September 19, 2024
Why the Old Testament is Important
The Bible’s story in the Old Testament has lost its coherence over the centuries. We have broken apart and dissected it in so many ways that we have lost the most important lessons: who God actually is and how deep His love is for us. By studying the Old Testament, we can learn who God is, and by studying the New Testament, we learn how much He loves us. Both testaments go together. The Old Testament informs the New Testament, and the New Testament enlightens the Old Testament. They work together. Studying the Old Testament will bring a sense of continuity and coherency to the story God is telling us and an understanding of why the Old Testament is constructed the way it is.
To get the most out of this study, lay aside what you think you already know and be open to letting the scriptures speak for themselves. The focus of this course is the Old Testament. Here, the Old Testament is identified with the 39 “books” or separate compositions in English Protestant translations. The Roman Catholic Bible contains some additional books that Protestants consider apocryphal or outside the biblical canon. This study concentrates on the 39 undisputed books that both Jews and Christians accept as “canonical.”
To truly grasp the essence of the Old Testament, we must approach it with our spiritual senses awakened by God, as believers in the resurrected Jesus. As we navigate the twenty-first century, we are faced with questions: Are the promises of the Old Testament still relevant to us? Do the laws of the Mosaic covenant still guide us as followers of Jesus? Is the Old Testament still relevant, and if so, how should we engage with it? These are intellectual questions and spiritual journeys that require our hearts and minds to be open and receptive.
Some Christians might ask, if we live under the new covenant, why should we bother to understand and apply the Old Testament? Here, I will present seven reasons why the term “Old” in “Old Testament” should not be interpreted as irrelevant or insignificant for Christians.
Seven Reasons
1. The Old Testament Was Jesus’ Only Bible and Makes Up 75 Percent of Our Christian Scripture
For Jesus, everything in the Old Testament was real. Adam and Eve were real people; Moses did lead the Israelites out of Egypt, and Jonah was swallowed by a whale. Everything Jesus says is related to the Old Testament. When Jesus talks about the Law, he does not mean just the Law of Moses; He means the entire Old Testament. Jesus also says he did not come to abolish the law but to fulfill it.
2. The Old Testament Influences Our Understanding of Key Biblical Teachings
Because so much of what Jesus says about God, righteousness, love, who He is, and so much more is comes from the Old Testament, we should pay close attention to what He means and where it is found. Without the Old Testament, we wouldn’t grasp the various types and shadows that point to Jesus. The explanation of why we need a savior is found in the Old Testament.
3. We Meet the Same God in Both Testaments
In John 14, Jesus explains if you have seen me, you have seen the Father. Who is the Father? Again, the answer is in the Old Testament. You might ask, “Isn’t the God of the Old Testament characterized by wrath and burden, while the God of the New Testament is about grace and freedom?” In reality, God’s wrath is present in the New Testament just as it is in the Old Testament, which is rich with displays of God’s saving grace.
While the Old Testament contains numerous examples of Yahweh’s righteous anger, the New Testament overflows with the mercy purchased by Christ’s blood. All saving grace finds its fulfillment in Jesus. What is crucial to understand is that we encounter the same God in both the Old and New Testaments. Throughout the entire Bible, we meet a God who is faithful to His promises, whether to bless or to curse. He takes both sin and repentance seriously.
4. The Old Testament Announces the Very “Good News” We Enjoy
We first learn about needing a savior from the first book in the Old Testament and the story of the creation of man and his separation from God in the Garden of Eden. God announces then and there that He will provide a way back to Him. This plan of salvation is called the Gospel, good news. Therefore, Reading the Old Testament is one of God’s ways for us to better grasp and delight in the gospel.
5. Both the Old and New Covenants Call Us to Love and Clarify What Love Looks Like
In the Old Testament, love was what Yahweh called Israel to practice (Deut. 6:5; Deut. 10:19), and the other commandments explained how to live that out. Jesus emphasized this when he taught that the entire Old Testament is grounded in the command to love God and love one’s neighbor: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets” (Matt. 22:37–40). Christ also highlighted, “Whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets” (Matt. 7:12). Similarly, Paul states, “The whole law is fulfilled in one word: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself’” (Gal. 5:14; cf. Rom. 13:8, 10).
6. New Testament Authors Recognized That God Gave the Old Testament for Believers
Regarding the Old Testament prophets, Peter explains that “it was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves but you” (1 Pet. 1:12). Similarly, Paul believed that the Old Testament writers were addressing new believers in Christ. He wrote, “For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures, we might have hope” (Rom. 15:4; cf. Rom. 4:23–24). Paul also noted, “Now these things happened to [the Israelites] as an example, but they were written down for our instruction, on whom the end of the ages has come” (1 Cor. 10:11). Indeed, the Old Testament contains the very “gospel of the grace of God” (Acts 20:24).
7. New Testament Authors Expect Us to Read the Old Testament
Jesus says the Old Testament points to Him. After his first encounter with Jesus, Philip announced to Nathanael, “We have found him of whom Moses in the Law and also the prophets wrote” (John 1:45). In order to celebrate Jesus as much as we can, we have to read the Old Testament. The New Testament often cites the Old Testament in ways that call us to reflect on the context of the original story.
When Paul wrote to the Ephesian Elders, he testified, “I am innocent of the blood of all, for I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God” (Acts 20:26–27). The “whole counsel of God” refers to the complete scope of God’s plan of salvation as revealed throughout Scripture. Luke emphasizes that if Paul had failed to fully reveal God’s redemptive plan—how God’s love overcomes man’s sin through Jesus—he would have been held accountable by God for any future doctrinal or moral errors in the Ephesian church (cf. Ezek. 33:1–6; Acts 18:6). Now, with the completion of Scripture in the New Testament, we have “the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 3).
However, this “faith” can only be properly understood within the framework of “the whole counsel of God.” Therefore, we must value the Old Testament concerning Christ and the New Testament to guard ourselves from accountability for failing to teach the fullness of God’s Word.
Paul believed Christians needed to preach the Old Testament to protect the church from falling away. Though we now have the New Testament, it remains essential to study, practice, and teach the Old Testament as Jesus and His apostles did for the benefit of all believers.
Author: Jon-Roy Sloan is the Chief Communications Officer for NationsUniversity and the author of Anastasia Smiles: Love Needs No Translation. Disclaimer statement: Please note that the opinions expressed herein are those of the author alone and are based on his personal understanding of scripture and how God works in our lives and do not necessarily reflect the views of NationsUniversity®.
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