Debby Topliff

Do you anyone who reads the last page of a novel before the first? My husband and I subscribe to a magazine that has its table of contents inside the back cover for just such folks. (There must be a lot of them!) Today I realized that I unconsciously painted the books of the New Testament in reverse order: Revelation, Acts, then the Gospel of Mark. I began with the end of the story and worked my way backwards from effect to cause. Revelation tells the end of the story, Acts shows how the first Christians lived their lives in preparation for the end, and Mark explains how it all began with one special person.

This fall I’m auditing a seminary course on John’s Gospel and sketching some of the chapters. As I study the extended teachings of Jesus and reports of his miracles, I find myself thinking about the backstory—what came before, what is the context Jesus is speaking and acting out of. That takes me back to the Old Testament. Like all boys and girls in ancient Galilee, by age 13 Jesus would have memorized the whole Torah—the first five books of the Old Testament. Then as a student of a rabbi, by age 30 he would have memorized the entire Old Testament.

So that means whenever he quotes or refers to an OT passage, he is evoking the whole passage. There are countless examples of this, but one that came to mind yesterday is Isaiah 6. This is the most-quoted OT passage in the NT. In John 12 Jesus tells his listeners a seed of wheat must fall to the ground and die in order to bear fruit and become many. Then John summarizes the apparent effect of Jesus’ ministry by quoting Isaiah 6—people don’t see or understand.

As I “read backwards” I was amazed to find in Isaiah 6:13 that the Holy Seed is the stump—which will restore God’s kingdom. Follow the trail back to the beginning of Genesis and you see God has laid out his plan of salvation from the start.

Don’t give up if you don’t see or understand. Ask the Lord, open his Word, and follow the bread crumbs to the Bread of Life.