"For I Tell you, Unless Your Righteousness Exceeds that of. . ."

fhansen

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The analogy of the speed limit can be used for any of God's laws. If we have perfect love for our neighbor, then we don't need be told not to murder them or steal from them because our love for them will cause us to meet or exceed those requirements. However, when you say it becomes unecessary, I want to be sure that I understand exactly what you mean because it sounds like you might be leaving room to say once we've gotten to where God would have us, it no longer becomes necessary to live in accordance with God's law, so someone could then feel free to murder, or steal, or break any of God's other laws. Rather, God's law would only become unnecessary when we are at the point where we meet or exceed all of its righteous requirements like the example that Christ set for us to follow. If you are made to meet a stricter or higher requirement, then that necessarily involves also meeting the lower requirements.
Ok, man's only requirement for justice is to love God with his whole heart, soul, mind, and strength and his neighbor as himself. This is what faith-and the relationship between man and God that it establishes- is meant to blossom into, and this just happens to be a very tall order. To the extent that we fill that order we'll never break the law-as a sort of side benefit almost-because love never harms. But it doesn't happen overnight; its a work of God's in us that we cooperate with-or not. So we never quite "arrive" in this life, but, again, if we did, the law would be rendered unnecessary. Augustine even went to the extent of wording it this way, "Love, and do what you like". Presumably there's no law in heaven-only love. This all assumes agape love, of course, love of a quality and quantity beyond human ability to achieve to any great degree on our own.
 
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God has always been holy, righteous, and good, so He always has such a conduct, and His law is holy, righteous, and good (Romans 7:12) because it is a reflection of His character and it is His instructions for how to have such a conduct. So the way to have such a conduct existed from the beginning, exists independently of any covenant, and did not change between covenants. The laws that govern the function of the Levitical priesthood changed because we now have a superior High Priest, but God's character and the way to act in line with His character did not change. As part of the New Covenant, we are also told to have a holy, righteous, and good conduct (1 Peter 1:14-16, 1 John 3:10, Ephesians 2:10), so we are still to follow God's instructions in His law for how to do that.

For example, we are told to have a holy conduct in 1 Peter 1:14-16, so if we want to figure out what it means we should do, then, then we should look at God's instructions in the law for how to do that, starting with where verse 16 is quoting from. In Leviticus 19:2-3, it talks about keeping God's Sabbaths, so it should be relatively straightforward that observing God's holy days is part of what it means to have a holy conduct. In Leviticus 11:44-45, keeping God's dietary laws is also part of what it means to have a holy conduct. So we are by no means permitted to sin by eating unclean animals or to violating any of God's other laws.

If morality were only in regard to man's relationship with man, the the first four of the Ten Commandments are not moral commands, including the law against idolatry. However, if morality is also in regard to man's relationship to God, then all of God's laws are moral laws. In fact, morality is based on God's character, so all of God's laws are inherently moral laws and God gave amoral laws.

In the Old Covenant, they were also under God's grace. Abraham and David were saved by grace through faith (Romans 4:1-8) and everyone else who was saved was also saved in the same manner. In Roman 13, it is talking about synagogue authorities, not civil authorities. In Matthew 5, Jesus was not teaching anything new, but rather he was teaching something ancient in correction of what the teachers of the law of his day were saying. Whenever he was quoting Scripture, he said "it is written...", but when he was quoting what the teachers of the law were wrongly teaching about Scripture, he said "you have heard it said...".
I agree that God's moral laws never change, but the way that He has chosen to punish those who disobey His moral commands within specific covenants has changed. Also, I disagree that the Sabbath is a moral law. A moral is something that is instinctively written upon all people's hearts. It is simply the ability to know right from wrong without any specific command telling a person to behave in such a way. The Sabbath Command is a ceremonial law because it is the observance of the day God stopped from His work in creating all things within 6 days. For us this is a day of rest from work as a parallel or reflection. For we are created in the image of God. The Saturday Sabbath has also not changed, either. A believer today can still observe such a day as God's Sabbath. However, God no longer requires us to observe this day as a part of our worship and rest in Him because Jesus nailed those ordinances that were against us. Meaning, observing a certain day as being holy does not make me a better person on a moral level to the rest of humanity; And we cannot be more holy than God, either. We are also not to go back to the Law of Moses in order to be justified. Scripture is very clear on that fact. We are only to obey the Commands in the New Testament and there is no Sabbath Command given to New Covenant believers. For Paul says there are some who regard every day alike. He also says we are not to judge anyone in regards to holy days or sabbaths, too. So this means, the Sabbath is no longer binding. In fact, believers under the New Covenant would gather on the first day of the week (Sunday) as a part of their fellowship and not on the Saturday Sabbath, as well.


