Reading the Old Testament with the Magic Eye

Do you remember those Magic Eye posters that were popular in the 90's? They appeared as meaningless patterns, swirls and mis-matched colors broken into un-understandable gibberish. You could stare all day at a corner of the poster, labeling each pixel by color and position, and never have any idea what they were about. Yet if you stood back, and allowed your focus to shift- suddenly an image would take form. What appeared meaningly and random now revealed intention, design.

I think we often read the Old Testament in isolated parts, and expect each part to stand alone- most obvious in our reading of the conquest of Canaan. We expect to see God fully visible in every second, to have our reason, our understanding fully appeased in every episode of His workings. Yet we read of a God who sometimes relents of destruction, but who other times requires it. We read of a God who forgives some sins quickly, and yet brings just punishment down on others. If we read the Old Testament as isolated parts, we are tempted to see a capricious God, a whimsical God, an unmeasured and dangerous God.

And indeed He is dangerous, as C.S. Lewis well portrays. And He does act differently in different times, this is true. Yet His plans have purpose, purpose only visible when we step back and allow our vision to widen and to shift.

To step back, we must read scripture in context. We must understand what happens throughout the bible- not that God is fully revealed in each moment, but progressively through different and building revelations of Himself over time. These specific narratives only make sense as part of a greater story, He is not capricious, or whimsical, or unmeasured. His work is intentional, each moment a determined step towards an intentional determined end- that of calling His people back to Himself.

Yet to step back is not enough. To see the story of God clearly, to understand His plan, there must be a shift in our focus. We must shift from being ones who seek to figure God out, to those who submit to Him. We must change from fearful caution against being fooled, to loving trust for a God who's plan is larger, grander, and more wonderful than any we could understant. This is a shift of focus only possible in Christ, for there we find the grander end, the plan that makes all the steps worthwhile. There we find a God who is trustworthy, whether we understand or not. From this position, then, we begin to truly understand the scope of God's redemptive story, and the role that each particular part plays in the whole.