Over SpringBreak I went with FBC Waco’s college group to Helena,Arkansas on a mission trip. During the mornings we did construction and during the evenings we went to play with the local children. Although this was exceptionally fun,what I found to be the most influential aspect of the trip was one girl’s willingness to memorize Isaiah 53. I asked her why she chose that particular passage and she gave a response that I have not often heard in academic circles:it made her cry because she thought of Jesus.
The past few years of my life I have devoted my analytical capacities to higher criticism of the Bible. Thus,it has become difficult for me to read Jesus into the Old Testament. Beyond this,I could reconcile the Old Testament with the Gospels (and the historical Jesus),but I became unsure what to do with Paul and Early Church tradition.
I still have trouble assigning Old Testament texts to Jesus,but what I need to remember is that it was not only Paul and the Early Church who reinterpreted the Old Testament in light of the Christ,but Jesus himself said that the prophets spoke of him. And if I remember correctly,and I think I do,it was from the scroll of Isaiah that Jesus himself read.