Have you ever opened your Bible and wondered if you missed something?
One minute you’re reading about God telling his people what they can eat. Later, you’re reading about Christians who do not have to follow those food rules. There are priests, sacrifices, and a temple. Then there is Jesus, who says the Scriptures were pointing to him all along.
What happened? Did God change the rules? Did he change his mind? And what are you supposed to do with the first three-fourths of your Bible?
The Old and New Testaments are both God’s Word, and both belong to his one plan to save sinners through Jesus. The Old Testament promises and prepares for the Savior. The New Testament tells us how he came, what he accomplished, and what he promises to do when he returns.
There are important differences between the two. Understanding them helps us read the whole Bible with greater clarity and confidence.
What is the difference between the Old Testament and New Testament?
The Old Testament contains the books written before Jesus’ birth. It begins with God creating the world and follows the history of his people, especially Israel. Along the way, we find laws, songs, wisdom, prophecies, and promises of a coming Savior.
The New Testament contains the Gospels, Acts, the apostles’ letters, and Revelation. It tells us about Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection, the spread of the gospel, life as his people, and the hope of his return.
The word testament is connected to the word covenant. That connection matters, but the two sections of the Bible are not competing explanations of how to get to heaven.
God did not begin by telling people to save themselves and eventually decide to send Jesus instead. His promise of a Savior goes back to humanity’s fall into sin in Genesis 3.
The Old Testament is also not simply law while the New Testament is simply gospel. Both contain both.
God’s law tells us what he requires and exposes our sin. His gospel tells us what he has done to save us. That distinction matters whether we are reading Genesis or Galatians.
If those terms are unfamiliar, the basics of Christianity can help you get started.
Why do Christians still read the Old Testament?
Imagine joining a movie halfway through. You might understand what is happening on the screen, but you would probably have questions. Why does that promise matter so much? Why is everyone waiting for this person to arrive?
Reading the New Testament without knowing the Old can feel similar.
You meet Jesus, the Lamb of God. But why a lamb? You hear him called the Son of David. Why David?
The Old Testament helps answer those questions. More than that, it is God’s Word through which he teaches us, calls us to repentance, and comforts us with his promises.
After his resurrection, Jesus showed his disciples how the Scriptures pointed to him:
“And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.”
—Luke 24:27, NIV
The risen Jesus opened the Old Testament to explain his saving work.
The creation account tells us whose world this is. The fall explains why it is broken. God’s promises show that he has not abandoned sinners. The Psalms give us words for grief and gratitude. The prophets reveal a God who keeps speaking to people who desperately need to listen.
“Old” does not mean useless. These are words our heavenly Father still uses to strengthen our faith.
Is the God of the Old Testament different from the God of the New Testament?
Sometimes people describe the Bible as though God underwent a personality change between Malachi and Matthew: angry before, loving afterward.
But listen to how God describes himself in Exodus:
“The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness.”
—Exodus 34:6, NIV
Long before Bethlehem, God was gracious.
And in the New Testament, Jesus warns about judgment, hell, and the seriousness of sin. His love does not mean he dismisses evil. The same Lord who showed mercy to Israel calls sinners to repentance through Jesus and his apostles.
There is one God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. He is holy and merciful in both Testaments.
The Son did not begin to exist when Mary gave birth. The eternal Son became truly human to save us. To explore his identity further, read Is Jesus actually God?.
God’s unchanging character matters when life is painful. We do not have to wonder which version of God hears our prayers. The God who kept his promise to send Jesus is the God who hears us now.
For more on difficult questions about his goodness, see How could a good God allow so much suffering? and Evil is real, but so is God.
How does the Old Testament point to Jesus?
Sometimes through a direct promise. Sometimes through sacrifices or an office that prepares us to understand his work.
We should pay attention to what each passage says and how the New Testament explains its fulfillment.
In Genesis 3:15, God promises that the woman’s offspring will crush the serpent’s head, though his own heel will be struck. Here is the first promise of the Savior, who would suffer and defeat the devil.
Later, God promises that all nations will be blessed through Abraham’s offspring. Galatians 3 connects that promise to Christ. God also promises David a lasting throne, and the New Testament identifies Jesus as the promised King.
Then there are the sacrifices.
An Israelite watching an animal die was seeing something serious about sin and the need for atonement. But an animal’s blood could not, by its own power, take away human sin. Hebrews explains:
“It is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.”
—Hebrews 10:4, NIV
Those sacrifices pointed forward to the perfect sacrifice of Jesus.
