Christ in the Old
Testament
There are three reasons that led me to this subject. The first is a
seminar in two parts given by Dominic Smart of Gilcomston South Church of
Scotland earlier this year, the day after an address he gave at the Lakeland
Christian Fellowship meeting in Parr
Street
PART 1
First of all, in order to set the scene, I want to say that I have some doubts
about a Christ-centred biblical theology, at least if that is set out as the
primary way in which we are to approach the Bible and, in particular, to handle
and preach from the OT. Biblical theology is not the final form of theology; it
is a discipline on the road to theology. Biblical theology explores themes and
periods of revelation, but the whole has to be systematic theology. That, after
all, is the meaning of the word ‘systematic’; it brings all the different parts
together into one overarching system. My own approach would be along these
lines, I think. If I have to put the whole Bible into a nutshell I would
describe it as the revelation of the
redeeming God. It is not simply about a big story; if you want to use the
word story, it is a story about a great God. Nor is it just a revelation of God
per se, but in particular it reveals a triune God as a God who redeems. So care
must be taken not to focus on one person of the Trinity to the exclusion of the
other two.
The problem with biblical theology, as Goldsworthy points out, is to
work out what, if any, is the central, cohesive theme that unites all the other
themes together. If God has spoken at
many times and in many ways to our fathers by the prophets, and in these last days has spoken to us by his Son,
how do we bring all that together into a unity? Moreover, as he also
acknowledges, how does the wisdom literature fit into the picture? Even if we
can trace a storyline through the OT what do we do with Proverbs, for example?
So while there is much that is thought-provoking and indeed valuable about his
books I am not sure that they are the last word – though he would probably
agree with that himself.
On reflection I think that I have also been influenced in my
understanding by writing a biography. In a biography you tell a story which
develops over time through many different events. But through all that happens
you are seeking to bring out the character of the subject about whom you are
writing. The events, the actions and reactions of the person concerned reveal
the essential person. Moreover, in some cases, as with Ernest Kevan, the
subject of the biography has himself written various books. But what he has
written also reveals more about him and therefore his writings are not a problem,
they add to an understanding of his personality and priorities. However, there
is this vital difference when it comes to the Bible. Any human being will
develop and change over time, but this is not the case with God. His acts and
words are appropriate to the times in which they take place, but in himself he
is always the same.
So if we see the Bible as the revelation of the redeeming God, what
does that mean? Firstly, God is Father, Son and Holy Spirit and, as Dominic
Smart emphasised, all the works of God outside of himself involve all three
persons of the Trinity. Within the Godhead the persons act in love upon each
other. In divine dealings with the created universe, including the angelic
universe, the persons all act together, though not necessarily all in the same
way. So in creation, the Father speaks and acts by the Word who executes the
will of God by the Spirit. God is one in willing and one in acting, though
there may be order and differentiation within the willing and acting. When it comes
to divine dealings with human beings, in general we can say that God makes
himself known, speaks and acts in and through the Son and by the Spirit. So to
say the Bible is Christ-centred is at the same time to say that it is
God-centred, but I think that this needs to be made explicit.
The Bible reveals God in two ways. It is an inspired record in which
human authors reveal God to us by their words about him, including of course
reporting his own words, but also by recounting his acts. In this case actions
do not speak louder than words, but both words and acts combine together to
complete our understanding. From the first verse, speaking of creation, until
the last verse, speaking of what is yet to take place, we have a record of a
God who has spoken to us, as we saw before, at
many times and in many ways. However, through all that God has revealed
runs the thread of redemption, or if you prefer it, salvation – I use the word
redemption because it speaks of deliverance by a price or cost. The opening
chapters set the stage on which we see the fall of man into sin, and from then
on we see God at work in various ways, leading up to the climactic occasion
when on the cross, God was, in Christ, reconciling the world to himself. That,
of course, still awaits a final consummation, as is testified in the now
completed word of revelation.
The theme of redemption is particularly important in two ways.
