When I was a new Christian, someone recommended reading The Jesus Storybook Bible. Though I wanted to follow his recommendation, a book written for kids didn’t quite interest me. As a result, it stayed in my amazon cart for about three years. But last year, Lifeway had it on sale for Black Friday. So, I decided to buy it and finally read it.
It was surprisingly delightful!
I was amazed by the parallels between some Old Testament stories and Jesus. Besides the protoevangelium in Genesis 3:15, I never knew Jesus was in the Old Testament. I was generally aware that the Bible was about Him, but I never appreciated how much His presence saturates the Bible, particularly the Old Testament. It made me realize I have been reading the Bible wrong.
We are not supposed to read the Bible for facts or instructions only. We must read it primarily to see Jesus. He said in John 5:39, “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me.”
All Scriptures testify of Jesus. They may not all be explicitly about Him, but they all point to Him. And if we read any portion of the Bible without seeing how it, then we will miss the unified message of the Bible.
However, we cannot see Jesus in Scriptures on our own. We need the Holy Spirit because of a veil that prevents us from understanding Scriptures. 2 Corinthians 3:15-16 says, “Yes, to this day whenever Moses is read a veil lies over their hearts. But when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed.” The Jews had a veil upon them that blocked them from seeing Christ in the Old Testament. They read the Scriptures, but they couldn’t comprehend that is was about Jesus.
But when they turned to Jesus, He lifted the veil and enabled them to behold His glory in the Old Testament and understand how Scriptures all point to Him. We will also miss Jesus in all Scriptures without the Holy Spirit. Take the two disciples in Luke 24, for example.
They were traveling to Emmaus after Jesus died, and they didn’t know He had risen. They were talking about it when Jesus appeared to them, but they couldn’t recognize him (Luke 24:16). These disciples knew the Scriptures and had even heard reports of the women saying He had risen, yet they didn’t believe and failed to see Jesus as the Messiah. Hence, Jesus taught them how the whole of the Old Testament was about Him.
Luke 24:27 says, “And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself.”
Later, Jesus appeared to the eleven disciples who also doubted His resurrection, and He reminded them of all He had taught them about Him from the Scriptures, and their fulfillment. And then He “opened their minds to understand the Scriptures.” (Luke 24:45)
Understanding how Scriptures points towards Jesus, not only makes more sense, but it is also exciting.
For instance, when I first read The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S Lewis, I had no idea it was a Christian allegory. But after I became a Christian and heard C.S Lewis quotes in every other sermon, I looked him up. That’s when I discovered he was a devout Christian, and the whole series was an allegory. And the light bulb went on in my head! I saw the book in a new light and began to recall all the different themes in it, and how Aslan represented Jesus. It got me so excited that I read the other six books in the series.
Seeing Jesus in all of the Scriptures will also give us that exhilarating feeling, albeit much higher. The two disciples on Emmaus experienced it and said, “did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the Scriptures? ” (Luke 24:32).
If you also want your hearts to burn within you and see Jesus in all Scriptures, here are some questions that will help you during your Bible study. Disclaimer: I did not come with this method. It was invented by James Vanderstelt, author of Gospel Fluency.
Questions to ask when studying the Bible
1. Who is God? – Theology
What is God trying to teach me about Himself?
2. What has God done through Christ? – Christology
What has Jesus done for us? Look for the suffering of Christ, His death and resurrection, repentance for the forgiveness of our sins, and proclamation of the good news (Luke 24:46-47).
3. Who are we? – Ecclesiology
In light of who God is and has done, who am I in Him? What is my identity?
4. What do we do? – Missiology
What are we aiming to do as the body of Christ?
5. How do we do it? – Contextualization
What does this look like in my community and my life?
Application
Let’s look at a couple of Scriptures/stories from the OT and find Jesus in them using these questions as a guide. Since the contextualization is subjective, I will skip it.
Honor your father and mother (Exodus 20:12)
God is the one giving the commandment, and He is also our ultimate Father who deserves all honor.
Christ suffered and died so that we could be forgiven and adopted into God’s family. Christ obeyed the commands of God entirely on our behalf.
As a result, we are now children of God and co-heir with Christ.
We must now obey him in honoring our parents out of gratitude and love.
David and Goliath (1 Samuel 17)
God is the defender and provider of the Israelites. He uses the weak to shame the strong, and He brings victory in unlikely ways. He is also faithful, merciful, mighty, and achieves His purposes.
Christ humbled himself to enter the battlefield and used an unlikely means to defeat evil and drive out sin. He ascended into heaven and claimed the throne.
We are the fearing and cowering crowds who could not face sin ourselves. However, we got the victory through Christ and have been shown mercy even though we didn’t deserve it.
Now, we must spread the good news to others.
The Bible is the cradle wherein Christ is laid
Martin Luther
When you read the Bible, especially the Old Testament, ask these questions to see Jesus in every corner of Scripture. Do be careful not to see Christ where he is not. I know Jesus is in every book of the Bible, and every story whispers His name. But I do not know if every single verse somehow foreshadows Him.
I made this printable showing Jesus in every book of the Bible, as well as bookmarks with the questions listed above. They are in my library of resources, and you can access it for free when you subscribe to the blog.
Here are some additional resources that may be of interest to you:
- Spoken Gospel – a ministry dedicated to “producing creative videos that help people see and savor the good news of Jesus on every page of the Bible.“
- Jesus on Every Page: 10 Simple Ways to Seek and Find Christ in the Old Testament by Bill Murray
- The Jesus Bible
Stay tuned for my next post with more specific examples of Christ in the Old Testament.
This is good! I read a book recommended by an older gentleman at my church who I enjoy talking Bible with that talks about how you can see Jesus throughout the whole Bible.
I LOVE The Jesus Storybook Bible. I second that recommendation and very much agree: it points to the coming of Jesus more than you probably realize.
Indeed, I wished I read it much earlier!