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Soyeong

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I agree that God's moral laws never change, but the way that He has chosen to punish those who disobey His moral commands within specific covenants has changed. Also, I disagree that the Sabbath is a moral law. A moral is something that is instinctively written upon all people's hearts. It is simply the ability to know right from wrong without any specific command telling a person to behave in such a way. The Sabbath Command is a ceremonial law because it is the observance of the day God stopped from His work in creating all things within 6 days. For us this is a day of rest from work as a parallel or reflection. For we are created in the image of God. The Saturday Sabbath has also not changed, either. A believer today can still observe such a day as God's Sabbath. However, God no longer requires us to observe this day as a part of our worship and rest in Him because Jesus nailed those ordinances that were against us. Meaning, observing a certain day as being holy does not make me a better person on a moral level to the rest of humanity; And we cannot be more holy than God, either. We are also not to go back to the Law of Moses in order to be justified. Scripture is very clear on that fact. We are only to obey the Commands in the New Testament and there is no Sabbath Command givent to New Covenant believers. For Paul says there are some who regard every day alike. He also says we are not to judge anyone in regards to holy days or sabbaths, too. So this means, the Sabbath is no longer binding. In fact, believers under the New Covenant would gather on the first day of the week (Sunday) as a part of their fellowship and not on the Saturday Sabbath, as well.
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The way that God has chosen to punish disobedience has not changed, it is just that now Christ has taken that punishment instead of us. While our consciouses are good barometers of morality, they do not define morality because it is God's character and His standard of behavior that defines it. God his holy, so He rested on the 7th day, and the way to act in line with God's character is to also rest on the 7th day. Jesus is Lord of the Sabbath and kept the Sabbath perfectly, so we should follow his example.

What was nailed to crosses was the violations of the law that the person being crucified had committed, not the laws themselves, so they didn't need to legislate new laws every time someone was crucified. This fits perfectly with our violations of the law being nailed to his cross and with him dying in our place, but does not fit at all with needing to be redeemed from a set of holy, righteous, and good instructions. The problem with the Old Covenant wasn't with God's laws, but with God's people not following them, so it doesn't follow that God would make a New Covenant where He would lower His holy, righteous, and good standard so that we wouldn't have to meet it or that we should even want to be saved from something that is holy, righteous, and good. Rather, our salvation is from sin, and sin is defined as lawlessness (1 John 3:4), so our salvation is from lawlessness for the purpose of lawfulness.

The proper response to God's law is to delight in it and consider it to be a divine privilege (Romans 7:22, Psalms 1:1-2) because it gives rest for our souls (Jeremiah 6:16-19, Matthew 11:28-30). It is not possible to go back to the law in order to become justified because the law was never given for that purpose in the first place, but rather it was given to instruct how the righteous are to live by faith (Habakkuk 2:4). We are not to do what is holy and righteous in order to become more holy and righteous, but because that is what those who are holy and righteous and called to do by faith.

Jesus gave no indication that he was editing the law down to just the ones that he repeated, but rather he said just the opposite in Matthew 5:17-19 that not the least part would disappear from the law until heaven and earth passed away and all is accomplished, both of which refer to end times. The law is what gives us knowledge of sin (Romans 3:20), without the law we wouldn't even know what sin was (Romans 7:7), sin is defined as lawlessness (1 John 3:4), so when we are told not to sin, that means that we should not break any of God's laws, such as keeping the Sabbath. Jesus gave us a perfect example to follow of how to obey the law and we are told by faith to uphold the law (Romans 3:31), to follow his example (1 Peter 2:21-22), to walk as he walked (1 John 2:4-6), to walk in the Spirit (Ezekiel 36:26-27), to be his disciple (Matthew 23:8), to imitate him (1 Corinthians 11:1), to be like him (Philippians 2:5), to bear much good fruit (John 15:8-10), to have a righteous conduct (1 John 3:10), to have a holy conduct (1 Peter 1:14-16), and to do good works (Ephesians 2:10), all of which are in accordance with his example of obedience to the law.