Firstly, an act of redemption is not what we would necessarily expect of God.
Anyone who believes in one God is likely to think of him as all-powerful,
eternal, all-knowing, creative and above us in every way. But that he should
deliver those who have sinned against him, and do it himself by incarnation and
an atoning death goes beyond human expectation and imagination. General
revelation tells us nothing about a God who redeems. Incidentally, a Unitarian
god could never have redeemed by incarnation and an atoning death. If he died
he would remain dead. Secondly, it is just at this unique point that so many
who profess to be Christians go wrong. Redemption is compromised by the idea
that we have to pay for our own sins, or that our good deeds count towards
salvation or that God simply lets us off, especially if we do our best.
However, a redeeming God is a uniquely biblical revelation and this truth must
be zealously guarded and made known as widely as possible.
There are three important themes bearing on this subject that I
believe must be considered before we go any further. The first is the place and, I think, the priority of the Father.
What I mean by that is best brought into focus by reminding ourselves of the
most well-known verse in the Bible: God
so loved the world that he gave his only Son. Supremely it is the love of
the Father which is manifested in the incarnation and saving work of Jesus
Christ. In this is love, not that we have
loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our
sins. Similarly, God shows his love for
us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. That is
extraordinary, isn’t it, not Christ shows his love for us by his death, but God shows his love for us.
I am also struck by the way
in which God speaks in Isaiah: Behold, my
servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul delights. And at the
beginning of the fourth servant song: Behold,
my servant shall act wisely, he shall be high and lifted up, and shall be
exalted. It is God the Father himself who delights in his Son and draws our
attention to him. We are to look at the Son because his Father tells us to. The
New Testament equivalent is: This is my
beloved Son, with whom I am well-pleased.
There are two aspects to this which I think we need to reflect on.
Firstly, does a Christ-centred biblical theology adequately express, or make
room for, this truth? Some years ago there was a book written with this title, The Forgotten Father. I haven’t read it
so I do not know what it says, but sometimes it does appear as if the Father is
rather overlooked. Is the human Jesus more appealing in these days to people
than a gracious and loving God? I think we have to be careful not to forget the
Father or his love.
This leads, secondly, to this question: isn’t the gift of the Son by
the Father actually the highest and greatest demonstration of love? This is a tricky
point, and we must not try to contrast the roles of Father and Son
unnecessarily and we must acknowledge that we are in the realms of the mystery
of a triune God. However, the language of John 3:16 clearly picks up the
language used by God to Abraham: Because
you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, I will surely
bless you. Wouldn’t it have been easier for Abraham to have offered
himself, rather than his only son? What father, with an only son, would not
prefer to give his life – perhaps already half-lived – rather than sacrifice
his only son? Surely, we can’t help thinking like that. In the mystery of God
in our nature forsaken by God, there is a depth of suffering, love and grace
that goes beyond anything that we can imagine. We dare not overlook this
greatest aspect of the love of God.
John Owen addresses this matter in a slightly different way. ‘The
foundation of the whole [we might say, at this point, the whole of salvation]
is laid in a sovereign act of the will, the pleasure, the grace of the Father.
And this is the order and method of all divine operations in the way and work
of grace. They originally proceed all from him; and having effected their ends,
do return, rest, and centre in him again.’ He bases this statement on Ephesians
1:3-6: Blessed be the God and Father of
our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual
blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the
foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In
love he predestined us for adoption through Jesus Christ, according to the
purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has
blessed us in the Beloved.
Has anyone ever published a book on a Father-centred biblical
theology? I’ve never heard of one. Yet isn’t that precisely what Ephesians 1
presents?
The second important theme concerns how we are to understand the Wisdom
literature in its relationship to the overall theme of the Bible. In this
connection it is really the books of Job, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes and the Song
of Solomon that are in question. It may be helpful to look at each briefly in
turn.
