JY: Welcome to Gear Talk, a podcast on Biblical Theology. Today, Jason DeRouchie and Tom Kelby talk about the Old Testament prophets. How much did they know? Did they know about books that had been written earlier? What about the time to come? How much did they know about the gospel and the Messiah?

JD: Hi friends, welcome to Gear Talk. This is Jason DeRouchie and I’m sitting across the table from two good friends, Tom Kelby and Mark Maloney. Mark, who are you?

MM: Hi I’m associated with Hands to the Plow Ministry. Sitting in today, just listening to Jason and Tom ponder these truths.

TK: He’s thinking he’s not going to talk, and Jason and I thought that was funny, and we’re going to keep making him talk.

JD: That’s right. So we’ve actually been gathered the last couple of days for our whole team. And gathering up in northern Wisconsin and it’s been such a sweet time of fellowship and eager now to get into this podcast. We’re going to be focusing today on what did the prophets in the Old Testament actually know? How much did they know? We know that God, who’s the author of all of Scripture, has known everything from beginning to end. And that as he inspired the scripture itself, he had an ultimate goal in mind. He knew Jesus was going to come. It was part of his plan. But the question is, how much did the human authors that he was using to proclaim these truths—how much were they aware of? And so we want to wrestle with that today.

TK: Mark Maloney and I were just talking a second ago and I said I have a friend and a guy I travel with, Bob McCoy, and he said when he grew up, he thought that Jesus was a little bit like—when he appeared in the Old Testament—look a little bit like in America, at least, a groundhog on Groundhog Day pops out for a little bit, disappears. So in a certain passage like Isaiah 53, oh, there he is. That passage is about Jesus. Or take another pic, Isaiah chapter 7 or Psalm 22, he shows up for a little bit and then he’s gone. And I would say that’s at least what my perception of the Old Testament was—is there’s passages that talk about him, but he shows up more as a bonus than a known thing that the prophets know about and are talking about.

JD: Sure, but when we come to the New Testament and we get their perspectives on what the Old Testament prophets were doing and how much the Old Testament prophets understood, it seems as though we’re we’re actually getting a different view from Jesus and the apostles regarding how much those who came before them actually understood. That’s our target today. We want to focus on this question: what did the prophets know? And we’re going to begin in 1 Peter chapter 1. Tom, why did we go there 1 Peter 1:10–12.

TK: I this is really a stunning passage it—what it says here about the prophets. So Peter in verses 1 through 9 of 1 Peter—he’s writing to this group of people who’ve been scattered, believers, and he’s using actually language taken from the Old Testament. But he lays out the gospel message. And so in verse 10, he says, “Concerning this salvation, the prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully.” And I think it says a couple of things right away. It says the prophets wrote about this salvation, meaning the salvation that believers have now, that’s what the prophets wrote about. And I would say at least for me, if you would have said, what did the prophets write about? My thought would have been they wrote about Old Covenant things, and so they wrote about another salvation, a different thing than what I have, and the New Testament is about the New Covenant. But Peter’s not saying that.

JD: Right, he’s not. And and we might also think, oh, when we think about the Old Covenant prophets, we picture them portraying a God of wrath, a God of fury who’s coming after sin. And that’s there, but what Peter says in this passage is that the very gracious salvation that we’re enjoying today, that’s what the prophets were talking about.

TK: Yeah. So, he says, “The prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours.” So they wrote about the grace that the three of us at this table have experienced in the Lord Jesus. So the question is, which prophets? How many of the prophets actually wrote about that? Was it infrequent or the majority of the prophets? Or did all the prophets write about that?

JD: And in the process of when they were writing about this grace, how was it happening? What was actually—how aware were they of what they were writing? And was it coming only in visions and dreams, or what were the means by which God was actually giving them the instruction and they were all of a sudden writing about the salvation that you and I enjoy?

TK: Yeah, this is really remarkable—what Peter says—because he says the prophets who prophesied—so they were writing about our salvation, “Prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully.” So the question is—that’s not a dream. They’re searching somewhere; they’re inquiring somewhere. The question is where did they search? Where did they inquire? And Peter knows something about this.

JD: Right. So it appears as though these are brothers that were doing research and were doing it prayerfully. They’re inquiring and they’re searching something. What would they have had that they could have searched among and where might they have inquired?

