is the greater Moses who brings his people out of slavery to sin, the greater Israel who is not disobedient in the wilderness, the greater son of David whose Kingdom will last forever, the greater Solomon who is the Prince of Peace. He is the weeping prophet, the greater Jonah who runs toward sinners rather than away from them, the Bridegroom, the Branch, Isaiahs child who is born.

Though this is not the way I learned to read and understand the Old Testamentand perhaps not the way you have read and understood it up to nowthis is clearly the way Jesus read, understood, and taught it, and therefore the way his disciples began to teach it after his departure.

Jesus often said that he fulfilled specific Old Testament passages. At the beginning of his ministry, he went to the synagogue in Nazareth and stood up to read from the Old Testament scroll of Isaiah:

The Spirit of the L ORD is upon me,

for he has anointed me to bring Good News to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim that captives will be released,

that the blind will see,

that the oppressed will be set free,

and that the time of the L ORD s favor has come.

He rolled up the scroll, handed it back to the attendant, and sat down. All eyes in the synagogue looked at him intently. Then he began to speak to them. The Scripture youve just heard has been fulfilled this very day! (Luke 4:18-21)

Those who heard Jesus say this were amazed, but ultimately infuriated, because they understood exactly what he was claiming.

Yet according to Jesus, it is not just individual prophecies or passages that point to him. It is the Old Testament Scriptures as a whole. Jesus said to the religious leaders, You search the Scriptures because you think they give you eternal life. But the Scriptures point to me! (John 5:39). Jesus was saying that the entirety of the Old Testamentits history, its promises, its people, its laws, its ceremonies, its songsall of it is all about him.

Perhaps the clearest and most intriguing thing Jesus said about fulfilling the Scriptures came after his resurrection, as he walked along with two of his disciples on the road to Emmaus. They didnt recognize that it was Jesus who was walking with them, and they began telling him how heartbroken they were. They had hoped Jesus was the Messiah, and now, in light of his crucifixion, it seemed their hopes had been dashed.

Jesus said to them, You foolish people! You find it so hard to believe all that the prophets wrote in the Scriptures. Wasnt it clearly predicted that the Messiah would have to suffer all these things before entering his glory? Then Jesus took them through the writings of Moses and all the prophets, explaining from all the Scriptures the things concerning himself. (Luke 24:25-27)