Testaments, Old and New

Testament means “agreement.” The Old Testament laid the foundation for the time when Jesus would come and teach more about God. The Old Testament tells about God’s concern for the Hebrew nation and His instructions on how it was to live and worship. The New Testament is the new agreement God made with people through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. The Old Testament. The first part of the Bible has thirty-nine books that record what happened from the time God created the world until the time of Malachi, the last prophet—about 400 BC. The first five books—Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy—are called the Law and were written by Moses. The next group of books, the books of history, record what happened to the people of Israel from the time they entered Canaan until about 400 BC. These books are Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1 and 2 Samuel, 1 and 2 Kings, 1 and 2 Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther. Five books of poetry appear next in the Old Testament: Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Solomon. After the poetry books come the books of the major prophets: Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, and Daniel. After these come twelve short books known as the minor prophets: Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi.

The New Testament. A collection of twenty-seven books written about the life of Jesus, the early church, and the Christian faith. They were written between the years AD 50 and 90. There are four kinds of books in the New Testament: the Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John); Acts; the epistles (Romans; 1 and 2 Corinthians; Galatians; Ephesians; Philippians; Colossians; 1 and 2 Thessalonians; 1 and 2 Timothy; Titus; Philemon; Hebrews; James; 1 and 2 Peter; 1, 2, and 3 John; and Jude); and the book of Revelation.