“Show your work!” Math teachers everywhere scrawl this message across their students’ homework. This book by Michael Vlach, an ardent and articulate defender of dispensationalism, could be summarized as an attempt to respond to that challenge. Jesus fulfills the OT; that is the answer. How? To answer this question is to show the work. Vlach attempts to demonstrate that Jesus is not the fulfillment of the OT so much as he is the means by which all the details of the OT are fulfilled (p. 6).

First, Vlach refutes “Christocentric hermeneutics,” which he labels “metaphysical personalism” (p. 12). He defines this view as the claim that “major Old Testament promises, prophecies, and covenants vanish, dissolve, transform, or absorb into Jesus in such a way that the details of these will not be accomplished” (p. 11). To show he has not misread the literature, he cites several scholars who use this exact language (pp. 12–15). Ultimately, he finds this view exegetically, theologically, and philosophically wanting because it misinterprets fulfillment language, implies unfaithfulness in God, and spiritualizes the text (pp. 16–17). The remainder of the book is a constructive attempt to answer the titular question.

Vlach begins with an analysis of three key texts to establish his thesis. First, he argues that Matthew 5:17–18 presents Jesus not as the fulfillment of the OT but as the agent who accomplishes its fulfillment (pp. 19–25). Second, he argues from Romans 15:8–9 that Jesus accomplishes this task in varied ways, based on different promises to Israel and the Gentiles (pp. 25–28). Third, he suggests that the phrase, “to fulfill all righteousness,” in Matthew 3:15 relates to the transformation of the earth through the establishment of a righteous kingdom at his second coming (pp. 29–31). For Vlach, this seems to imply the continuance of the land promises to Israel, not their dissolution in Jesus.

Vlach proceeds to sketch six ways Jesus fulfills the OT, but these can be simplified to three. First, Vlach notes that some passages are fulfilled rather straightforwardly. These include specific messianic prophecies like Jesus’s birth in Bethlehem (p. 35) and general messianic expectations like his rule over all nations (pp. 44–46). Second, Vlach argues that some OT texts are fulfilled through correspondences between events or persons rather than predictive prophecies. To illustrate this point, he focuses on correspondences between Israel’s Exodus and Jesus’s childhood (pp. 59–71) and correspondences between the sufferings of Jesus and the sufferings of David (pp. 73–77). Third, using the language of shadow and substance, he argues that certain features of the Old Covenant adumbrated the person and work of Christ. He highlights Israel’s festivals and ceremonies (pp. 79–86). He concludes with a chapter that catalogs promises and prophecies that either remain to be fulfilled or were fulfilled after Jesus’s earthly ministry.

There is much to appreciate in this book. For example, I found Vlach’s refutation of “metaphysical personalism” compelling. I also appreciated his evaluation of the correspondence between Jesus and David. He noted with admitted surprise the frequency with which events in Jesus’s life were said to fulfill events in David’s life, particularly in his sufferings (p. 73). I believe this is one of the best ways to show that the OT spoke beforehand of Christ’s sufferings. Should not the Son of David be like his father, that righteous sufferer?

Nevertheless, I would grade Vlach’s work as incomplete for two reasons. First, he rarely engages with opposing scholarship, thus leaving the false impression that there are only two views on this subject: dispensationalism and his opponents’ metaphysical personalism. One alternative I wish he would engage concerns the identity of Israel and its relationship to the church. John Carpenter has shown an OT expectation that Israel would be multinational (“Genesis’s Definition of Israel and the Presuppositional Error of Supersessionism,” TrinJ 42 NS [2021]: 17–34). Moreover, Jason Staples has shown that modern scholars conflate the Jewish people with all Israel when the NT writers recognized them as only that subset of Israel associated with Judah (The Idea of Israel in Second Temple Judaism: A New Theory of People, Exile, and Israelite Identity [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021]). This conflation is evident in Vlach’s work (p. 28). I wonder how engagement with these scholars would affect the work of Vlach and other dispensationalists.

Second, while Vlach places Christ at the center of his explanation, he often leaves Christ’s death and resurrection at the periphery. Accordingly, his work lacks a principle to unify the diverse expectations of the OT. Luke provides that principle when he declares that Jesus fulfills all the written things through his death, resurrection, and the Gentile mission (Luke 18:31–34; 24:44–47). Too often, Vlach neglects to show how Christ fulfills the OT by way of the cross. This lack is especially glaring in his discussion of the New Exodus and the transition from the Old Covenant to the New. Thus, he does not fully answer the titular question.

Ultimately, Vlach’s book is not helpful as a guide but as a challenge. It challenges pastors, students, and scholars to focus on the details and show their work as they attempt to explain how Jesus fulfills everything that is written.