Jesus in the Old Testament is a series of posts that will offer my readers a chance to consider pictures or shadows of Jesus in the Old Testament. As mentioned in the introduction to this series, some may be obvious, some may be not so obvious, and some may simply be a facet of the Lord those reading may not have considered previously.

I hope as we venture through this series, we will see the Lord in many wonderful pictures throughout the Old Testament.

Abel was a shepherd. Jesus was a carpenter. But in reality, Jesus was a Shepherd, a good Shepherd, not of those four legged wooly critters, but of a more stubborn and cantankerous type of “sheep”.

Yes, both were shepherds, but Jesus was the Shepherd of all Shepherds, and is the One who not only was murdered due to anger and envy, but His mission was to lay His life down. As far as I can imagine, Abel did not have an inkling of the darkness in Cains heart when they went out to the field. Abel never saw it coming!

Jesus came to die. It was His end goal, His target to hit, the will of God for Him. For Abel, his death was a consequence of living a God honoring life, of seeking to do good. He was the first martyr, and his end would be repeated by many others before the good Shepherd would experience the same vitriol of hatred. But for all the martyrs that have come and gone, the good Shepherd has joined in the same suffering, and provided us a salvation from the enemy of our souls, the one who desires to murder our souls!

Similarities between Abel and Jesus exist, and they are awesome to find as we venture through the Old Book, as we consider not only the similarities, but also the differences.

Can you think of any other similarities?

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