Our hearts will burn within us when we find Him.
by Kelsey Gjesdal
Our dust clouds puffed from the ground as I walked side-by-side with Cleopas down the road from Jerusalem. The seven-mile journey felt long — too long for weary feet. Not that my feet were really that weary; we’d barely started our journey. It was more like my heart was weary, dry like the dust rising and falling with our steps. Pointless.
Cleopas sighed. “How could we be so wrong?”
I shook my head. “Everything had lined up . . . till three days ago.”
Neither of us spoke for a moment, the rhythmic plodding of our feet filling the air.
“Do you think they’re right?”
“The women?” Cleopas asked.
I nodded. “I . . . don’t know. I mean, I’ve seen crucifixions before. You can’t survive that. Rome wouldn’t let you survive that horror.”
“They didn’t say He survived. They said He resurrected.”
Another set of plodding feet joined ours, and I turned to see a man walk up next to me, not much older than I. He smiled warmly. “I couldn’t help overhearing, and I’m intrigued. What have you two been discussing?”
Cleopas stopped dead still. The sadness etched on his face mirrored how my own heart felt. “Are You the only one visiting Jerusalem who doesn’t know what’s happened these past few days?”
The man cocked his head. “What things?”
I almost laughed. How absurd anyone coming from Jerusalem wouldn’t know! “The things about Jesus of Nazareth,” I answered. “He was a prophet who did mighty deeds and spoke mighty words before God and all the people. But the chief priests and our rulers sentenced Him to death, and He was crucified. We were hoping that Jesus would redeem Israel, that He would be the Messiah. But it’s been three days since all this happened.”
Cleopas nodded. “Some of the women who followed Him went to His tomb early this morning and didn’t find His body there. They claimed to have seen angels who said He was alive. Peter and John went to the tomb, and it was empty as the women said, but they didn’t see Jesus anywhere.”
The man shook his head sadly. “O foolish men! How slow you are to believe what the prophets foretold! Didn’t the Scriptures say it was necessary for the Christ to suffer crucifixion and to enter His glory?”
I looked over at Cleopas, utterly confused. He just shrugged. The priests and rulers had always taught that the Christ would overthrow Rome. What was this man talking about?
The man began walking again and motioned for us to follow Him. “Let’s go back to the Scriptures and start with Moses.”
Pointing to Christ
The above story, adapted from Luke 24, tells of the Lord Jesus joining two men as they walked down the road to Emmaus. They were downcast after the Lord’s crucifixion and perplexed that the women who went to the tomb three days later found it empty. But Jesus had an answer for their confusion: The Christ was to suffer and enter His glory. Then Jesus expounded on the Scriptures about Himself (24:26, 27).
Jesus did this for a reason. The Old Testament Scriptures teem with prophecies of the coming Messiah. In fact, all the Old Testament is written to point us to Christ. Even before the foundation of the world, the Father planned for Christ Jesus to redeem us (Ephesians 1:4; 1 Peter 1:20). Jesus was not the backup plan; He was the plan, and the Old Testament reveals that. On the road to Emmaus that day, Jesus walked His disciples through the Old Scriptures to show them this glorious truth.
Let’s walk through a sampling of the many ways the Old Testament points to our Savior and proves that He came not to overthrow the Roman Empire, but to overthrow the empire of sin and death and restore us to a right relationship with God.
Fulfilled prophecies
The first glimpse of the gospel is in Genesis. After the Fall, God promised to send someone to crush the head of the serpent that had deceived Eve (Genesis 3:15). Then God clothed Adam and Eve with animal skins to cover their nakedness (v. 21), a shadow of our Messiah who would clothe our spiritual nakedness with His robes of righteousness (Galatians 3:27).
The rest of the Old Testament is filled with prophecies concerning the coming Messiah, all fulfilled by Jesus Christ:
Born of a virgin (Isaiah 7:14; Luke 1:26-38);
Born in Bethlehem (Micah 5:2; Luke 2:1-7);
Proclaim the good news, set free the oppressed, and proclaim the “favorable year of the Lord” (Isaiah 61:1, 2; Luke 4:18-20);
Ride into Jerusalem on a donkey’s colt (Zechariah 9:9; John 12:14, 15);
Be betrayed by a friend (Psalm 41:9; John 13:18);
Die by crucifixion (Psalm 22; Matthew 27);
His clothing gambled away during His death (Psalm 22:18; John 19:24);
Refuse to fight to save Himself from crucifixion (Isaiah 53:7-9; Matthew 27:12-14);
No bones broken (Psalm 34:20; John 19:33);
Rise from the dead before His body could undergo decay (Psalm 16:10; Matthew 28).
Shadows of Jesus
Not only did Christ fulfill hundreds of prophecies, but the Scriptures are also full of shadows (called types) that point to Christ. These shadows are true events, objects, ceremonies, or structures that point forward to the truth of our coming Savior. Let’s look at three of the many shadows in the Old Testament.
The ark. Just as the ark saved Noah’s family from the judgment of the flood, Jesus saves us from the wrath of God to come. Just as the ark had one door, so there is only one way to salvation and a right relationship with God: through Jesus Christ.
The lamb. During the Jewish feast of Passover, the Passover lamb was to be unblemished and have no broken bones. Jesus was our unblemished Lamb, without sin so He could pay the penalty for our sins in our place.
The bronze serpent. During one of the many times Israel rebelled against God in the wilderness, the Lord sent poisonous serpents among the people. When they asked Moses to intercede for them to God, He commanded Moses to make a bronze serpent and put it on a standard. If those who were bitten by the serpents looked to the serpent on the pole, they would live (Numbers 21). Similarly, Jesus was lifted up on a cross so that those who look upon the cross will be saved from their sins and granted eternal life.
Burning hearts
When the two disciples finished their journey to Emmaus, they invited the man who explained Scripture to them to stay and eat with them. When He blessed the food, their eyes were opened and they realized who they had been traveling with: the Lord Jesus, alive from the dead forevermore! With their recognition, Jesus vanished from their sight.
Immediately, the two disciples returned to Jerusalem to share the good news with the rest of the disciples. “They said to one another, ‘Were not our hearts burning within us while He was speaking to us on the road, while He was explaining the Scriptures to us?’” (Luke 24:32).
The next time you sit down to read the Old Testament, look for Jesus in the pages. May our hearts burn within us as we see Jesus and the glorious gospel of grace in all of Scripture.