In order to understand Colossians 2:16 and Romans 14:5, you need to keep in mind the consistent theme that we must obey God rather than men, so you should be careful not to mistake something that is coming against obeying man's laws as coming against God's laws. As it stands, Colossians 2:16 is not clear whether it is saying that they are not to let anyone judge them for doing those things or for not doing those things. In order to tell which is which, we need to look at what the views are of the people judging them:

Colossians 2:8 See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits[a] of the world, and not according to Christ.

Paul would never describe God's holy, righteous, and good laws as empty deceit or according to human tradition, and to say it is not according to Christ would be pitting the Son against the Father. He goes into more detail about the elemental spirits are later in the chapter:

Colossians 2:20-23 If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the world, why, as if you were still alive in the world, do you submit to regulations— 21 “Do not handle, Do not taste, Do not touch” 22 (referring to things that all perish as they are used)—according to human precepts and teachings? 23 These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body, but they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh.

So the people judging them were promoting human precepts, self-made religion, asceticism, and severity to the body, and not God's holy, righteous, and good laws. In other words, the Colossians were doing those things in obedience to God and Paul was encouraging them not to let anyone judge them for it or keep them from obeying God.

The context of Romans 14 is in the first verse, namely that it is about disputable matters of human opinion, not about God's commands. They did dispute how to obey God, but they were not disputing whether to obey God. For example, they knew they weren't to commit idolatry, but God's word doesn't say anything about whether they could eat meat if they didn't know whether it had been sacrificed to idols. Meat that had been sacrificed to idols was often later sold on the market, so if someone were at a community meal and didn't know where the meat had come from, they might be of the opinion that only vegetables should be eaten (Romans 14:2). They were judging people who chose to eat everything at the meal and were in turn being resented (Romans 14:3).

Whether man esteems one day over another is very different from whether God esteems one day over another. We are not to keep the Sabbath because we esteemed it over other days, but because God did and blessed it and made it holy and commanded us to keep it. The only day that God commanded fasting is on Yom Kippur, but it had become a common practice to fast twice a week or to commemorate certain events (Luke 18:12). Those who esteemed those days were judging others who didn't fast or for fasting on the wrong days and were in turn being resented (Romans 14:5-6). So whether someone chooses to fast on those other days is a disputable matter of obedience to human opinion, but whether someone chooses to fast on Yom Kippur is a matter of obedience to God.
 
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The way that God has chosen to punish disobedience has not changed, it is just that now Christ has taken that punishment instead of us.

I am not denying Christ paid the price for the punishment of believer's sins upon the cross. I am also not denying that God can execute Judgment Himself directly by His own hand, or His angels, or by using the secular nation's army or police forces, and courty systems. But God does not have a specific nation today like Israel today with certain detailed laws on how to carry out justice. In other words, God wants His people today (i.e. his saints under the New Testament) to be focused on love, forgiveness, and in doing good towards their enemy and not in carrying out justice. For the Lord says, "Vengeance is mine, I will repay."

While our consciouses are good barometers of morality, they do not define morality because it is God's character and His standard of behavior that defines it.

No. The Scriptures say that the Gentiles did by nature those things within the Law because it was written in their hearts.

"For when the Gentiles, who have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves: Who show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another; ) (Romans 2:14-15).​

God his holy, so He rested on the 7th day, and the way to act in line with God's character is to also rest on the 7th day. Jesus is Lord of the Sabbath and kept the Sabbath perfectly, so we should follow his example.

Are you a better person for worshiping on a Saturday versus say another day?
Yes, this was the day God stopped from all His work and it is honoring that day, but Paul says there are those who regard all days a like in the Lord in regards to the Sabbath. For can anyone tell that you are a better person for worshiping on a certain day versus another?

What was nailed to crosses was the violations of the law that the person being crucified had committed, not the laws themselves, so they didn't need to legislate new laws every time someone was crucified.

No. It says hWhat ordiances of God were against us? Well, for one, the animal sacrifices that had to keep being repeated over and over was against us. It was an act that one had to do over and over. We do not have to do that anymore. So the Law has changed just as Hebrews 7:12 says.

