Biblical Typology

I had the pleasure of teaching Biblical Typology at Koinonia Bible College in the fall of 1998. I also wrote the textbook for the course, as the subject is one that I know quite well, having begun an intense (if somewhat informal) study of types shortly after my conversion, a study which I have continued until this day. I had the privilege of sitting under the ministry of Jimmy Swaggart (whether the reader cares for the man or not, no one know knows anything at all about the Bible will argue that he is guilty of teaching false doctrine; quite the contrary, the man is a scholar of the Bible in his own right), and picked up a love for scripture in general and types in particular from him and the other ministers at his church.

But what is a type?

Typology is the study of the types, or shadows, which are found in the Old Testament. These shadows are shadows of the Lord Jesus Christ. Christ, who existed before His incarnation (remember, He is God and therefore always existed, even before His appearance in the New Testament), can be seen working in the lives of the Old Testament saints, such as Abraham, David, and Moses, just to name a few. To give a brief example, consider the following:

Moses was sent by God to deliver the children of Israel from Egyptian bondage. After spending 40 years in the desert, Moses arrives on the scene to tell Pharaoh, "thus saith the Lord God of Israel, let my people go." This one man, by the power of God, convinces the Jews to follow him, then manages to free all Israel from slavery by the shedding of the blood of the Passover lamb. He then leads his flock through the Red Sea, where the enemies of God's people are drowned. A victory celebration is held when the people realize what God, through this man, has done for them.

This "Bible story" is remarkably similar to the gospel story, where Christ the Savior was sent by God from Heaven to deliver man from his sin. Christ spends 40 days in the desert, and when he returns from the wilderness, He is empowered by the Holy Spirit to preach and win converts, erstwhile sinners that believed what he preached, dropped everything they were doing, and followed Him. Christ sheds His own blood, blood which has the power to remove the sins of those willing to believe His preaching. Converts are baptized in water, and spend the rest of their lives rejoicing that the powers of sin and the devil has been broken off of them.

Moses was not Christ, but he was a shadow of Him. Reading through the Old Testament we can plainly see what Christ Himself would later do by looking at what Moses and the other Old Testament characters did. As another example, this month's cover article, "And All The Days That Adam Lived... And He Died", demonstrates how the circumstances surrounding Adam's death tells the gospel story from yet another perspective.

An ongoing study...

The purpose of this column will be to attempt a survey the Old Testament, beginning with the creation account in Genesis, bringing out the shadows of Christ that are found in its pages. The reader is urged to study along, for much can be gained from a proper understanding of the Old Testament shadows. I can attest to the enrichment of my faith and the deepening of my understanding of the Word of God that has come directly from my study of types.