TK: So they can’t search the New Testament, there isn’t one yet. And if you are a prophet, you can’t search writings that come after your time because they haven’t happened yet. So for instance, Isaiah can’t search Malachi. But you can search earlier Scriptures that have been written. And the question would be then—that sounds like a premise, like I bet they could have done that, is there a way to prove that they searched earlier Scriptures? And it—would Peter have said this not based on the Lord told me they did this—which we believe the Lord inspired all scripture—but would he said this because he would say, I have evidence they did this. I know for certain the prophets looked in earlier writing.

And they did it not just as a—I should be reading these, right? But they’re searching for something. That’s what Peter’s saying. They searched and inquired carefully. And what we’re saying, what we’re arguing for right now is they’re doing research in earlier scriptures. But they’re looking for something. So what they’re looking for is “what person or time, the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories” (1 Pet 1:11). This means the Spirit of Christ in them was predicting Christ’s sufferings to them already. And the glories of his person, his Kingdom, his work. They knew all about this, but it says what they’re wondering is what person or time. They have specific questions they’re looking for that they’re wanting to find answers to. It it speaks, really, of a deep longing—I have to know more about that.

JD: Knowing about the Messiah and when he would come, this is what was on their mind, and they were prayerfully inquiring, wrestling carefully with what God had already given them and in the process God is revealing them more.

TK: An example I use with people sometimes—and this, at least in America, we have these things, we have these name tags that we use if there’s a gathering. And it might say hello, my name is and then you write a name. And they talk frequently about the Christ, the Messiah. But imagine a table at a party or something where everybody—you’re wondering, people are coming and they take the name tag off and they put it on their shirt. But there’s a name tag that says the Christ on there. They know all about this person. They don’t know who’s going to come in and put it on himself as, Oh that’s the one, I see him now. I know when he came. But they know all about him. That’s, at least what we’re arguing. Before we get to the Old Testament—that’s what Peter is saying.

JD: That they’ve got a sense of who was going to come and when he was going to arrive. They had a sense of his identity and they were longing to know more. So they were searching and inquiring carefully. And it was the Spirit of Christ who was indicating to them such things.

TK: As I said before we go—I think for me that’s such a fun picture of the prophets. Because I think what I grew up with is they’re having dreams, visions. But I didn’t picture them with scrolls and and reading things, trying to find something out. They’re a lot like us.

JD: They are, and it’s intriguing even in a book like 1 Peter, where we’re at, 1 Peter is loaded with Old Testament quotations and Old Testament illusions. Peter himself has been searching his scriptures in the process, and he’s pointing to texts that are often reaching even further back. When we read Isaiah, we’re reading regularly allusions to Moses. It identifies these were people—the Old Testament prophets were bathed in their scripture. And a key element in the process of their alluding to Moses was alluding to texts that were pointing to the person or the time of Christ coming.

TK: So what you’re saying is Isaiah was reading the first five books, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. He was not only reading, searching these things for his favorite subject, which was the grace that was to be ours in the coming Christ.

JD: That’s right. This isn’t the only place Peter talks about this. In the book of Acts, early on in Acts chapter 3, he says, explicitly, “What God foretold by the mouth of all the prophets” (Acts 3:18). What are you talking about, Peter? “That his Christ would suffer, thus he has fulfilled”—that’s Acts 3:18—all the prophets. Now, I was recently engaging another Old Testament professor and he said that’s just hyperbole. Hyperbole. When it says all the prophets spoken this way.

TK: Exaggerating to make a point.

JD: Well, I would actually distinguish exaggeration. I think exaggeration is designed to misdirect people, whereas hyperbole is—at least there’s still something there that is true, and he’s bringing emphasis to it in order to draw attention. Even if that’s the case—and I don’t think it is because even a little bit later it’s talking about how Moses foresaw the prophet like Moses who is to come. And then it says in verse 24, “All the prophets who have spoken from Samuel and those who came after him also”—along with Moses—”proclaimed these days.” Like he’s not just referring to all in a general sense he refers to Moses. Then he goes to Samuel.

TK: And then he says all.

JD: And then he says, and all the rest also, over and above these two, proclaimed these days about the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow. That’s how Peter is thinking about his Old Testament and about the specific prophets who who were writing and proclaiming. They knew Jesus was coming. They recognized his sufferings. And the rise of the church—they saw it.