Job is about the problems which arise when a godly person suffers,
greatly, randomly and exceptionally. It describes inadequate, mistaken and
hurtful attempts by friends to understand and explain what has happened. It
pictures the fluctuations of hurt, doubt and faith experienced by the godly. It
finishes with the greatness, sovereignty and grace of God. All this is of
lasting importance.
Proverbs is primarily about ordinary life. It promotes wisdom in
daily life not only by basing it on the fear of the Lord, but by bringing it
right down into details. Proverbs are not promises or absolute statements of
truth, but general principles and wise instructions which are generally true
and have to be understood and applied with wisdom.
Ecclesiastes is about the uncertainty, fragility, frustration and
emptiness of life as it is under the sun. Though this is primarily true for the
unbeliever, who has no hope above and beyond the sun – that is from outside the
universe – the believer too lives in the same world. To fear God is the answer;
this radically alters the way the believer lives, but it does not alter the
world in which he lives, for that he has to look for a better world.
The Song of Solomon is a song, or songs, in praise of love. It
pictures the highest form of human love, the joyful, ecstatic love of a man and
a woman. Coming immediately after Ecclesiastes it presents an astonishing
contrast and reminds us that – if I can quote this – ‘love changes everything’.
It is firstly the love which is expressed by a man and woman in marriage, but
this can point us to the love of God for his people – at the time of writing this
was Israel
It seems to me that the only one of these books which can be fully
made to fit a Christ-centred biblical theology is the Song of Solomon
understood as an allegory. If, however, we think of the Bible as a revelation
of God – ultimately Father, Son and Holy Spirit – then we have God expressing
himself through history, through the words of the prophets and through wisdom
literature. This does not sideline Jesus Christ and his saving work; it simply
puts it in a fuller context. We must remember in particular that redemption is
not merely justification and forgiveness, it continues in sanctification and a
life which aims to be well-pleasing to God. This continuing process belongs to
both Testaments and the wisdom literature is very valuable in this connection.
My feeling is that when people talk about Christ in the OT they are almost
always thinking simply in terms of a message of salvation to unbelievers
without reference to the ongoing life of the redeemed community.
So, for example, it is not moralism to preach from Proverbs, it
shows how God’s people, ultimately all saved by Jesus Christ, can live in the
details and nitty-gritty of everyday life. Actually Christians often need such
detailed guidance and perhaps don’t always get it as they should. You know the
acronym WWJD – what would Jesus do? It is interesting to remember that Jesus
would have known the Law, the prophets and Proverbs. What he would do would be
the outcome of his knowledge and perfect understanding of the OT. We don’t need
to guess what Jesus would do – we have the Word he sanctioned, Old and New
Testaments, to guide us.
This leads to the third important theme which concerns
the OT law in its fullness. It is now nearly forty years since Chris Wright’s
ground-breaking book, Living as the
People of God was published. This has now been enlarged and superseded by a
much bigger book, Old Testament Ethics
for the People of God. I confess I have only dipped into it but I did read
the earlier book and also his commentary on Deuteronomy which I found very
helpful. What Wright did was to show that all the OT laws enshrine principles
and moral perspectives that are valid and timely throughout history for the
people of God. I am not going to enlarge on this; all that I am maintaining is
that redemption has always issued in an ongoing life of holiness. In a certain
sense, too, the initial saving act of faith is continually recapitulated as
people confess their sins and receive forgiveness through the sacrifice of
Jesus Christ.
To sum up so far in a sentence: any overall approach to the OT must
be able to embrace the priority of the Father’s love in a redemption which only
reaches its finale in glorification, the full range of the Mosaic law, and the
wisdom literature. I think it is doubtful that a Christ-centred approach, by
itself, is adequate to that task. I am also fearful that an over-emphasized
focus on Jesus can lead to a reduced impression of what the Bible actually
says.
However, there is another very important side to our whole subject
which I acknowledge has to be taken into account. There are two aspects to
this. First, redemption is the specific work of Jesus Christ and has been
accomplished by him: his incarnation, atoning death, resurrection and
glorification were essential to it. Second, we can only come to know God in and
through Jesus Christ. We cannot know the Father apart from the incarnate Son.
