Tom Wright gives his response to a reader’s question
Q. How should Christians read Old Testament prophecy?
I am often asked whether the Old Testament really predicts Jesus, or whether Christians sometimes force meanings on to ancient texts that were never intended.
Sceptics occasionally suggest Christians read the prophets like fortune-teller’s predictions, vague enough that almost anything can be made to fit. There is an important point hiding inside that objection.
Many Christians have grown up hearing the Old Testament explained as though it consisted of isolated prophecies. Then, alongside each one, we place an event from the life of Jesus and declare the prophecy has been fulfilled.
Sometimes that happens. Zechariah 9:9 speaks of Israel’s king coming “humble and riding on a donkey” (NRSVA); and Jesus deliberately entered Jerusalem in exactly that way. But that is not generally how it works.
When we read the prophets, we need to do so through three different lenses. I wear varifocal glasses: one part helps me see what is close, another what is far away, and in between is the middle distance. Old Testament prophecy often works like that.
The first lens asks what the passage meant in its own historical setting. For example, what was Isaiah saying to Israel in exile? The second lens looks towards God’s ultimate purpose for the whole of creation. The prophets were not simply interested in solving one immediate political crisis. They were looking ahead to when God would finally put the whole world right.
In between comes the middle lens, where we see Jesus. The danger comes when we jump straight to Jesus and forget the larger story, or if we leave Jesus out altogether. The three lenses belong together.
Take Isaiah 40-55 for example. This extraordinary poem builds movement upon movement until it reaches its climax in chapter 53. It begins with God’s promise to comfort His exiled people. Israel longs for the Lord to return to Zion, deal with the sin that led to exile, overthrow the idols and establish His kingdom once more.
But then comes the surprise. Isaiah 53:3 says the God who will return to rescue His people will be someone “despised and rejected by men, a Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief” (NKJV). The suffering servant somehow embodies Israel, yet also stands over and against Israel, doing for God’s people what they cannot do for themselves.
Only when we have followed the whole sweep of Isaiah’s vision can we ask how this is fulfilled. The New Testament writers answer without hesitation: Jesus’ entire public ministry announces that what Moses and the prophets had anticipated is coming true.
The ministry of John the Baptist fulfills the prophecy spoken in Isaiah 40:3: “This is he who was spoken of through the prophet Isaiah: ‘A voice of one calling in the wilderness, “Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him.”’” (Matthew 3:3).
The suffering servant shapes our understanding of Jesus’ death. The promises of a new covenant and new creation begin to unfold through His resurrection. Jesus does not merely fulfil a handful of disconnected predictions; He fulfils the whole story.
The writers of the New Testament did not perform clever tricks with specific verses. They recognised that the great narrative – which began with Israel’s exile, God’s promised return, the defeat of evil, the forgiveness of sins and the renewal of creation – reached its climax in Jesus the Messiah.
The prophets did not merely predict isolated events. They were telling the story that Jesus would one day step into.
Hear more from Tom Wright on the Ask NT Wright Anything podcast
No comments yet