TK: Would you say that these statements so far from Peter and Acts and obviously other place in New Testament—that as a believer you could go then to a book that you don’t know very well. So take a take one of the prophets. Let’s pick Joel and say I think I already know what Joel is about. I know what he’s doing. I just don’t know how he does it. He knows about the Messiah.

JD: He knows about the Messiah and he’s writing about grace. And when we open up his book, the New Testament is giving us a clear call to go look for where Joel talks about the person of Christ and the time of his coming, what’s it associated with. And it may often—the proclamation of the Messiah and his time may often be related to an Old Testament illusion within the Old Testament itself. That’s what it’s saying.

TK: And examples of this are all over the place where you’d say I have evidence that, well, in the same way in 1 Peter, for instance, he’s thinking of lots of passages, some that he goes to repeatedly. But we also find this in the Old Testament. You’d say it’s clear that, for instance, Ezekiel in Ezekiel 47 is thinking of Psalm 1 because he quotes it.

JD: Unpack that a little bit.

TK: So, someone talks about the blessed man who does not walk in the counsel of the ungodly stand in the way of sinners, sit in the seat of mockers—his delight is in the law of the Lord (Ps 1:1–2).

JD: And that blessed man is then paralleled or put up alongside of the blessed people. So Psalm 1 opens, “Blessed is the man,” and Psalm 2 ends, “Blessed are those who take refuge in him” (Ps 2:12).

TK: And so we start with a man who constantly is meditating on God’s law and obeying. And he’s never doing what’s evil. And as believers, we can rightly say in Christ that speaks of us. But the only reason we can is because of what it says at the end of Psalm 2, “Blessed are those who are in him” (Ps 2:12). He’s made us righteous. He’s done something, but as a first read through of Psalm 1, I am not that blessed man that doesn’t describe my life. I have sat in the seat of the scoffers. I have had plenty of time when I’ve not meditated on God’s law. This someone describes perfectly an Adam-like figure because it’s talking about a tree planted by rivers of living water. It’s using all language taking from Genesis, but it’s a new kind of Adam—an Adam, who perfectly obeys, doesn’t disobey. And that one, we’d say, wait a minute, I know who that second Adam is, that is our Lord. That picture—so it says he will be “like a tree planted by rivers of water gives forth its fruit in its season, and whose leaf does not wither” (Ps 1:3).

JD: And it’s at that point that we have that connection with Ezekiel 47.

TK: Right. So Ezekiel 47, there’s a significant chunk in Ezekiel where he is talking about a brand new temple to be built.

JD: And out of that temple is flowing a river.

TK: Yep, and the river is coming. And wherever this river goes, life comes.

JD: Like new creation—the Dead Sea itself that couldn’t host any fish and around which nothing wants to grow is going to be transformed into a place where fish are going to be thriving. I like this image. There’s going to be fishermen gathered all around this this lake and then in a route everywhere, the desert between the temple and what was the Dead Sea is being transformed into like a new garden of Eden. That’s the picture we’re getting in Ezekiel. 47.

TK: And the way you just said that I can think, wow, that sounds like the grace God has given us in Christ. But I could say, apart from Peter’s words, I wonder if—Ezekiel surely doesn’t know that he lives in an Old Testament time period. He wouldn’t know that. And Peter is arguing. Yes, he does. And he was searching scriptures, wanting to know more. So what he says here in Ezekiel, he’s talking about it. I’ll just read, talking about starting verse 11 of Ezekiel 47, “Its swamps and marshes will not become fresh; they’re to be left for salt. And on the banks on both sides of the river there will grow all kinds of trees for food. Their leaves will not wither, nor their fruit fail, but they will bear fresh fruit every month” (Ezek 47:11–12). And what’s significant about this is that statement, their leaves will wither is a direct quote from Psalm 1.

JD: There’s only two places in all of Scripture where we see that exact phrase Psalm 1, Ezekiel 47.

TK: And so Ezekiel’s describing a temple. But he’s quoting a passage that’s talking about a man. It’s a stunning thought, really. If if you think about it, you’d say, Ezekiel, how can you be taking something that belongs to a man and refer to a temple and out of that temple life comes to people? Surely he doesn’t know about the gospel we know, does he? Does he? Because we can get there very easily when Christ said my my body is a temple and even things he said which are alluding to the same passage, “Whoever believes in me out of his heart will flow rivers of living water” (John 7:38). So Jesus is thinking of this passage, but Ezekiel is thinking of the blessed man from Psalm 1 here, but he refers to him as a temple and the fruit that’s coming out from him.