It is, of course, the Spirit’s ministry to show Christ to us and to enable us
to embrace him in faith, but it is to Christ himself that we must come, and
through him we come to the Father. Both these points mean that insofar as
preaching the gospel is concerned the focus is, and must be, on Jesus Christ,
but it should not stop there. Nor, for that matter, does it need to begin
there. In fact, unless you bring in God the Father at some point you are going
to distort the gospel message. To love our Lord Jesus Christ means to love the
Father too, with a love shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit.
Let me sum up this first part of my address with three quotations.
The first is from Vern Poythress [The
Shadow of Christ in the Law of Moses]: ‘To be Christ-centred in
interpretation is not, however, to be Christomonistic.’ So is the second: ‘To
read the Old Testament Christocentrically need not mean collapsing creation
into redemption or suppressing the revelation of God the Father in the Old
Testament. Rather, it means appreciating the Old Testament for what it is in
the design of God: a witness, foreshadowing, anticipation and promise of
salvation as it has now been accomplished by the work of the triune God in
Jesus Christ incarnate.’ Personally I would want to add to this that while in a
vital sense salvation has been accomplished it has not yet been fully
implemented or brought to its grand conclusion. Thirdly, Thomas Schreiner,
writing on New Testament theology [in Introducing
Scripture] says: ‘New Testament theology, then, is Christ-centred and
God-focused, for what Christ does on earth brings glory to God.’ Perhaps we
might say about Old Testament theology that it is God-centred and
Christ-focused because it is the Christ who will fulfil all the saving purposes
of his Father.
PART 2
In a sense all that I have said so far is introductory to the main
theme of Christ in the OT, but I believe it is essential to try and sort out
the parameters within which we are to consider our subject. Now, in the second
place, I believe we need also to clarify
our approach to Christ and the Old Testament. You will see what I mean from
the points that I cover.
Firstly, we need to look at the word ‘Christ’ itself. The trouble is that
we often give to the word a broader connotation than it has in Scripture. We
frequently use it in a general way to refer to the whole person, Jesus Christ
our Lord. We use it as a name rather than as a specific title. For us preaching
Christ covers preaching on any aspect of the person or work of Jesus Christ,
but not in the Bible – or at least, not generally. In Acts 8:5 when Philip went
to Samaria Paul
came to Thessalonica he went into the synagogue and reasoned with them from the Scriptures, explaining and proving that it
was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead and saying,
‘This Jesus, whom I proclaim to you, is the Christ.’
As you all know, Christ is the anglicised Greek for the anglicised
Hebrew ‘Messiah’. The word means ‘the anointed one’. In the OT three sorts of
person were anointed: prophets, priests and kings. This is why the work of
Jesus Christ is generally considered under these three heads. Personally I
think it is best to think of Jesus under these headings as Messiah rather than
to add others. For example, wise man – or wisdom personified – and shepherd,
both come under the heading of king; Solomon was the wisest man and David the
shepherd king. Also, I do not think it is wise or right to speak of Jesus being
in the OT. The OT points in various ways to figures, institutions and actions
which all prove to be summed up in the one person of Jesus. There is much in
the OT that leads us to Jesus, but we should not import him back into the OT.
However, as we shall see, the Son of God is
in the OT, but that is to anticipate.
Secondly, I believe we need to understand Luke 24 in a realistic way. In
v.27 we are told that beginning with
Moses and all the prophets, Jesus interpreted
to the disciples in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself. This
surely does not mean that we are to find a reference to Christ in every verse
or even in every chapter in the OT. It means that all through the OT you will
come across persons, institutions and events which in various ways anticipate
and point to the Christ. I have heard some extraordinary applications of
various verses and passages to Christ which I am sure are simply evidence of a
vivid imagination – I only wish I had made a note of some of them to
demonstrate what I mean, but you have probably come across some yourselves.