For we can now eat unclean animals which is a violation of OT Law.
We do not have to offer sacrifices to a priest which would be a violation of OT Law.
We do not have to be circumcised which would be a violation of OT Law.
We can completely ignore an eye for an eye which would be a violation of OT Law.
We can worship God on any day of the week we like, which would be a violation of OT Law.

This fits perfectly with our violations of the law being nailed to his cross and with him dying in our place, but does not fit at all with needing to be redeemed from a set of holy, righteous, and good instructions. The problem with the Old Covenant wasn't with God's laws, but with God's people not following them, so it doesn't follow that God would make a New Covenant where He would lower His holy, righteous, and good standard so that we wouldn't have to meet it or that we should even want to be saved from something that is holy, righteous, and good. Rather, our salvation is from sin, and sin is defined as lawlessness (1 John 3:4), so our salvation is from lawlessness for the purpose of lawfulness.

God didn't lower His standards. There are more Commands in the New Testament than in the Old Testament. There are 613 Commands in the Old Covenant and 1,050+ Commands given to us in the New Covenant (or New Testament).

The proper response to God's law is to delight in it and consider it to be a divine privilege (Romans 7:22, Psalms 1:1-2) because it gives rest for our souls (Jeremiah 6:16-19, Matthew 11:28-30).

Certain Laws under the Old Covenant are not in effect anymore. We are to obey the Laws God has given to us in the New Covenant and not the Old Covenant. We are New Covenant believers and not Old Covenant believers.

It is not possible to go back to the law in order to become justified because the law was never given for that purpose in the first place, but rather it was given to instruct how the righteous are to live by faith (Habakkuk 2:4).

I agree that a person could never be justified by the Law either in the Old and or the New. But the Laws in the Old Covenant are no longer binding because the New Covenant went into effect with Jesus Christ's death. A New Covenant means new rules. One does not put new wine into old wine skins.

We are not to do what is holy and righteous in order to become more holy and righteous, but because that is what those who are holy and righteous and called to do by faith.

Jesus gave no indication that he was editing the law down to just the ones that he repeated, but rather he said just the opposite in Matthew 5:17-19 that not the least part would disappear from the law until heaven and earth passed away and all is accomplished, both of which refer to end times.

Yes, He did give us indications He was changing the Law. He said, "you have heard it said an eye for an eye, .... but I tell you to turn the other cheek."

So there was a change in the Law given to us directly by Jesus Christ Himself.

The part about Jesus saying He came not to destroy the Law but to fulfill it is in context to..... the phrase: "The Law and the Prophets." The word "Law" was in reference to encompass both of these things. So when He said He came not to destroy the Law, he was also referencing the: "Prophets" part of the Law in how it needed to be fulfilled, as well. Meaning, there are many End Times prophecies in the Old Covenant that still need to be fullfilled. Jesus was also talking in that moment about how He would fulfill (a future thing) the Old Covenant Laws upon the cross. In other words, He came not to destroy but to fulfill.

For example: If I took an apple seed and smashed it with a hammer, I would be destroying it.
But, if I took an apple seed and planted it into the ground and gave it the proper care it needed, it would then be fulfilled into it's intended purpose - which is to grow into being an apple tree.

The law is what gives us knowledge of sin (Romans 3:20), without the law we wouldn't even know what sin was (Romans 7:7), sin is defined as lawlessness (1 John 3:4), so when we are told not to sin, that means that we should not break any of God's laws, such as keeping the Sabbath. Jesus gave us a perfect example to follow of how to obey the law and we are told by faith to uphold the law (Romans 3:31), to follow his example (1 Peter 2:21-22), to walk as he walked (1 John 2:4-6), to walk in the Spirit (Ezekiel 36:26-27), to be his disciple (Matthew 23:8), to imitate him (1 Corinthians 11:1), to be like him (Philippians 2:5), to bear much good fruit (John 15:8-10), to have a righteous conduct (1 John 3:10), to have a holy conduct (1 Peter 1:14-16), and to do good works (Ephesians 2:10), all of which are in accordance with his example of obedience to the law.

Yes, I am aware that sin is transgression of the Law. I quote 1 John 3:4 to many OSAS proponents all the time. But nowhere will you find a Command under the New Covenant (that begin with Christ's death) that we are to obey the Saturday Sabbath. Especially if it was a salvation issue (if that is what you are implying).