JD: It’s intriguing that in the earlier part of the book, that isn’t portrayed as a future visionary account, where he’s just talking tangibly about the restoration that will come after the exile. He identifies the period of restoration as the period where his presence will be in the midst of the people, and then he associates that same period with “My servant David shall be king over them” (Ezek 37:24)—the very time when God’s Spirit will be poured out upon the people is the day when they will be following the new king David, whom we know of as Jesus.

TK: Yep. And what we’re arguing is Ezekiel is not writing about things he doesn’t know about. He’s been searching. So he was reading the Psalms, looking for something specific and he found it in Psalm 1. So that also provides a lens for how should I be reading the Psalms if that’s how the prophets are doing it.

JD: There’s another great example in Psalm 72. Psalm 72 is a—it says over the top of it, “A Psalm of Solomon.” So a psalm associated in some way with Solomon that celebrates a kingdom far beyond anything David or king Solomon produced in the Old Testament. A kingdom that has a king that will rule in justice, who will crush the oppressor, where righteous will flourish and peace abound unto eternity, till the moon is no more. That’s the image. And we get a number of phrases that recall things from Genesis, even the great Genesis 3:15 promise of the offspring of the woman crushing the serpent—like, may desert tribes bow down before this coming king and his enemies lick the dust. That’s that’s exactly the sphere of where the serpent was judged. But into this context, then we get a key phrase that’s going to be repeated later in the Old Testament.

TK: So verse 8, “May he have dominion from sea to sea and from the river to the ends of the earth.”

JD: This is a global dominion, reaching from sea to sea, from the river, that’s the great Euphrates river. May his kingdom expand all the way to the ends of the earth. This was the vision in Genesis 22, of the offspring, the male offspring of Abraham—may he possess the gate of his enemies (Gen 22:17). So all of a sudden he has turf, and yet he’s claiming the turf of his enemies. His kingdom is going to be expanding, and through this offspring, all the nations of the earth will be blessed. So as his Kingdom expands, the blessing of God expands. It’s like that’s the one we’re talking about here. Now many people might read Psalm 72 and say, well, that’s just talking about the earthly king.

TK: It’s talking about—you could possibly say—it’s talking about Solomon and it was like his kingdom extended to the end of the earth.

JD: Right it would be that potential exaggeration or maybe better hyperbole. But I’m talking about in extreme language in a way that didn’t really happen in Solomon’s day. But I was still referring to Solomon. Why might we say what would be a good case using the Old Testament’s use of the Old Testament, that would suggest, no, that’s not what this passage is about.

TK: Well, I think for us, and we’ve practiced this in the New Testament, how did the apostles interpret Scripture? That is to be a guide for us. Jesus said that—in the upper room when he said that the Spirit would help them, they would perfectly remember, they would perfectly know (John 14:26; 16:13). So gives us confidence in following the apostles.

JD: So in specifically, they would remember all that Jesus taught them. So Jesus was modeling the type of exegesis we see the apostles doing, the way that the apostles are interpreting scripture is actually recollections of how Jesus interpreted scripture for them.

TK: And I’m convinced those verses in John 14 and then 16 it’s repeated are for our benefit. So we can say they didn’t get it wrong. I can trust the apostles when they say something. That’s not Peter twisting something out of the way because Jesus’s words are on the line. He said they would get it right because of the Holy Spirit. So a question then is what about the prophets? So how do I know what the prophets are doing? Is it fair to say I can look at how another prophet interpreted something and say, OK, I can follow his lead if he’s interpreting in a certain way, I should follow his lead.

JD: So we at least have a good example here in relation to Psalm 72. How the prophet Zechariah—this is after the northern Kingdom and the southern Kingdom are both destroyed—Zechariah is the prophet of the return back to the land, and so we’re in this period moving out of exile. But before the New Covenant has come, but there’s no king on the throne, and yet Zechariah is going to draw on Psalm 72 and celebrate the king that Psalm 72 was talking about.

TK: And I think, again going back to where we started in 1 Peter 1:10–12, that thought of Zechariah was searching and inquiring carefully, determining what time and place the Spirit of Christ in him was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ, the glories to follow. Zechariah is looking for something, and he finds it in in Psalm 72.