The prophets also speak of the coming Savior. Isaiah describes his suffering:
“But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed.”
—Isaiah 53:5, NIV
The passage directs us toward the Savior who bears our sins and brings peace with God. It does not promise that every believer will experience immediate physical healing.
We do not have to invent a hidden meaning for every stone, tree, or number to find Jesus in the Old Testament. God has given us promises and connections that Scripture itself helps us understand.
What is the old covenant?
The term old covenant usually refers to the covenant God made with Israel through Moses at Mount Sinai. It governed Israel’s life as his chosen nation, including worship, sacrifices, and national laws.
That is not exactly the same thing as the Old Testament.
The Old Testament books contain much more than the Sinai covenant. God’s promises to Abraham, for example, came centuries before Moses received the law.
Notice another important detail: God rescued Israel from Egypt before giving the commandments at Sinai. He did not tell enslaved people to earn their deliverance. He delivered them and then instructed them in how to live as his people.
The Sinai covenant included commands, blessings for obedience, and consequences for disobedience. The trouble was not that God’s commands were bad. His people kept breaking them.
We understand that problem. Knowing what is right does not automatically make us do it. We can know we should be patient and still snap at someone we love.
The law exposes sin. It cannot make sinners righteous before God through their obedience.
But God’s promise of salvation remained. Israel’s sins did not turn his plan into a failed experiment that required a new idea.
How were people saved in the Old Testament?
By God’s grace through faith in his promise.
They were not saved by keeping enough commandments or offering enough animals.
Genesis tells us:
“Abram believed the LORD, and he credited it to him as righteousness.”
—Genesis 15:6, NIV
Paul returns to that passage in Romans 4 to explain justification by faith apart from works.
Abraham needed God’s gift of righteousness. So do we.
Old Testament believers trusted the Savior God had promised. We trust that Savior knowing his name and the history of his death and resurrection. The amount of revealed detail is different. The Savior is the same.
Their forgiveness was real. Their faith was real. The Holy Spirit was already at work through God’s Word, creating faith in hearts that could not bring themselves to spiritual life.
This keeps us from reading the first part of the Bible as a lesson in earning God’s love. From the beginning, sinners have needed grace, and God has promised rescue.
What is the new covenant?
Through the prophet Jeremiah, God announced that he would make a new covenant with his people. At the heart of that promise is forgiveness:
“For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.”
—Jeremiah 31:34, NIV
Those are words a guilty person needs. God promises forgiveness, not merely another opportunity to try harder.
At the Last Supper, Jesus connected that covenant with his sacrifice:
“This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you.”
—Luke 22:20, NIV
The promised forgiveness rests on his saving work. He would give his life for sinners, paying the price we could never pay.
In the Lord’s Supper, Jesus gives us his true body and blood with the bread and wine for the forgiveness of sins. His gift makes the promise personal: for you.
A Christian’s comfort rests in what Jesus gives, not in how impressive our faith or obedience feels.
The new covenant also includes God writing his law on hearts. Through the gospel, the Holy Spirit creates faith and moves believers to love God and their neighbors. That work of renewal was not absent before Jesus came; the Spirit was at work in Old Testament believers too.
Our obedience is the fruit of salvation, not its price. Do good works earn you heaven? explains that distinction further.
Do Old Testament laws still apply today?
If the Old Testament is God’s Word, why do Christians not offer animal sacrifices or follow Israel’s food laws?
Because those commands had a purpose that Christ has fulfilled.
Jesus said:
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.”
—Matthew 5:17, NIV
It helps to distinguish three kinds of laws. These are useful teaching categories, not headings printed above every command in Scripture.
Moral laws express God’s abiding will for people to love him and their neighbors. Murder, adultery, theft, and idolatry have not become acceptable. The New Testament continues to condemn them.
Ceremonial laws governed Israel’s worship, including sacrifices, ritual purity, and religious festivals. They pointed ahead to Christ. Because Jesus offered the perfect sacrifice, Christians do not bring another animal to an altar.
Paul also explains Christian freedom concerning food regulations and sacred days:
“Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath day. These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ.”
—Colossians 2:16–17, NIV
Christians are not bound to Israel’s required seventh-day rest, though we still need and gladly hear God’s Word.
Civil laws governed ancient Israel as a nation. God has not commanded the church to impose Israel’s national legal code on every country. Those laws teach us about Israel’s history and God’s concerns for justice, but their specific penalties are not the church’s instructions for governing society.
