Preaching Christ From The Old Testament

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Preaching Christ From The Old Testament

By Jace Broadhurst

STEP 1

The first thing we must realize is that God is the author of all of Scripture — both the Old Testament and the New Testament. Recognizing this allows us to accept that He had one big purpose in having all of this penned. Recognizing a divine author helps us realize that God may have had a special reason not only for the historical events but also for the writing about that history, and that this purpose may not have been perfectly known to the human authors.

STEP 2

Closely connected to this first step is an acceptance of the Redemptive Historical Approach to the Bible. This approach to understanding the Bible assumes that we as Christians believe that all the history that we read about in the Bible leads to that climactic event when God Himself breaks in on history in the person of His Son, Jesus.

Each covenant God makes in the Old Testament progressively reveals the plan God has. During the Exile, the prophets bring hope that restoration will take place, but the people of God continue in their old ways and so the true restoration is put off and is ultimately fulfilled only in the coming and death of Christ. What we absolutely must recognize is that both the Old Testament and the New Testament are eschatological — the New Testament just tells us how Christ fulfilled the Old Testament.

STEP 3

The final step is recognizing the three anointed offices of covenant mediation in the Old Testament — prophet, priest, and king. Every prophet, priest and king is given a role of being between God and His people and is, therefore, able to mediate the demands of the covenant. We also know that Jesus fulfills all three of these offices in the New Testament: “Christ, as our Redeemer, executeth the offices of a prophet, of a priest and of a king, both in his estate of humiliation and exaltation.” (Westminster Shorter Catechism #23). Why is it important that Christ fulfills these offices? These three offices are at the center of what it means to be in relationship to God. The only way covenant can be established is if one of these offices mediates.

The three steps to finding Christ in the Old Testament are clear:

1. Recognize the divine authorship of the Bible.

2. Look at the Bible redemptive-historically — that all biblical history is leading to Christ.

3. Recognize that Jesus is the Prophet, Priest, and King.

You already have enough information to enable you to find Christ anywhere in the OT. I am guessing you already understand steps 1 and 2, but this third one may be a bit new. Let me briefly illustrate how to do this third step.

PROPHET

First, you have to ask yourself “what do prophets do?” Prophets bring God’s word to the people — they preach. How does this help in our goal to find Christ? Anywhere you find people proclaiming God’s word in the Old Testament, you need to recognize that this proclamation of the word is fulfilled in Jesus. Hebrews even tells us that in times past, God spoke through His prophets, but now He speaks through His son (Heb 1:1). This means that all of the prophets’ proclamations or anything they do is only a shadow of the great prophet who proclaims God’s word.