Jesus had to reveal the true meaning of the Old Testament to His disciples after the resurrection despite the fact that they had been acquainted with it their entire lives.  We too have no hope of understanding Scripture unless the Spirit reveals it to us as Jesus promised He would.  So we must pray for His guidance to understand the Scriptures He inspired whenever we read them.  Finally, all theology should lead to doxology (worship), so read any passage looking for things that can aid your worship. 

But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
-2 Timothy 3:14-17, ESV
With any new year, many Christians begin a quest to read through the entire Bible that often gets bogged down and fails just like many health and fitness resolutions.  Interestingly, the reason is the same: people lack a greater purpose for wanting to read through the entire Bible. They get lost in the confusing history of Genesis, the seemingly-insignificant tabernacle details of Exodus, the puzzling ceremonial laws of Leviticus, or the endless genealogies of Numbers.  Then they face a myriad of difficult names in Joshua, a bewildering barrage of strange stories and more genealogies in the history books and cryptic language in the poetry, wisdom, and prophetic books.  When you see little of relevance in these passages, it is easy to become discouraged and quit reading, returning instead to the familiarity of the New Testament.  If your sole reason for reading the Old Testament is because you are supposed to since it is part of the Bible, that reason will not sustain you through “the doldrums”.  In this post, I hope to give you reasons not only to read the Old Testament, but to love the Old Testament.
Inspired and Profitable
The doctrine of Scripture is the foundation of all other doctrines, which is why my theology page and posts on theological illiteracy begin with the doctrine of Scripture.  A biblical theology of Scripture holds that every bit of the Bible is inspired by God and that the Bible in its entirety is sufficient to equip us for life and godliness: “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16-17).  While this certainly applies to all of Scripture, we can see from context that this is particularly referring to the Old Testament.  Paul started the letter by recalling the faith of Timothy’s grandmother Lois and mother Eunice (2 Timothy 1:5), so they are the ones who taught him “the sacred writings”.  Eunice was a Jewish Christian, but Timothy’s father was a Gentile (Acts 16:1-3) so he was not brought up in the Jewish community.  Still Eunice and Lois taught Timothy the Old Testament.  Therefore, Paul is reminding Timothy that the Old Testament is able to make him wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.  So along with the New Testament, every word of the Old Testament is inspired and profitable.  Additionally, Paul specifically says that they are useful because they “are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus”.  Yes, the Old Testament is able to make you wise for salvation.  The New Testament did not come in a vacuum but into the context of the Old Testament.  This is seen in countless direct quotes and references to the Old Testament found throughout the New Testament, especially in its first and last books.  Written to Jews to prove that Jesus was their King, Matthew includes numerous references to Old Testament prophesies.  And Revelation contains more Old Testament references than any other New Testament book, so you cannot hope to understand Revelation if you do not understand the Old Testament.  Therefore, studying the Old Testament will greatly enrich your understanding of the New Testament.
Jesus is the Point
We are tempted to focus on the New Testament not only because it is often easier to understand but also that we find Jesus there. But you can find Jesus in the Old Testament as well—and not just a few places.  If you have a keen eye, you can spot Jesus everywhere in the Old Testament because the entire Old Testament like the New Testament is about Him.  He said as much on the Emmaus road after the resurrection:
And he said to them, “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?” And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself.
-Luke 24:25-27, ESV
Notice how Jesus interpreted “in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself” in Moses and the Prophets—i.e. the entire Old Testament.  He is even clearer to his disciples:
Then he said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.” Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, and said to them, “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.
-Luke 24:44-47, ESV
Here Jesus sums up the meaning of the Old Testament in statement that followed: He would suffer, die, and rise again, bringing forgiveness through faith and repentance that would start in Jerusalem and spread to all the nations.  The entire Old Testament therefore points to Christ and prepares the way for Christ, so if you diligently search for Jesus throughout the Old Testament, you will find Him.
