Here’s a good rule to remember any time you are reading anywhere in the Bible … and especially the Old Testament.

In the Old Testament, every time you read about and see:

• a human failure and need to be saved: sin, disobedience, lostness, faithlessness
• an act of mercy
• a demonstration of salvation and deliverance
• a provision for forgiveness
• a promise of hope

…every one of these is a pointer, picture, prophecy, prequel, and a pre-enactment of Christ who will come and what He will do when He does come.

We learn this rule from Jesus Himself:

John 5.39 / You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me…

Luke 24.25-27, 32, 44-46 / And He said to them, “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! ²⁶ Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into His glory?” ²⁷ And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, He interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself … They said to each other, “Did not our hearts burn within us while He talked to us on the road, while He opened to us the Scriptures?” … 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.” ⁴⁵ Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, ⁴⁶ and said to them, “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead…

1 Peter 1.10-12 / Concerning this salvation, the prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully, ¹¹ inquiring what person or time the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating when He predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories. ¹² It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves but you, in the things that have now been announced to you through those who preached the good news to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things into which angels long to look.