Old Testament "Christians"

A thought spurred from my reading the other day . . .

For I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ (1 Corinthians 10:1-4).

“All ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink.” 

What does Paul mean by those statements? That all the Israelites ate and drank the same food and drink in the wilderness? Isn’t that kind of an obvious thing to say? 

But perhaps what Paul is saying is this: 

“All ate the same spiritual food [as us], and all drank the same spiritual drink [as us].”

This would fit the context of the next verse, then, which speaks of Christ. And Paul is making an important theological statement: that Old Testament Israel received Christ in His promises just as the Christians of Corinth. 

Maybe that’s obvious to you, but how important to know this: that Christ is present in His promises; that we receive Christ in His promises, wherever, whenever you live. Old Israel or New Israel, where the Word and promises of Christ are proclaimed and given, there He is given and there is the Church. 

So yes, the believers in the Old Testament were “Christians.”