HOW WERE PEOPLE SAVED BEFORE JESUS?
As believers in Jesus Christ, we believe the entire Bible points to and culminates in the death and resurrection of Jesus. His death is the only way to salvation and reconciliation with God the Father (John 3:16, Romans 3:22, 1 Peter 1:18-19, Hebrews 9:12). But Jesus was born (and died) several thousand years into creation. How were people saved prior to the birth, life, crucifixion, and resurrection of Jesus?
Credit
Have you ever gone to Home Depot, Best Buy, or the mall and walked out with some product/merchandise without having to pay for it? You probably have, it’s called credit. You get something today, but until the bill comes due, you don’t pay for it. That’s a tiny illustration of how those were saved prior to Jesus’ incarnation and death. God gave those that lived before Jesus grace, forgiveness, and reconciliation “on credit” before the bill came due. Romans 3:25 says:
God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood –to be received by faith. He did this to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished – Romans 3:25
God had left sins “committed beforehand unpunished” and in his righteousness, paid the bill himself at the cross.
How can a man be right with God?
The book of Romans explains that every man knows there is a God and is without excuse because we look out at God’s creation (Romans 1:19-20). The next logical question then is found in Job 25:4 which states “How then can a mortal be righteous before God? How can one born of woman be pure?” Once we know there is a God, how can a man be right with him? I’m not sure that question is answered empathically in the Old Testament the way that it is in the New…or is it?
Faith
We know that men and women in the Old Testament were saved before Jesus. In fact, men were saved before the Mosaic Law. How was this done? The same way it’s done in the New Testament, by faith. All the way back in the first book of the Bible, in Genesis, Abram (Abraham) believed that God would provide him an offspring at age 75 (well passed he and Sarah’s childbearing years). Thus, we see in Genesis 15:6 that “Abram believed the LORD, and he credited it to him as righteousness.” It was Abram’s faith and trust in what God told him he would do that made Abram righteous before God.
Even a prostitute was saved—made righteous by faith! In Joshua chapter 2 we see how Rahab the prostitute saved the life of two Jewish spies by protecting them from the king of Jericho by hiding them on the roof of her house in stalks of flax. In James 2:25 it says, “In the same way, was not even Rahab the prostitute considered righteous for what she did when she gave lodging to the spies and sent them off in a different direction?” Rahab feared and believed that the God of Israel had given the Israelites the land and she acted in faith to save the spies (Joshua 2:8-11). And the New Testament tells us that she was considered righteous because of her faith.
Progressive Revelation
How exactly were Abram, Rahab and everyone else saved before the knowledge and understanding of Jesus Christ (or even knowledge of a Messiah)? “Progressive revelation” is the idea that God revealed certain aspects of His will and overall plan for salvation over different periods of time.
Scripture (both Old and New Testament) plainly states that faith is the key to salvation for all people throughout history. But how could God save people without their knowing of Christ’s sacrifice for them? God saved them based on their response to the knowledge that they did have. Their faith looked forward to something that they could not see. Today, however, we look back on events we can see.
Charles Ryrie, the late professor and theologian, explains progressive revelation like this: “The basis of salvation in every age is the death of Christ; the requirement for salvation in every age is faith; the object of faith in every age is God; the content of faith changes in the various ages.” No matter when a person has lived, their salvation is dependent on the work of Christ and faith placed in God, but the amount of knowledge a person had concerning the specifics of God’s plan has increased through the ages via progressive revelation.
Conclusion
People that lived before Christ were saved just like you and I are saved. They were saved by the death of Jesus at the Cross. Jesus is the only one that could pay the sin penalty. The fact that no one is saved apart from the death and resurrection of Christ is clearly stated in Scripture: “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” John 14:6.
The basis of salvation has been, and will always be, the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross, and the means of salvation has always been faith in God. However, the content of a person’s faith has always depended on the amount of revelation that God was pleased to give at a certain time. The detailed content of our faith—the amount of revelation given—has increased through the ages so that people today have a more direct understanding of what God requires of them.