Finding Jesus in the Old Testament
If Jesus can be found throughout the Old Testament, how do we find Him?  The first step is to properly interpret that passage within the context of redemptive history.  Since the Old Testament covers thousands of years, observing where a passage falls within that history is vital.  Every passage was written to specific people at a specific time in a specific context, so bear in mind how the original audience would have interpreted the passage.  Remember, the Bible was written for us but not to us.  Still, we have an enormous advantage over the original audience because we have the entirety of God’s revelation in the form of the complete Bible.  We can read the Old Testament with the New Testament in mind and therefore see how Old Testament passages fit within the greater story of redemption.  In addition to what we discussed on how to study the Bible, look for what the passage teaches us about who God is, who we are, and the plan of redemption.
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Rather than aim for perfection, conservative energy would be better spent rebuilding the foundations of virtue. We need laws that, for instance, encourage marriage, discourage divorce, and promote community through friendship and civil associations. The benefits of rebuilding a healthy society are uncontroversial. Moral regulations must build upon this foundation rather than grate against it. In this way, conservatives can support incremental progress toward traditional morality while avoiding the twin dangers of judgmental moralism and amoral libertarianism.

Tim Keller recently critiqued evangelical Christians for not developing a political theology—that is, a theory of how to apply religious beliefs to public policy. He correctly points out that Christians do not want to penalize every sin. Specifically, most evangelicals want to penalize abortion but do not want to penalize idolatry (i.e. false religion). He writes: “Since we can’t simply say, ‘If the Bible says its sin it should be illegal’—how do we choose which morals to politically champion?” Keller aims to prevent Christians from dividing over politics by accepting that the political implications of Christianity are debatable. Keller’s piece provoked a response from several commentators, including Adam Carrington.
Keller’s challenge applies not only to Christianity but to ethical philosophies more generally. Should an action be illegal simply because it is wrong? If not, then which wrong actions should be illegal? Are there “harmless wrongs” that the state ought not to forbid?
In America, one often hears that the state shouldn’t “legislate morality,” or that people have a right to do anything so long as they aren’t “hurting anyone.” This position derives from John Stuart Mill’s famous “harm principle,” which holds that the state may only interfere with liberty to prevent non-consensual harm to other people. Live and let live!
This view, while popular, is wrong: the law may encourage virtuous actions and punish evil ones. As I have argued elsewhere, conservatism ought to abandon the liberal idea that the state exists solely to protect individual rights. Rather, individual rights derive from, and must remain rooted in, a framework of moral duties oriented toward natural human goods. Natural goods are not fleeting desires; rather, they are perceived by reason to be worthy of pursuit for their own sake because they enable humans to reach the best possible state according to their nature. If, then, rights are designed to facilitate the pursuit of natural goods, one cannot have a “right” to do wrong.
Nevertheless, drawing upon the natural law theories of Thomas Aquinas and Richard Hooker, I will argue that the state ought to refrain from punishing minor vices. Sometimes, people ought to have tacit “permission” to perform wrong actions, particularly those with minor social consequences. This view of the relationship between morality and law is attractive in that it encourages the promotion of virtue while preventing harsh intolerance. It acknowledges the reality of human sin without excusing or ignoring moral norms. It is idealistic without being unrealistic.
The Common Good Involves Virtue
Classic natural law thinkers hold that human law ultimately derives from natural law, which originates from God’s creative design and is known through reason. Thomas Aquinas argues that the natural law encompasses “everything to which a man is inclined according to his nature,” including virtue, since all people have a natural inclination to pursue virtue (Aquinas, Political Writings, 119). As the Anglican Richard Hooker–who followed Thomas rather closely–wrote in The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, humans have a natural “desire” to become “more perfect,” i.e. to reach “an exquisite excellence of form” by “constantly and excellently doing whatever it is that their kind does” (62). They not only seek “continued existence,” both for themselves “individually” and for their species “through their offspring,” but above all aspire “to the greatest conformity with God by pursuing the knowledge of truth and growing in the exercise of virtue” (63).