JD: Psalm 72. So what did he find?

TK: Well, in verse 9 of Zechariah 9 it says, “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is he.” So he’s writing about a king. And it’s a kind of king that Jerusalem will celebrate. So Zechariah is excited about this particular king.

JD: But already in just those words, you’ve already read, those are familiar to me. I’ve heard those before.

TK: Going a little bit further you go, I know I’ve heard them before, because it says here, “He’s humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt the foal of a donkey.”

JD: This is the passage that John quotes in John 12 in relation to Jesus’s triumphal entry.

TK: Right. And even in that thought of the way the apostles would word this sort of thing is thus fulfilling the words of the prophet. That idea of what Jesus did is a fulfillment of Zechariah’s words. So you’re able to say Zechariah was talking about this.

JD: So Zechariah, I mean, it’s explicit—there’s a king coming from the time of Zechariah all the way up until the days of Jesus there’d been no Judean king, no king from Israel to redeem at all. And yet he’s envisioning a coming king, riding on a donkey and John says Jesus is the one, he’s the coming king. It’s very clear the one that Zechariah was envisioning is the one we know of is Jesus.

TK: Right. And Zechariah is very excited about what he’s writing here. So, he goes on. He says, “I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the war horse from Jerusalem; and the battle bow shall be cut off, and he shall speak peace to the nations” (Zech 9:10). Again we are that same idea from Psalm 72. This is a king. It’s beyond just one nation that we’re dealing with. This has gone to a worldwide thing. You went back to Genesis 22—that idea of a king who’s going way beyond, his territory goes way beyond one specific place.

JD: The piece here, it recalls texts like Isaiah chapter 2 where all the nations have gathered to Jerusalem to hear God’s law. And all of their weapons are turned into garden tools.

TK: Because they don’t need them anymore.

JD: Because they don’t need them anymore. And in fact, it’s not only that they don’t need the weapons, but now what are they in the business of?—Cultivating a new garden, a new Eden. That’s the the vision. There’s a new creation and they have new roles. And here it’s that same imagery and it’s this king riding on a donkey who’s going to be leading the new process.

TK: So now we get to the end of verse 10 and it says, “His rule shall be from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth.”

JD: Now, it’s amazing to me—I look here and, yeah, I’ve got a little footnote right next to “His rule shall be from sea to sea, and from the River to the end of the earth.” And I go to my margin and it says Psalm 72:8.

TK: And the question is—we always wonder this when we look at these things—are they saying, hey, that’s sort of like this or this is a similar passage? What it’s saying in this connection is he’s quoting Psalm 72:8.

JD: Word for word, it’s right there.

TK: Word for word. So it’s not that they’re both reading the same thing. It’s Zechariah had that psalm in front of him and he’s thinking about it. And even though he quotes that one little part, he’s thinking about the entire psalm.

JD: That how we see it. And that whole idea of new creation and global peace—that’s what Psalm 72 is talking about.

TK: Right. Right. So for us, the question we started with is what did the prophets know. Zechariah knew a king is coming, and when he read the Psalms and he—the one we see just in this passage, we’re talking about Psalm 72—he was so excited because he said, that’s the one I’m already writing about, and I will demonstrate it by quoting that psalm. The gift to us is now, all of a sudden, I’ve been given help in Psalm 72. One of the prophets has said I’ll help you out here. I will demonstrate this is what you thought maybe it was about. I might have thought that sounds sort of like Jesus. And then Zechariah is saying no, it is Jesus. And John in quoting that same passage, is putting a stamp on it, saying you can rest assured that’s what this passage is about. So what’s interesting is John takes us back to Zechariah, but I don’t have to stop there, I can go from Zechariah to Psalm 72.

JD: And even as I’m reading the end of Psalm 72, you don’t have to stop at Psalm 72 because Psalm 72 ends in verses 16 and 17, right toward the end of the psalm, “May people blossom”—like new creations—”in the cities, like the grass of the field! May [that king’s] name endure forever, his fame continue as long as the sun!” And then it says, “May people be blessed in him, all the nations call him blessed!” And then there’s a little footnote that says, oh, go check out Genesis 22:18, and that’s exactly where it’s talking about the offspring of Abraham, a male individual who possessed the gate of his enemies and through his offspring, all the nations of the earth will be blessed. So all of a sudden we’re in, John, we jump back to Zechariah. Zechariah leads us to Psalm 72, and Psalm 72 reaches us all the way back to Genesis. And in all four texts, we’re talking about the same person, whom John now gives us his name. It’s King Jesus, who’s entering into Jerusalem and who is going to triumph through his tribulation.

