Day 30: Jesus is in the Old Testament Too

Now that same day two of them were on their way to a village called Emmaus, which was about seven miles from Jerusalem. Together they were discussing everything that had taken place. And while they were discussing and arguing, Jesus himself came near and began to walk along with them. But they were prevented from recognizing him. Then he asked them, “What is this dispute that you’re having with each other as you are walking?” And they stopped walking and looked discouraged.

The one named Cleopas answered him, “Are you the only visitor in Jerusalem who doesn’t know the things that happened there in these days?”

“What things?” he asked them.

So they said to him, “The things concerning Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet powerful in action and speech before God and all the people, and how our chief priests and leaders handed him over to be sentenced to death, and they crucified him. But we were hoping that he was the one who was about to redeem Israel. Besides all this, it’s the third day since these things happened. Moreover, some women from our group astounded us. They arrived early at the tomb, and when they didn’t find his body, they came and reported that they had seen a vision of angels who said he was alive. Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but they didn’t see him.”

He said to them, “How foolish you are, and how slow to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Wasn’t it necessary for the Messiah to suffer these things and enter into his glory?” Then beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted for them the things concerning himself in all the Scriptures. LUKE 24:13–27, EMPHASIS MINE

I WAS LISTENING TO a podcast recently and heard a lovely woman I used to learn from describe her personal Christian deconstruction narrative and how she no longer considers the Bible something that can be read with certainty. She encouraged listeners who remained inclined to read the Bible to do so purely as an inspirational endeavor and emphatically declared that if one wants to know what Jesus taught, they should focus solely on the red letters in the four New Testament Gospel accounts because that’s the only time He shows up in the story! Sadly, her opinion has become all too common in modern culture with more and more self-proclaimed experts clamoring to deconstruct the authority of God’s Word and the divine nature of Christ Himself.

I’m not a formally trained apologist—my doctorate is in Spiritual Formation—and I take no pleasure in doctrinal fisticuffs (it took years of therapy for me to learn how to healthily engage in conflict, but I still tend to avoid it with more gusto that I do steamed kale or unemployed blind dates who live in their mother’s basements!). But I can’t help noticing the gaping holes in this flawed logic. Besides a plethora of passages illustrating the preexistent, self-sustaining, trinitarian nature of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit (including but not limited to: Gen. 1:26–27, 3:22; Isa. 6:8; Job 19:25–27; Matt. 3:16–17; Luke 3:21–22; John 1:1–18, 29–34; Eph. 4:4–6; Col. 1:15–17; Heb. 1:3; and 1 Pet. 1:1–2), we’ve got almost two thousand years of theological scaffolding built by saints and scholars who devoted their entire lives to seeking God through His enscripturated revelation and serving others for His namesake. Therefore, I think the bulwark of biblical Christianity can withstand the softballs lobbed by social media influencers posing as purveyors of truth!

Plus, we’ve got the Emmaus Road encounter in Luke 24—which I like to call Jesus’s own Christological explanation of Himself as seen in the Old Testament!

These two guys are walking home to the suburbs of Emmaus after experiencing the very first Passion week in the big city of Jerusalem. They’re walking along with their heads down, kicking at pebbles on the dirt road, because they’re completely flummoxed by what they just witnessed. They assumed Jesus was going to be the king who would liberate them out from under the oppressive authority of Rome, but instead He was killed on a cross less than a week after Jerusalem held a parade in His honor. It just didn’t make sense to them.

But then Jesus—whom they didn’t yet recognize—sidles up next to this despairing duo and effectively asks: “Why the long faces, guys?” After giving each other a sideways glance that said “How does this yahoo not know what just happened in Jerusalem?” they go on to explain (likely with some impatience or even condescension) the events that had just taken place from Palm Sunday to Easter.

After patiently listening to their sad saga, our Savior basically replies (and I picture Him with a hint of a smile here): “Don’t you guys remember? We studied this in Torah 101. The prophets told us this would happen!” And starting with a lesson from the Pentateuch, He continues all the way through to the end of the Hebrew Bible, interpreting for them the things concerning Himself in all the Scriptures. In other words, Jesus takes these two discouraged dudes on a comprehensive Old Testament tour and makes it clear: all of this is about Me!

Don’t limit yourself to just the red letters, y’all—every single letter of this divine love story we call the Bible is saturated with the promise of redemption! Frankly, I think if you look hard enough, you can find the compassionate countenance of Jesus on each page, no matter which Testament!

• “SHADOW AND SUBSTANCE” is a term that describes how we can see the promise of redemption in the Old Testament and the fulfillment of redemption in the New Testament. Besides an obvious love story like Hosea (whose name is the Hebrew equivalent of the Greek name Jesus!) and Gomer, can you name a few other Old Testament stories that are filled with the “shadow” of Jesus?
• READ JOB 19:25–27. Now look up the Hebrew word for Redeemer, which is Go’el. How does Job’s prophetic assertion point to Jesus?
• CONSIDER JOHN 5:46, 8:52–58, and 12:39–41. Also consider 1 Peter 1:10–12. What do these passages teach about Christ’s presence in the Old Testament, and the knowledge that Hebrew patriarchs and prophets had about Him?