Achieving basic goods, moreover, requires good political institutions. Hooker states that societies need laws “governing the order of their common life together,” which must be framed “for the sake of the common good” and for “the sake of public order” (82). Thus, as Aquinas likewise notes, “human laws should be adapted to the common good,” i.e. the collective flourishing of members in a political community, which is accomplished especially through natural goods such as life, peace, friendship, and the rearing and education of children (Aquinas, 138). Even supposedly private actions implicate the common good to the extent that they promote or hinder human flourishing.
In a chapter in Mere Christianity called “The Three Parts of Morality,” C.S. Lewis provides a good example of how virtue promotes the common good. He invokes the image of society as a naval convoy traveling through the ocean. There is a danger that the ships will either “drift apart from one another, or else collide with one another and do one another damage.” In order to avoid this, the individual ships must be in good shape; a ship with a faulty engine or steering mechanism will fall behind or veer wildly. The only way to keep the convoy safe is to ensure that each individual ship is seaworthy enough to stay in formation. Likewise, individual people who lack virtue are especially likely to harm others. So even “private” actions affect people’s ability to follow the rules and to lend society their aid.
If virtue serves the common good, then the promotion of virtue falls within the state’s legitimate powers. Hooker writes that “the course of politic[al] affairs cannot in any good sort go forward without fit instruments [i.e. citizens], and that which fitteth them be their virtues.” He argues for this reason that “pure and unstained religion ought to be the highest of all cares” for rulers inasmuch as religion is the best way to inculcate virtue among the citizenry. Whatever view of church-state relations we choose to adopt nowadays, Christian theorists traditionally perceived the inculcation of moral character to be a chief priority of good political communities. The same is true of non-virtuous or “vicious” acts, which may be proscribed. Hooker states that laws are not “properly devised” unless they “presume that man’s will is obstinate” and seek to “moderate his actions to prevent any hindrance to the common good” (82-83). This classic view follows Romans 13:1-7, which states that God instituted government to be a “terror” to people who do “evil” but to “praise” those who do “good.”
The Danger of Banning all Vices
Natural law theorists nevertheless believe that there should be practical limitations on laws that compel virtue or punish vice.
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The Bible calls all Christians to be above reproach, to have unquestionable character, to have a life that is so consistent that no blame or disgrace can be attached to it. Pastors (and surely any others with a public platform) are expected to exemplify this virtue. When they have been involved in a scandal that, if found out, would bring reproach upon Christ and his church, the best and wisest and holiest thing they can do is to protect Christ’s cause by removing themselves from public ministry. This is a display of true repentance, a proof of genuine remorse.

In recent months the evangelical world has been rocked by a number of scandals, by news of yet more leaders who used their churches or ministries to indulge themselves to the harm of others. These are yet more cases of men who will no doubt stand before God some day and plead all their accomplishments—“Didn’t I preach the gospel for you? Didn’t I encourage many people in their faith? Didn’t I lead many people to the Lord?” Yet despite such pleas, they will surely hear words of the severest condemnation. They will learn in that day that accomplishments stacked as high as heaven are no recompense for character sunk as low as hell.
Their stories are consistent with so many others in a number of details, including this: There were many times at which they should have stepped aside. There were many times at which, had they genuinely loved the Lord and wanted the best for his church, they would have acknowledged their disqualification from any kind of public ministry and then quietly backed away. They would have displayed their love for the Lord by their willingness to abandon the platform they had proven themselves unworthy of. There may still have been scandal, but it would have been tempered by their genuine repentance, their genuine willingness to leave behind all the benefits that came with their platform. It would have been tempered if only they had shown humility by initiating their own departure.
But that’s not the way it goes, is it? No one ever resigns. No one ever steps aside. No one ever has such integrity that he counts himself disqualified and removes himself from public ministry. Or very few, anyway.
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