Most Christians, when they sit down to study their Bible, immediately and almost reflexively open to the last quarter of Scripture, with scant attention paid to what precedes it. While many are familiar with New Testament revelation, few would claim the same sort of familiarity with the Old Testament. Often, the Old Testament is treated as a collection of moralistic stories for kids rather than an indispensable part of God’s self-disclosure. This priority of the New Testament over the Old is reflected in both the pulpit and the pew, and even in the names given to the testaments themselves (“Old” vs. “New”).

Christians are worse off for this. Scripture is a unified piece of literature, written under the superintending guidance of a single, divine Author. Just as you would not expect to understand a book by only reading the last chapter, so we cannot expect to understand God’s revelation if we relegate ourselves solely to its closing section. For us to truly comprehend and appreciate God’s redemptive work accomplished by His Son and recorded in the New Testament, we must understand all that came before. We must understand the Old Testament.

This course is designed to introduce you to the rich depths of God’s revelation in the first testament of Scripture. Though time will not permit us to explore each book as much as we might like, this course will orient you to each Old Testament book and its purpose in the greater story God has written.