In order to understand Colossians 2:16 and Romans 14:5, you need to keep in mind the consistent theme that we must obey God rather than men, so you should be careful not to mistake something that is coming against obeying man's laws as coming against God's laws. As it stands, Colossians 2:16 is not clear whether it is saying that they are not to let anyone judge them for doing those things or for not doing those things. In order to tell which is which, we need to look at what the views are of the people judging them:

No. Colossians 2:16 is very clear to me in what it says. You either accept what it says plainly or you don't, my friend. It is talking about how we now have a liberty in Christ. Not to be lawless. No, no. Most certainly not. For God has given us plenty of Commands for us to obey under the New Covenant.


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Soyeong

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Are you a better person for worshiping on a Saturday versus say another day?
Yes, this was the day God stopped from all His work and it is honoring that day, but Paul says there are those who regard all days a like in the Lord in regards to the Sabbath. For can anyone tell that you are a better person for worshiping on a certain day versus another?

I wouldn't say that you are a better person for obeying God, but the obedience of faith is more pleasing to God than disobedience. We must obey God rather than man, so if God said to keep the Sabbath and Paul said not to keep the Sabbath, then we should obey God rather than Paul, but I don't think it comes to that because Paul wasn't referring to the Sabbath in Romans 14. In Romans 14:6, Paul detailed what he was referring to in verse 5 by saying that some were eating to honor God while others were abstaining to honor God, so he was talking about fasting. God only commanded fasting on one day, but as a disputable matter of human opinion, it had become a common practice to fast twice a week or to commemorate certain events and the people who esteemed these days were judging those who didn't esteem them or who esteemed other fast days. There is again a big difference between whether man esteems one day over another and whether God does. We are to keep the Sabbath not because we esteemed it over other days, but because God did and commanded it to be kept. Romans 14 is about disputable matters of human opinion, not whether to obey God, so Paul was certainly not suggesting that anyone could feel free to sin and disobey God as long as they were convinced in their own mind that it was ok.

This is an example of the sort of frivolous disputes over opinion that Paul was seeking to quell in Romans 14:

Didache 8:1 Your fasts should not be with the hypocrites, for they fast on Mondays and Thursdays. You should fast on Wednesdays and Fridays.

Yes, He did give us indications He was changing the Law. He said, "you have heard it said an eye for an eye, .... but I tell you to turn the other cheek."

So there was a change in the Law given to us directly by Jesus Christ Himself.

When Jesus was quoting from the law, he said "it is written...", but when he was quoting what the teachers of the law of his day were saying about the law, he said "you have heard it said...". In Matthew 5:17-20, Jesus was about to correct what the teachers of the law had been teaching, which he said was not good enough for his kingdom standard, and which would sound to his audience like he was undermining or abolishing the law, so in contrast he said that he came to fulfill the law, which he proceeded to do six times in the rest of the chapter by correcting and teaching how to fully understand it.

So Jesus was not teaching something new, but something ancient in accordance with how the law was originally intended to be understood. The phrase "eye for an eye" comes from Exodus 21:24-25, which is in regard to how a judge must deal with a crime and Deuteronomy 19:18-21 is in regard to how they are to carry out this judgement, namely that the punishment must fit the crime. However, the religious leaders had twisted a guideline for judges into a principle of revenge in personal matters, which is contrary to the OT (Proverbs 20:22, Proverbs 24:29). Most people were right-handed, so a slap on the right cheek would be with the back of the right hand, which carried half the penalty for slapping someone on the left cheek with the palm of their right hand. By someone turning their left cheek and not going to the judge for compensation, they were taking the initiative of solving the dispute. Jesus was fulfilling the law by teaching that we should show restraint in pursuing our rights and that we should be ready to suffer further injustice in order to show the true nature of the offender and provide the chance for them to refrain from further repeating the offence and thereby the chance for transformation and reconciliation. In refusing to be humiliated by turning the left cheek, they were restoring their dignity and provocatively offering to do more than what was originally demanded (in line with the surrounding verses), which in turn gives the opportunity for the offender to reconsider their action. If they continue, then their unjustness will be exposed, but if they stop, then they also restore their dignity and distance themselves from their previous action.

No. It says hWhat ordiances of God were against us? Well, for one, the animal sacrifices that had to keep being repeated over and over was against us. It was an act that one had to do over and over. We do not have to do that anymore. So the Law has changed just as Hebrews 7:12 says.

