Jesus never preached from the New Testament.

That statement may sound strange, but the reason is simple. The New Testament had not yet been written.

When Jesus spoke about “the Scriptures,” He was speaking about what we call the Old Testament. The same was true when Peter preached at Pentecost, when Paul entered the synagogues, and when Philip explained the gospel to the Ethiopian official.

They preached Jesus from the Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms.

That matters because many Christians treat the Old Testament as little more than background material. They may know some stories about Noah, Abraham, Moses, and David, but they spend most of their time in the New Testament.

The New Testament is easier to understand in some ways because it speaks plainly about Jesus, the cross, salvation, and the church. But the New Testament did not appear without a foundation. God spent centuries preparing people to understand who Christ is and why He came.

Without the Old Testament, we may know that Jesus is called the Lamb of God without understanding the Passover. We may know that He died for sinners without understanding why blood and sacrifice were necessary. We may know that He is the promised King without knowing the promises God made to David.

Jesus told the religious leaders, “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; it is these that testify about Me” (John 5:39).

Those men studied the Old Testament carefully. They knew its words, laws, stories, and prophecies. Yet when the One to whom those Scriptures pointed stood before them, they refused to believe Him.

They knew the text but missed Christ.

That warning still matters. A person can know many Bible facts and still miss the Bible’s central message. Scripture is not a collection of unrelated stories. It is the record of God revealing Himself, dealing with sin, keeping His promises, and bringing salvation through His Son.

After His resurrection, Jesus joined two discouraged disciples on the road to Emmaus. They knew He had been crucified, but they did not yet understand how His suffering fit God’s plan.

Jesus did not merely tell them that everything would be all right. He opened the Scriptures.

“Then beginning with Moses and with all the Prophets, He explained to them the things written about Himself in all the Scriptures” (Luke 24:27).

Imagine hearing that lesson.

Jesus may have shown them the Passover lamb whose blood protected Israel from judgment. He may have pointed to the sacrifices that taught that sin brings death and forgiveness is costly. He may have reminded them of the bronze serpent lifted up in the wilderness, an event He had already used to explain His own coming death.

We are not told exactly which passages He used, so we should not pretend that we know. But the truth is clear. Moses and the Prophets had been pointing toward Christ long before Bethlehem.

The Passover prepared people to understand the Lamb of God.

The sacrificial system prepared them to understand the price of sin.

The priesthood prepared them to understand the One who stands between God and man.

The promises to David prepared them to understand the eternal King.

Psalm 22 described the suffering of the righteous One. Isaiah 53 spoke of a Servant who would be pierced for our transgressions and crushed for our wrongdoings. The Old Testament was not silent about Christ. The problem was that many people read it without seeing Him.

The apostles followed the same pattern Jesus used.

On the Day of Pentecost, Peter did not open the Gospel of John or the book of Romans. Neither had been written. He quoted Joel and the Psalms. From those Scriptures, he showed that Jesus had died, risen, and been exalted as both Lord and Christ.

When Paul entered a synagogue, Acts says that he “reasoned with them from the Scriptures, explaining and giving evidence that the Christ had to suffer and rise from the dead” (Acts 17:2–3).

Those Scriptures were the Old Testament.

When Philip met the Ethiopian official, the man was reading Isaiah 53. He asked who the prophet was describing. Scripture says, “Then Philip opened his mouth, and beginning from this Scripture he preached Jesus to him” (Acts 8:35).

Philip began with Isaiah and preached Jesus.

The first Christians did not treat the Old Testament as an outdated book. It was the Bible from which they preached the gospel. It showed them that Jesus was not an interruption in God’s plan. He was the fulfillment of it.

This does not mean every Old Testament verse is secretly about Jesus. We must read each passage honestly and in its proper setting. But the whole story moves toward Him. The promises, sacrifices, covenants, priesthood, kingdom, and prophecies prepare the way for Christ.

The Old Testament tells us what went wrong when sin entered the world. It shows that mankind cannot make itself right with God. It reveals God’s holiness, justice, mercy, and faithfulness. It creates the questions that the New Testament answers.

Why do we need a Savior?

Why must sin be judged?

Why was blood required?

Why is Jesus called the Lamb of God?

Why is He both King and Priest?

The answers did not begin in Matthew. They began in Genesis.

Christians need the entire Bible. The New Testament clearly reveals the fulfillment, but the Old Testament gives that fulfillment its depth. When we neglect it, our understanding of the gospel becomes thinner than it should be.

Read the Old Testament slowly. Ask what the passage reveals about God, sin, faith, obedience, judgment, mercy, and God’s promises. Then consider how it fits the larger story that leads to Christ.

Do not read the Old Testament merely to collect stories or search for interesting facts. Read it as Jesus and the apostles did: as the true Word of God that prepares the way for the Savior.

The Bible Jesus preached from still speaks.

And it still points us to Him.