Regrettably, these sorts of ‘interpretations’ have done great harm and turned
expositors away from legitimate anticipations of Christ. Finding Christ in the
OT is not an exercise in human cleverness but in searching out real connections
between the Testaments.
Thirdly, the flow of history and development of the people of God in the
OT, with the gradual and deepening revelation of truth, is important in its own
right. The first question we ask when we come to an OT passage is not
necessarily, ‘How can I get to Christ from here?’ The OT deals with real people
and their relationship with God; there is therefore much that we can learn
about how God deals with people from its pages. Incidentally, when we read the
word ‘God’ in the Old Testament we are actually reading about the divine nature
of Jesus Christ, though not the person. I shall say more about this later.
Dominic Smart, in his seminars, sought in particular to show how
Boaz functions in a way that clearly prefigures Jesus Christ. He was very
persuasive in presenting his case, and quite clearly wished to honour Christ,
but I still find what he said unsatisfying. So I want to say something about
the book of Ruth, though it must be very brief. The hero, or rather, heroine,
of the book is surely Naomi. Through great sorrow she nonetheless won the
affection of her two daughters-in-law so that both desired to return with her
to Bethlehem Israel
Moving on, it was Naomi who took the initiative in gaining Boaz as a
husband for Ruth, not Boaz himself, nor God. She was rewarding Ruth for her
faithfulness to her. Was Boaz a widower, I wonder, or an older single man –
surely unlikely in that culture – or would Ruth even be a second wife? The way
Naomi told Ruth to go about gaining a night-time rendezvous with Boaz seems
strange and a little dubious – especially if you know anything about customs in
rural England
The main point of the book is clearly to show that Ruth, a
Moabitess, features in the genealogy of David, and hence of course ultimately
in the genealogy of Christ himself. We should not overlook the remarkable words
of the people and elders of Bethlehem : May your house be like the house of Perez,
whom Tamar bore to Judah Israel
So, I have doubts about making too much of Boaz as a picture of
Christ. The Lord acts in this book
twice. In 1:6 he visits his people again to give them food, and that brings
Naomi and Ruth back to Bethlehem Judah
Fourthly, I believe it is important not to marginalise or downplay the
importance of the giving of the law. The law was written on the heart of Adam
and Eve at the very beginning; but the fall and indwelling sin means that man
also needs an external, objective writing of the law. The law delivered by
Moses and enshrined in the 10 commandments is not another or lesser law. Paul ’s words in Romans 2:12-16 cannot possibly be
understood in that way. Because conscience itself is affected by sin an
external, unbiased standard of right and wrong is essential. I like the words
of John Collins: ‘The “law”, given through Moses, plays a vital role in the Old
Testament. It is uniformly presented as an object of delight and admiration
(e.g. Psalm 119), because it is a gift from a loving and gracious God. The law
is never presented in the Old Testament as a list of rules that one must obey
to be right with God; rather, it is God’s fatherly instruction, given to shape
the people he has loved and saved into a community of faith, holiness, and
love, bound together by mutual support and care.’ As such it has a continuing
role in the life of the Christian church and its members.
Fifthly, and simply in passing, we need to be guided by the NT in our
understanding of Christ in the OT. But that requires another paper!
PART 3
So, at last, we get to what you thought was the subject of this
paper! Firstly, if Jesus Christ is
God, then whenever we read about God in the OT we are learning about the divine
nature of the Christ. This is important for several reasons. To start with it
means we cannot talk about a great, remote, overwhelming Being in the OT and
contrast that with a near-at-hand, loving Christ in the New. Liberals and
unbelievers would often make the contrast even more stark than that, but we
ourselves need to take care that our language does not actually promote such an
idea. This reaches its heretical climax in the idea that a loving Jesus
interposed himself on the cross to appease an angry God. In order to avoid such
a conclusion it is vital to have a God-centred theology in which the Father has
a certain priority all the way through, as we were thinking earlier.