For we can now eat unclean animals which is a violation of OT Law.
We do not have to offer sacrifices to a priest which would be a violation of OT Law.
We do not have to be circumcised which would be a violation of OT Law.
We can completely ignore an eye for an eye which would be a violation of OT Law.
We can worship God on any day of the week we like, which would be a violation of OT Law.

We must obey God rather than man, so if God commands something and man tries to countermand God, then we should obey God instead of man. According to Deuteronomy 4:2, it is a sin to add to or subtract from God's law. Furthermore, according to Deuteronomy 13:4-6, even if someone performed signs and wonders, the way that God told them to recognize that they were a false prophet was if they taught against following OT law, so no one in the NT was doing that, but if you think that they did, then you should either reconsider your interpretation or disregard what they said.

Paul continued to live in accordance with the law (Acts 21:24) and never taught that we were permitted to eat unclean animals. In Acts 18:18, he took a Nazarite vow (Numbers 6), which involved making offerings, including sin offerings, and in Acts 21:20-24, he was on his way to pay for the offerings of others. Offerings didn't cease because of the death or resurrection of Jesus, but because there is no longer a Temple in which to offer them. Offerings will also be resumed during the Millennial reign of Christ (Ezekiel 44-46), which will also include sin offerings. The OT law does not require all Gentiles to become circumcised and keep Jewish customs in order to be saved, so by rejecting that requirement, the Jerusalem Council was actually upholding the law. Jesus was still in favor of judges justly giving punishments in proportion to the offense, so he was not changing the law, but was correcting an abuse of the law. The OT law does not prohibit worshipping God on any day of the week, but we are not permitted to sin or be lawless, so we are still to keep the Sabbath. The ordinances against us that were nailed to the cross were our transgressions of the law.

God didn't lower His standards. There are more Commands in the New Testament than in the Old Testament. There are 613 Commands in the Old Covenant and 1,050+ Commands given to us in the New Covenant (or New Testament).

All of the commands in the NT are in accordance with the commands in the OT, but if you think there are some things that are no longer required in the NT, then that standard has been lowered. For example, if keeping the Sabbath holy is no longer part of what it means to have a holy conduct, then God's standard of holiness has been lowered. The point of the New Covenant wasn't to do away with the standard of OT law, but to cause us meet its requirement (Romans 8:3-4).

Certain Laws under the Old Covenant are not in effect anymore. We are to obey the Laws God has given to us in the New Covenant and not the Old Covenant. We are New Covenant believers and not Old Covenant believers.

God's holiness, righteousness, and goodness, all stayed the same and we are still told to have such a conduct, so all of those laws remained the same. The only change between covenants is in regard to the conduct of the priesthood.

I agree that a person could never be justified by the Law either in the Old and or the New. But the Laws in the Old Covenant are no longer binding because the New Covenant went into effect with Jesus Christ's death. A New Covenant means new rules. One does not put new wine into old wine skins.

The way to live righteously and in line with God's character remained the same and remained binding for those who are children of God (John 3:10). Jesus was being questioned about his selection of disciples and he essentially responded that you can't teach an old dog new tricks. He was not making a comment about covenants.

The part about Jesus saying He came not to destroy the Law but to fulfill it is in context to..... the phrase: "The Law and the Prophets." The word "Law" was in reference to encompass both of these things. So when He said He came not to destroy the Law, he was also referencing the: "Prophets" part of the Law in how it needed to be fulfilled, as well. Meaning, there are many End Times prophecies in the Old Covenant that still need to be fullfilled. Jesus was also talking in that moment about how He would fulfill (a future thing) the Old Covenant Laws upon the cross. In other words, He came not to destroy but to fulfill.

For example: If I took an apple seed and smashed it with a hammer, I would be destroying it.
But, if I took an apple seed and planted it into the ground and gave it the proper care it needed, it would then be fulfilled into it's intended purpose - which is to grow into being an apple tree.

To fulfill the law is a rabbinic technical term that meant to demonstrate how to correctly obey the law through words or actions, which is what Jesus then proceeded to do six times in Matthew 5. According to Galatians 5:14, loving your neighbor fulfills the whole law, so everyone since Moses who has loved their neighbor has fulfilled the whole law, which means it is not an unique event done by Jesus to do away with it. Jesus didn't love God and his neighbor in accordance with the law so we don't have to, but so that we would have an example to follow.

