I once had a friend try to convince me that Christians didn’t need to read the Old Testament. Really, I thought? We should just rip out 3/4s of the Bible?
But the Old Testament can be confusing. Right?! There’s a lot of people and a lot of seemingly random events. Lots of killing, lots of bad kings, and lots of stuff most of us find boring or irrelevant or disturbing. So is there any reason to read the Old Testament, and to share it with our kids?
Watch the video or read the transcript below to find out!
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The Old Testament has a lot to teach us and our kids, and it’s sometimes in the tiniest details that we see hints of God’s great plan.
One thing can help you remember why it’s still important:
Jesus was a Jew.
Jesus’ Scriptures were what we call the Old Testament. He was steeped in the stories, and the words of the prophets and the laws and he referred a lot of them in his teaching. Without a good understanding of the Old Testament, it’s really hard to get a good grasp on the New Testament. Which is why we need to teach it to our kids.
There’s one obscure thing that is rarely mentioned in the actual words of the Old Testament that was absolutely central to Jesus’ faith life, and it’s something that’s helpful for our kids to understand too.
–>In the Old Testament, there one very special place where God was thought to live. That place was called the Holy of Holies and only one person, once per year, was allowed to go into the Holy of Holies and meet with God. One person.
That very special place was protected by an enormous curtain. Early Jewish tradition stated that the Temple veil was as thick as a man’s hand.
That’s a thick piece of fabric! So it was tall, it was wide, and it was like an enormous KEEP OUT sign.
But at the moment of Jesus’ death, that curtain ripped in two from top to bottom. From top to bottom. Who could rip up a curtain 6o feet tall and as much as 4 inches thick? Only God. God was showing us something through this strange little sentence we’d only understand if we read the Old Testament, and it is so incredibly meaningful. He was ripping up that Keep out sign, and saying “come on in. I want you to know me.”
Carl Laferton has written about this in a super kid-friendly way in his book called “The Garden, The Curtain and the Cross”. This book takes you from creation through the fall, to redemption, and the end times. It’s very comprehensive, but still only 32 pages. Carl tells the gospel through the story of the temple curtain and it’ll probably make you realize you missed SO Much in the Old Testament!
So go buy it, read it, then spend some time in the Old Testament with your kids.
It won’t be waste of time, because if we can learn this much from a curtain, we can learn a lot more from the rest of the Old Testament.
If you love the books I have suggested, you can download my free list of the 10 best Christian picture books using the link in the description!
If you enjoyed this video, make sure you subscribe on Youtube or Like my Facebook page so you’ll get notifications when new videos are up! Each one contains short, sweet, hope-filled ideas for spiritually parenting our kids.
You might also like: 4 books to teach kids about the women of the Bible
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