We do not decide what applies by asking which commands we like. We read each passage in context and listen to what the rest of Scripture says about its fulfillment and application.
Jesus perfectly obeyed the law, bore its curse for us, and fulfilled the sacrifices that pointed to him. His work frees us from trying to earn salvation. It does not give us permission to call sin good.
Why is there so much violence in the Old Testament?
Some passages are hard to read. Wars. Murder. Abuse. Entire communities under judgment.
If you have stopped at one of those accounts and wondered how to understand it, that question deserves careful attention.
First, distinguish what the Bible reports from what God approves. Scripture tells the truth about human evil. Recording a murder or an act of abuse does not make it acceptable to God.
Other passages describe judgment God himself commands or carries out. Those require more than the explanation that people behave badly.
God is the holy Creator and Judge. Human life belongs to him, and his judgments are just. That does not make every question easy, especially when children are involved. It does mean our limited understanding cannot provide a better view of justice than his.
Israel’s conquest of Canaan belongs to a particular divine command and moment in history. It gives Christians no authority to wage religious war. Jesus sends his church to make disciples through his Word and Baptism, not to conquer territory by force.
Remember the cross too. God does not brush evil aside. His Son bears the judgment our sins deserve so that we can be forgiven.
These paragraphs cannot answer every question about every passage. Read the specific account carefully and discuss it with a faithful pastor. Why does God allow evil? and Is murder OK in the Bible? address related questions.
How should beginners read the Old Testament?
Start with a manageable portion. You do not have to solve every question about Leviticus before learning from Genesis.
Genesis introduces creation, the fall, and God’s promises. Exodus shows God delivering Israel and establishing his covenant with them. The Psalms give you words to pray when you are grateful, guilty, afraid, or grieving.
Read a Gospel alongside them so you keep learning about the Savior they anticipate.
Ask what is happening in the passage. Who is speaking? To whom? Is this a command, a promise, a prayer, or a description of someone’s actions?
Context helps keep us from claiming a promise God made to a particular person as a guarantee of our own career success or physical safety.
Then ask what the passage teaches about God and us. Where does it expose sin? Where does it give a promise? How does it fit into the history that leads to Jesus?
Let clear passages help you understand difficult ones.
Read with other Christians too. God gives us pastors and fellow believers for a reason. Asking questions is part of learning.
For practical help, explore How do I start reading the Bible?, Where should I start reading the Bible?, and What part of the Bible do I read next?.
Old Testament vs. New Testament at a glance
| Topic | Old Testament | New Testament |
|---|---|---|
| When the books were written | Before Jesus’ birth | After Jesus’ earthly ministry |
| Focus in salvation history | Promises and prepares for the coming Savior | Proclaims the Savior who has come and will return |
| Main contents | Creation, Israel’s history, laws, wisdom, worship, and prophecy | Jesus’ life and work, the apostles’ ministry, and teaching for the church |
| Law and gospel | Contains both | Contains both |
| How believers are saved | By grace through faith in God’s promise | By grace through faith in Jesus, the promised Savior |
| Sacrifices and covenant | Includes sacrifices anticipating Christ and the promise of a new covenant | Proclaims Christ’s completed sacrifice and the new covenant in his blood |
Promise and fulfillment is a helpful way to understand the relationship, provided we remember that God was already saving people through his promises before Jesus was born.
Both Testaments also direct our hope beyond the present. Jesus has completed the work that pays for our sins. We still await his return, the resurrection of the dead, and life in the new heavens and new earth.
Discussion questions
- Why is it important to distinguish the Old Testament books from the old covenant made at Sinai?
- How does Abraham’s example explain the way people are saved in both Testaments?
- What is one example of law and one example of gospel in the Old Testament?
- How do Jesus’ sacrifice and the new covenant give comfort when your conscience accuses you?
- Why do Christians follow God’s moral will without observing Israel’s ceremonial and civil laws?
- What passage would you like to study with a pastor or Bible study group?
The whole Bible points to Jesus
Maybe you opened your Bible hoping to find a few good rules for life. You will find wisdom there. But God has something greater to give you than advice.
The Savior promised after humanity’s first sin came into our broken world. Jesus obeyed where we have disobeyed. He died for the sins we cannot undo. He rose so that death would not have the final word over those who trust in him.
That is why we can read both Testaments with hope, even when some passages take time to understand. The God speaking through these pages has kept his promise to save us through his Son.
Our confidence rests on his faithfulness. From Genesis to Revelation, he gives us reason to trust him.