Yes, I am aware that sin is transgression of the Law. I quote 1 John 3:4 to many OSAS proponents all the time. But nowhere will you find a Command under the New Covenant (that begin with Christ's death) that we are to obey the Saturday Sabbath. Especially if it was a salvation issue (if that is what you are implying).

If you agree that sin is the transgression of the law, that the law says to keep the Sabbath, and that in the New Covenant we are told not to sin, then why do any of God's laws need to be explicitly repeated in the NT before you will stop transgressing them? The law is God's instructions for how to have a holy, righteous, and good conduct, and we are told to have such a conduct in the NT (1 Peter 1:14-16, 1 John 3:10, Ephesians 2:10), so why do any of those instructions need to be explicitly repeated? We are not to have a holy, righteous, and good conduct in order to become saved, but because we have been saved. Our salvation is from sin, so our salvation is from transgressing the law, so why do you think it is a good idea to continue to transgress the law? As a follower of God, why do you need to be explicitly told that you should follow His commands and as a follower of Jesus why do you need to be explicitly told to follow his example? In Acts 15:21, it implies that they were already keeping the Sabbath every week in accordance with God's commands.

No. Colossians 2:16 is very clear to me in what it says. You either accept what it says plainly or you don't, my friend. It is talking about how we now have a liberty in Christ. Not to be lawless. No, no. Most certainly not. For God has given us plenty of Commands for us to obey under the New Covenant....

Do you not see that there could be any ambiguity between whether he was saying not to let anyone judge them for doing those things or saying not to let anyone judge them for not doing those things? Should we not consider what the views of the people judging them were in order to determine what they were judging them for not doing? The law says to keep God's Sabbaths, so if you agree that we shouldn't be lawless, then why do you insist on interpreting Paul as promoting lawlessness? And if Paul was promoting lawlessness, then why should we obey him rather than God?

2 Peter 3:15-17 And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, 16 as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures. 17 You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, take care that you are not carried away with the error of lawless people and lose your own stability.

According to this, Paul was difficult to understand, but those who are ignorant and unstable twist his words to their own destruction and fall into the error of lawlessness. In other words, if you think Paul was against keeping the law, then you have interpreted him wrongly.

I am not denying Christ paid the price for the punishment of believer's sins upon the cross. I am also not denying that God can execute Judgment Himself directly by His own hand, or His angels, or by using the secular nation's army or police forces, and courty systems. But God does not have a specific nation today like Israel today with certain detailed laws on how to carry out justice. In other words, God wants His people today (i.e. his saints under the New Testament) to be focused on love, forgiveness, and in doing good towards their enemy and not in carrying out justice. For the Lord says, "Vengeance is mine, I will repay."

Even if Israel today were entirely based on God's law, it would not be appropriate for them punish people for sinning because there is no need to enforce a penalty that has already been paid. Love, forgiveness, and doing good towards your enemy, and carrying out justice are just as important in the OT as they are the NT.

No. The Scriptures say that the Gentiles did by nature those things within the Law because it was written in their hearts.

"For when the Gentiles, who have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves: Who show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another; ) (Romans 2:14-15).​

If God was only concerned with whether people violated their consciences, then He would have only needed to give one law. People's consciouses have led us to disagree about what is right and wrong and some people aren't even bothered by crushing babies and selling their parts. So while our consciousness help guide us to obey the moral requirements contained in the law, they are not perfect indicators and do not perfectly define what is right and wrong. What defines what is right and wrong is found in God's character and in His commands that are a reflection of His character.
 
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I wouldn't say that you are a better person for obeying God, but the obedience of faith is more pleasing to God than disobedience. We must obey God rather than man, so if God said to keep the Sabbath and Paul said not to keep the Sabbath, then we should obey God rather than Paul, but I don't think it comes to that because Paul wasn't referring to the Sabbath in Romans 14. In Romans 14:6, Paul detailed what he was referring to in verse 5 by saying that some were eating to honor God while others were abstaining to honor God, so he was talking about fasting. God only commanded fasting on one day, but as a disputable matter of human opinion, it had become a common practice to fast twice a week or to commemorate certain events and the people who esteemed these days were judging those who didn't esteem them or who esteemed other fast days. There is again a big difference between whether man esteems one day over another and whether God does. We are to keep the Sabbath not because we esteemed it over other days, but because God did and commanded it to be kept. Romans 14 is about disputable matters of human opinion, not whether to obey God, so Paul was certainly not suggesting that anyone could feel free to sin and disobey God as long as they were convinced in their own mind that it was ok.

