Secret Church

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Having Trouble with the Old Testament? Posted: 20 Jun 2013 06:41 AM PDT Is it a struggle for you to read and understand the Old Testament? You can be honest. Many of us say that the Old Testament is important because it’s in God’s Word, which is obviously true, but in reality we’re not very motivated to read it. If that’s you, then consider going through Secret Church 1: Survey of the Old Testament. Pastor David Platt gives an overview of every book in the Old Testament, as well as principles for how to interpret this sometimes intimidating portion of Scripture. Below you’ll find a excerpt taken from the opening section of this study. Have you bought into one of these myths about the Old Testament? Common Myths The Old Testament is insignificant. Many times we think this is just background material for the New Testament. Why would we want to pay attention to the first half of the game if we already know the result of the second half of the game? Why would we want to sit in the stands with a blocked view when you can already see on the field what unfolds in the New Testament?  It is really not that significant for us in the 21st Century. The Old Testament is irrelevant. It contains a lot of things we don’t observe, things which don’t seem to relate to our lives anymore. There are a lot of people, even in Christianity, who say that the Old Testament is more for Israel and not for us. Let’s be honest, what relevance does an ancient animal-slaughtering religion that talks about God in a portable tent have for Christianity in the 21st Century? What does that really have to do with us? Have you ever read a passage in the Old Testament and just thought, “Why, Lord, did you decide to include that?” The Old Testament is inconsistent. It doesn’t make sense in light of the New Testament. This is where a lot of people disconnect the Old Testament from Christianity as a whole. They look at the Old Testament as a Jewish book. There are cults that use the Old Testament as well, such as Mormons. Even Muslims use parts of the Old Testament as part of their Scripture. The most commonly asked question is, “Why would the God of grace, love, mercy and compassion we see unfold in the New Testament, pour out judgment, wrath and punishment of sin in the Old Testament?” How do they go together? How do you explain the judgment that we see in the Old Testament, where entire nations are wiped out? How do you justify that with the God of love and grace and mercy? It seems inconsistent. The Old Testament is incomprehensible. What we basically think is that it is too cumbersome, or it is confusing and doesn’t make sense. It often leads us to boredom, apathy and neglect. It is just plain hard to understand. The books are large. They are filled with all kinds of history that many of us don’t know,  as well as unpronounceable names that we never could begin to talk about. How do you really begin to understand this? It is overwhelming. It is long. It is tedious. We are a lot more familiar with the Gospels where we see Jesus. As a result, we use the Old Testament every once in a while in our quiet times, but the bulk of our faith is dependent on the New Testament. The Old Testament just doesn’t make sense. The Central Message Well, these are myths I hope will be dispelled by one central message: The Old Testament is invaluable. If we abandon the books of the Old Testament, then we abandon the revelation of God. More than that, we hinder our ability to understand the New Testament’s revelation of God. If we abandon the Old Testament, we will never get the picture that the New Testament is trying to teach us. The key to the New Testament is the Old Testament. There are at least 1600 direct quotations of the Old Testament in the New Testament, in addition to all kinds of allusions and references to it. If we don’t get what the Old Testament teaches, we will never get Christ. It is important for us to remember that the Lord of the universe who gave us this book does not waste words. He gave us this entire book for a reason. It doesn’t mean that it is not confusing or tedious or doesn’t make sense. I will go ahead and be honest; I am not going to be able to answer all the questions that come up in the Old Testament. My desire is for us to see an overall picture of what God is doing and why the Old Testament is so important. Visit our Resource Library where you can find this and other Secret Church material. The audio and video downloads are free, as is the Study Guide that accompanies the teaching.  You also have the option of purchasing DVD’s and hard copies of Study Guides through our online store.

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