TK: So interesting. You frequently say this: we have the first 3/4 of the Bible are the Old Testament.

JD: 75.5%.

TK: Oh, there we go. They’re .5 more than I just said. But that thought of what we just said is we have four texts celebrating Christ as king—we had three of them right here that all came from the Old Testament. We had Zechariah doing it. We had Solomon in Psalm 72, so it’s meaning the same thing if he’s quoting Genesis 22. He’s doing the same thing. Zechariah was; he’s searching diligently, looking for something. But it’s not like searching like a heartless sort of researcher sort of person who doesn’t care. He’s delighting in his work, he’s loving his subject and he knows he’s writing for the benefit of a future people. So that’s us.

JD: He knows it because I mean, Peter stresses that these prophets who spoke of the grace that would be ours, the saving grace they were searching and inquiring carefully to know what person and time the Spirit of Christ in them was predicting when he foretold the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories. And then Peter says, “It was revealed to them”—those Old Testament prophets—”that they were serving, not themselves but us” (1 Pet 1:112). The Old Testament is Christian scripture. As we end out this podcast, reflect with us, Tom, just the significance of a passage like Ephesians 2:20 for Christians today.

TK: And I hope for you—something like this today just makes me want to read these passages again, because hopefully, like what Peter’s talking about, we’re saying I want to search and inquire carefully because this is my this is my favorite subject too. So Ephesians 2:20 this is a passage and interesting because we are talking about a temple being built here, but it says here that, I’ll start in verse 19, “So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit” (Eph 2:19–21).

And what what you were referring to is what’s the significance of verse 20? It says on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, that this superstructure, this temple, is resting on something. And it’s not meaning it’s resting on the man, Peter, as if our salvation rested on a human sinner. That’s not what it’s meaning. It’s meaning what they wrote, the things that they proclaimed, our salvation rests on those things, these established truths. And we should think then, OK, the apostles talk about this temple. But also the prophets do. I think the apostles are listed first—interested to hear your thoughts about this—but I would say they’re listed first because we’re being given an indication here, go to them first as the proof of how to interpret the rest of it. But it’s not saying in that the New Testament is better than the Old. I would say what it’s saying is look to the apostles, look how they use the prophets, do the same thing. What would your thoughts be about that?

JD: I think it’s helpful. Everything today as believers has to be run through the apostles. In Acts chapter 2, right after Pentecost, the group that was saved was gathering for fellowship breaking of the bread, and to hear it says explicitly the teaching of the apostles (Acts 2:42). It’s the apostles teaching that provides the foundation of the church. The apostles Bible was the Old Testament. And we work through the apostles and all of a sudden, Moses matters to us. We work through the apostles, and Isaiah gains clarity. But…

TK: In this passage, it’s not saying, though, Isaiah is the junior varsity like junior varsity scriptures, and then we have the varsity once we get to the New Testament at all.

JD: Right. And it’s very clear throughout the rest of the New Testament that the Old Testament prophets are massively foundational. We’ll talk more about this because it’s so important for the topic of Gear Talk, Biblical Theology. But the Old Testament prophets, as Paul says in Romans chapter 1, they foretold the gospel and the gospel of God concerning his son (Rom 1:2–3). It was the Old Testament prophets where Paul first learned about such things. He met Jesus…

TK: Thinking of David right now and David being a prophet (Acts 2:30).

JD: Acts chapter 2, yeah.

TK: Yep, just that statements like that, you see that over and over again and it connects it to and seeing the Christ. They know exactly what they’re writing about.

JD: That’s right. So friends, another Gear Talk podcast. It’s been a joy to be with you. Thank you for listening in today.

TK: See ya. JY: Thanks for joining us for Gear Talk. If you have questions about Biblical Theology, you’d like us to address in future episodes, e-mail us at [email protected]. Also check out HandstothePlow.org for resources designed to help you understand the Bible and its teachings. We’ve included links to some of the resources particularly connected to this episode in the episode notes.