I am not going to endlessly debate this issue. If you want to obey the Law of Moses, when such a Law has clearly changed in the New Covenant, then feel free to believe that against the testimony of the New Testament, my friend.

As for Romans 14: Well, in Romans 14, Paul did not stress that we must obey the Saturday Sabbath in order to be right with God. On the contrary, he ends Romans 14 by saying this:

"Happy is he that condemns not himself in that thing which he allows." (Romans 14:22).

This is in relation or context to eating certain foods and in what day a person chooses to worship God.

Didache 8:1 Your fasts should not be with the hypocrites, for they fast on Mondays and Thursdays. You should fast on Wednesdays and Fridays.

Nowhere does this saying line up with the Word of God. It is an additional book that is not included in the Bible; And we are not to add to God's Word.


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Soyeong

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I am not going to endlessly debate this issue. If you want to obey the Law of Moses, when such a Law has clearly changed in the New Covenant, then feel free to believe that against the testimony of the New Testament, my friend.

The only thing that changed between Covenants are the laws that govern how the priesthood functioned. The way to have a holy, righteous, and good conduct did not change. I'm saying that we should obey God's commands and follow Jesus' example, which is not against the testimony of Scripture, but just the opposite.

As for Romans 14: Well, in Romans 14, Paul did not stress that we must obey the Saturday Sabbath in order to be right with God. On the contrary, he ends Romans 14 by saying this:

"Happy is he that condemns not himself in that thing which he allows." (Romans 14:22).

This is in relation or context to eating certain foods and in what day a person chooses to worship God.

Sin is defined as lawlessness, the law says to keep the Sabbath, and Paul said not to sin and to correct others who had fallen into sin (Galatians 6:1). The law does not say to fast twice a week, so it was a matter of man's opinion to esteem those days, not God's opinion. Romans 14:22 is saying that we shouldn't judge each other over matters of opinion, which is sticking with the context of the chapter given in Romans 14:1, and which is different from judging others who are caught in sin, which is something that we are told to do.

Nowhere does this saying line up with the Word of God. It is an additional book that is not included in the Bible; And we are not to add to God's Word.
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Nowhere did I say that we should obey it, that this lined up with the Word of God, that it was included in the Bible, or that I was adding it to God's Word. I said, "This is an example of the sort of frivolous disputes over opinion that Paul was seeking to quell in Romans 14". They were arguing over which days to fast on and judging each other for fasting on different days, when the decision itself to fast twice a week was a matter of opinion and not something commanded by God. We must obey God rather than man.
 
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The only thing that changed between Covenants are the laws that govern how the priesthood functioned. The way to have a holy, righteous, and good conduct did not change. I'm saying that we should obey God's commands and follow Jesus' example, which is not against the testimony of Scripture, but just the opposite.



Sin is defined as lawlessness, the law says to keep the Sabbath, and Paul said not to sin and to correct others who had fallen into sin (Galatians 6:1). The law does not say to fast twice a week, so it was a matter of man's opinion to esteem those days, not God's opinion. Romans 14:22 is saying that we shouldn't judge each other over matters of opinion, which is sticking with the context of the chapter given in Romans 14:1, and which is different from judging others who are caught in sin, which is something that we are told to do.



Nowhere did I say that we should obey it, that this lined up with the Word of God, that it was included in the Bible, or that I was adding it to God's Word. I said, "This is an example of the sort of frivolous disputes over opinion that Paul was seeking to quell in Romans 14". They were arguing over which days to fast on and judging each other for fasting on different days, when the decision itself to fast twice a week was a matter of opinion and not something commanded by God. We must obey God rather than man.

I am sorry, my friend.
While I can respond to each of your points with Scripture to refute what you are saying here, God is talking to my heart not to debate this topic with you. Maybe another will arise to take my place that you may hear one day so that you might see what I am talking about in God's Word. But until that day (or unless God says otherwise), all I can do is pray for you at this point.

Anyways, may God bless you.
And may you please be well.


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