What we find in the OT about God is also important for seeing the
deity of Christ in the NT. So often what Jesus does in the NT reflects on the
activity of God in the OT. Sometimes this is made explicit, as in John 1:3: All things were made through him, and
without him was not anything made that was made. The miracle of the feeding
of the 5,000 shows Jesus is the creator, and the turning of water into wine
shows him as the active power at work in the natural world, as also does the
stilling of the storm. Psalm 107 says: He
made the storm be still, and the waves of the sea were hushed. Then they were
glad that the waters were quiet, and he brought them to their desired haven.
Sometimes OT descriptions of God are actually fulfilled in a remarkable way in
Jesus Christ, for example: For thus says
the One who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy:
‘I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with him who is of a contrite and
lowly spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly, and to revive the heart of the
contrite’ (Isaiah 57:15). It is One who was high and lifted up who came
down very literally to dwell with those of humble and contrite spirits.
Secondly, all the theophanies in the Old Testament, that is appearances of
God in angelic or human form, are actually Christophanies, or to be even more
accurate, appearances of the Son of God, the second person in the Trinity. In
Genesis 16 we have the first appearance of the angel of the Lord. This figure is both identified with
God and yet is distinguished from God by his very title. In the light of
further OT evidence and the NT it is not difficult to see that this must be God
the Son. The key passage is Isaiah 6 where Isaiah sees the Lord, high and lifted up. In John 12,
John writing about the unbelief of the Jews of his own day quotes from Isaiah 6
and then, referring to Jesus, writes: Isaiah
said these things because he saw his glory and spoke of him. These early
appearances of God the Son are anticipations of the incarnation, but they are
also indications that the Son was present and active in the world in the OT
period.
Thirdly, there are explicit messianic promises. When I say, explicit
messianic promises, I do not mean that the word Messiah is actually used, but
there are promises of someone to come which are clearly only fulfilled
ultimately in the person of Jesus Christ, though in some cases there might be a
preliminary and partial fulfilment. For example, there is the seed of the
woman, Gen.3:15; the prophet like Moses, Deut.18:15,18,19; the Davidic king, 2
Sam. 7:12-16; the servant of Jahveh, Is.42:1-4; 49:1-6; 50:4-9; 52:13 to 53:12;
the branch, Jer. 23:5,6; 33:14-16; the priest like Melchizedek, Ps.110:4;
wisdom personified; Prov.8:2-31.
This, I think, also enables us to see that there are other specific
figures which point us forward ultimately to Jesus Christ. For example, Joseph,
the saviour of his people, would come into this category. This would be the
case with other deliverers also, and in this connection we can think of the
judges, who were much more military figures than our judges. The deliverances
of Joseph and the judges, in my estimation, would come under the heading of
kingly rule, even though there were not anointed kings.
At this point, however, we have to consider a very important
principle, that of contrast as well as continuity. All, whoever they were, who
came before Jesus were failures – that’s why Jesus had to come. Eli was the
high priest but the man of God who came to rebuke Eli and his sons said, in the
name of the Lord: And I will raise up for
myself a faithful priest, who shall do according to what is in my heart and in
my mind (1 Samuel 2:35). I will come back to this point a little later.
Years ago I heard a minister whom I respected apply what we are told
about Samson to Christ: at midnight he
arose and took hold of the doors of the gate of the city and the two posts, and
pulled them up, bar and all, and put them on his shoulders and carried them to
the top of the hill that is in front of Hebron. I think he applied, or
rather misapplied, this picture to Christ storming and overthrowing the gates
of hell. In the context Samson had been spending the night with a prostitute
and it seemed to me utterly inappropriate to try and introduce a reference to
the Son of God at this point, even keeping in mind the principle of contrast. I
think, therefore, that we have to be careful in our applications.
