Christ in Genesis, Part 1

You diligently study the Scriptures because you think that by them you possess eternal life. these are the Scriptures that testify about me…

John 5:39

We find Christ in the scriptures in many different ways. We first of all find Him in the New Testament, in the Gospels and in the Book of Acts we read about His life. But we also find Him in the Old Testament in prophecies, in types, and in images. In the sacrificial system of the Mosaic Law, for example, we read of the description of the suitable sacrifice, “A male without defect” (Lev. 1:3), symbolizing Christ who was without sin and died for our sins — “he who knew no sin became sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor. 5:21).

How do we find Christ in Genesis? There are many different ways, and it does not require us to injure the simple understanding, rather the book anticipates the coming of the Messiah. Just as the story of human redemption is incomplete without the Christ, so our lives are incomplete without Him. If we leave Christ out of the story and read it solely from the human point of view, all we have are people struggling with their own troubles, and it is not remarkably different from any other person’s or family’s problems. But if we see Christ in it, if we notice the prophecies, the images, the examples, then it becomes a story that God can use to bless us, to bless the whole world.

First, He is in the prophecies of Genesis. Paul correctly understood the significance of God’s words to Abraham, for God said, “To your seed” (Gen. 12:7; 13:15; 24:7), and the singular word referred not to the nation but ultimately to Christ, and through Christ to believers in Christ, to Christians. “If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise” (Gal 3:29). Through Judah, the son of Jacob, through his tribe would come a redeemer. The prophecy was given in simple words, without the fullest disclosure of the role of the Messiah, but it is certainly there.

As Jacob blessed his children, his words inspired of God to Judah were different from the others. “The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, until he comes to whom it belongs and the obedience of the nations is his” (Gen 49:10). The One worthy of devotion and authority is coming into the world one day and this Person we Christians understand to be Jesus of Nazareth. His coming is in two main parts — His first coming in the flesh to minister and teach us, to die for the sins of the world and to be resurrected from the grave — adn His second, when He returns victoriously to rule and reign.

But we see Christ earlier than that as well. In the Garden, after Adam and Eve sinned, God pronounced that a Redeemer was coming. To the tempter God said, “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head and you will strike his heel” (Gen. 3:15). The word translated as “offspring” or “seed” is singular like in Genesis 12:7, and it points to a single Person coming to confront and destroy the work of the devil.

Second, we see Christ in types in Genesis. “Types” comes from the Greek “tupos” and it means a form of something that depicts or can serve as an analogous picture of another thing, and this is introduced to us in 1 Cor. 10:6, “These things occurred as examples” and the word translated “examples” is “tupos”. The first “type” or example we see of Christ are the many sacrifices that are made in worship to atone for sin. The words we find in Hebrews, “without the shedding of blood there can be no remission of sin” (Heb. 9:22), but the human understanding of this truth is revealed through the worship of the patriarchs. This prefigures the sacrifice of Christ, and is a very primitive understanding of the truth that is fully proclaimed in the New Testament: “For the wages of sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom. 6:23).

Later we will examine the other ways we see Christ in Genesis. But there is a very clear application for us of these truths. The Messiah is not only Savior but He is also Lord — we cannot divide these roles. To be a believer or to be a Christian does not mean only to believe not in God in general, not to merely have a sense of right and wrong, not to merely attend church, but to specifically believe in the historical Christ, in Jesus of Nazareth as the Messiah, and to believe that His death and resurrection are the saving acts of God. It also means to allow Him to rule our hearts and lives. We stand today between His comings, but the prophecies must be fulfilled and Christ will surely return one day. We are never satisfied as His followers with anything less than His complete Lordship over this world. And neither are our hearts satisfied with anything less than His complete Lordship over our lives. He works and moves within us today.

The scepter belongs to Him and He alone is worthy to rule our lives. Worship Him now. Bow at His feet and proclaim Him as your Lord. The Savior who loves you and died for you also claims the right to be your Lord.