I recently read Henry Law on both Joseph and Judah. He took Joseph
to be a type of Christ and Judah to be a type of Judas Iscariot. Yet Psalm
78:67,68 says of the Lord: He rejected the tent of Joseph, he did not
choose the tribe of Ephraim, but he chose the tribe of Judah , Mount Zion
Having introduced the word ‘type’ this brings us to the fourth way in which we see Christ in
the OT. Vern Poythress defines the word like this: ‘A “type”, in the language
of theology, is a special example, symbol, or picture that God designed
beforehand, and that he placed in history at an earlier point in time in order
to point forward to a later, larger fulfilment’ (Introducing Scripture). The word type originally meant the mark
made by a seal, so the image made was the exact representation of the letter,
word or symbol on the seal. Paul
uses the word several times in his letters, as in 1 Corinthians 10:6,11,
generally translated as ‘example’. Though, of course, in this case Paul does not want the Corinthians to follow the
example set by the Israelites.
A type, in the sense it is usually used in biblical interpretation,
can be a person, Melchizedek, for example; an event, such as the exodus, or an
institution, the sacrificial system. In every case the type is only an inexact
approximation; Christ and his work constitute the reality, the fulfilment.
Personally, I think there is an ambiguity in using the word ‘type’,
particularly in sermons, because in English ‘type’ generally means ‘sort of’’.
It is not helpful for people to get the idea that an OT character is a ‘sort of
Christ’ – and I believe that some do begin to think like that. So I much prefer
to speak of someone or some thing pointing towards Christ, or picturing some aspect
of his person or work; an indication given by God of future grace and
salvation.
Another word, used in Hebrews, is the word ‘shadow’. We often speak
about ‘types and shadows’. I think generally the idea that most people have is
that, as with types, various people, institutions and events in the OT
foreshadow what comes through Jesus Christ and his work. There is nothing wrong
with understanding it in that way. I have wondered whether it isn’t better to
look at it slightly differently and start with the New Testament – perhaps with
Hebrews. The light of Christ casts a shadow backwards over the OT, drawing
attention to those things that relate to him. What is helpful about this is
that it means we take our starting point as the NT and then look at the OT from
that perspective.
We have to be careful when we talk about types, though. We can say
that the temple is a type for it is a picture of Jesus, who is the dwelling
place of God. We find this made explicit in John’s gospel. But the temple is
also a type of the church, of the Christian and of a Christian’s body – all
these uses are found in 1 Corinthians. These other uses are related to Christ
and come about because of Christ, but they do not directly refer to him.
A second important point is to notice that when we speak of an OT
person being a type of Christ, we are not actually referring to the person as
such, but to some status, action or experience that is true of the person. All
the people we meet with in the OT were sinners who needed salvation by Christ.
All of them did things which do not point to Christ; all of them were guilty
before God and needed the salvation which was to come through Christ. This
means we must never give the impression that some people are types of Christ
because they were generally better than others. This, I think, would be to miss
the point. After all, David was in many ways a type of Christ, and wrote some
amazing messianic Psalms, most notably Psalm 22, yet his fall into sin was
terrible, even though he was pardoned.
Speaking practically, I think we need to say that there are often
different ways of looking at and preaching from the same passages of Scripture.
You can hear several different preachers taking the same text – I don’t
necessarily mean ‘verse’ by that – and yet the sermons may be quite different
in their emphasis. This is quite possible and we should not think there is only
one way of tackling a portion of Scripture.
Let me take Genesis 43 as an example, the passage which refers to
the second visit of Joseph’s brothers to Egypt Judah and focussed on the
opening verses and the astonishing change which took place in Judah Northern
Ireland
Conclusion
So, to sum up: In our treatment of the OT we must be Trinitarian in
our understanding of God. We must not be reductionist in our preaching; there
is a great variety of ways in which much of the OT can be handled. There is
more than one way of discerning the Christ in the OT and we must be sensitive
to this. We must take care not to reduce Jesus Christ by our usage of typical
persons, but always show that he is superior in every way to all OT figures.
Moreover, while salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ is clearly revealed in
the OT and therefore can be preached from the OT, conversion to Christ is only
the beginning of a lifelong saving experience and there is much in the OT that
helps us in our understanding of living a Christ-centred, Holy Spirit
empowered, godly life.
