The LAW Paul vs. Jesus

[DingDing]

View attachment 188901

I really like this diagram!

 

[miknik5]

DingDing,
Who gets to declare who is "righteous"?

And can you read Ecclesiastes 7:20 and Haggai 2 and tell me if GOD will declare any righteous apart from HIS SON?

 

[miknik5]

What you are not doing is attempting to understand the teachings of Jesus as understood by those who were hand-picked by Him to spread His gospel. So here you are, some unbeliever about 2000 years after the fact, and you are going to try to understand this gospel apart from the understanding of those Jesus hand-picked and taught and commissioned. That is where you are going wrong. If you were really after truth, you would be looking hard at what His followers wrote and taught. According to what you seem to be implying, they all got it wrong.

She would be looking at HIM and growing in her knowledge of HIM

 

[DingDing]

... In Hebrews 8 we read that the new covenant consists of God taking the law and writing it on the heart. So it seems to me that someone under the new covenant would be even more tightly enjoind to obey the law.
Thoughts?

Athée, you consistently try to make it out that the New Covenant laws simply must be some kind of a repeat/enhancement of the Old. But did Jesus not speak of putting new wine in new wine-skins, rather than the old ones? Let me make a recommendation. Please go to a bible-search website like biblegateway.com, enter the word "covenant" and a preferred bible like the NKJV, then filter the resulting search over the New Testament, and then read each and every passage listed carefully. When Jesus died, He fulfilled the Old Covenant and by His blood He instituted a New Covenant. You can try to pour that new wine into those old wineskins all you want, but as Jesus Himself said, they will not hold it.

 

[Norbert L]

My first question would be why the babysitter decided to leave the house andeave the kid alone, the purpose of babysitting being explicitly guided by the idea that the parent thinks their child should not be left alone...

There are resources available online that explain what younger teenagers are capable and responsible for. I would suggest that information may be something you should consider studying too. He's not going to burn the flat down, he knows his neighbors and is responsible enough that his mom expects him to walk the dog by himself. In a similar vein the same can be said for the apostle Paul and the information about his own views on the law and how Christians use it. It's also on topic.

As for the situation I am not sure what you are asking. Are you wondering what the response should be according to the ot laws or what your response should have been. How will the thought experiment get us to clarity on the OP question?

It's a small story about how tares use scriptures, the OT and NT, about minister's of righteousness (2 Corinthians 11:14-15) that cloak their sinful intentions using the name of Jesus. Something both Jesus and Paul pointed out. Matthew 7:15 and Acts 20:30

 

[smithed64]

Fair enough but I don't think you have addressed the question at issue. I am not asking if anyone can faithfully live by those laws today or what their purpose is.

Ok.

Rather I am asking in you think you are included in the group of people to whom Jesus specifically commanded that they were still expected to obey the law and teach others to do likewise. Does this apply to you today? Why or why not?

Matthew 5:17-19 Think not that I came to destroy the law or the prophets: I came not to destroy, but to fulfill. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass away from the law, till all things are accomplished. Whosoever, therefore, shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

As a Child of God, yes I am to obey the law. The law is God's Word. And it is the truth. So yes, we are to obey the law, live for Him and place our trust in Him.

Christ is the Word, He is also the truth. We are to live in Him and obey His Word.

 

[Athée]

Well not totally misunderstanding just kind of missing something. Sanctification for the ancient Hebrews was different then it would be for Gentile Christians. I can eat pork chops and God isn't going to refuse my prayers as a result. At the same time I think there are good reasons why they were prohibited from eating owls and vultures or even catfish.

I realize you are dealing with a lot of posts so I'm going to let this go. The bottom line is how you are sanctified and the New Testament makes it clear it is by faith, not based on what kind of food you eat. The Old Testament puts a lot of emphasis on faith but still demands certain dietary laws, they had their purpose but they were not necessarily practical, at least not for New Testament believers.

By the way, a delightful thread, thank you so much for giving it so much of your attention.

Grace and peace,
Mark

Thank you for the kind words, I am also enjoying this thread
I agree with your position as you state it, what I wonder is do you think those laws, like the dietary ones should still be followed as ana act of reverence. Not for salvation, just as a way to live a life pleasing to God?

 

[Athée]

Can you make a right judgement?

On what?

 

[Athée]

Hi Athee. Thanks for your response. I've made a reply. It's a bit long but it seems like you want details, so I've started by giving an assessment of why I think the Law exists in the first place. I hope you find it helpful.

Humanity is one long work in progress. God is teaching us in stages from the very first commands to name animals in the garden, to the discovery of Abraham. Abraham was an interesting test case, as there didn't seem to be any law for him. I don't know how God builds the souls that he puts into the body, but it's certainly not a cookie cutter method. There appears to be a randomness that God himself injects into the spirit and waits to see what pops out. Abraham appeared to be a rare gem in how he turned out and God liked it, a lot. He wanted to use Abraham as the model for what all Israel should be like. The relationship with Abraham was quite interesting. God just kinda worked casually with him, I think because Abraham didn't need a law. He listened to God because he believed God knew what was best.

Then there were the "Children of Abraham"; the Israelites. They were only in captivity in Egypt in the first place because they were rebellious and then when Moses pulled them out they were still rebellious (just about every other chapter after exodus starts with "and the children of Israel went a whoring again".)

With Abraham it was easy, because he wanted to be faithful to God, but real faith, by design, can't be mass produced. God could not count on having the same loose and carefree relationship with the children of Israel that he had with Abraham; they were simply too rebellious, so he gave them the Law (they were busy committing idolatry even as the Law was being given to Moses up on the mountain); a written list of rules to make his will clearly known in a situation where they were nowhere near as attentive at listening as Abraham was. It was only ever meant to be a temporary guide, just until they learned enough that they didn't need the Law anymore, like Abraham. It was God's way of starting slowly with them, much like we might write out a list of rules for kids.

Unfortunately, that's not how it turned out. People took the law and either became complacent with it or twisted it around to suit their own selfish desires and ambitions. The gospels are full of Jesus citing these examples. The gold of the temple had become more important than the temple itself. The sacrifice on the altar had become more important than the altar itself. The people loved the highest seats. They loved fancy robes. They loved fancy greetings of prominence and respect. The animals they killed to atone for their sins had become mere commodities to buy and sell. They had come to love wealth. They put heavy burdens on the people and they didn't lift a finger to help them. The Law was a near complete failure.

The "next phase" never came because the children didn't grow. God finally got tired of waiting for them and decided to move on without them; he started the next phase anyway and Jesus entered the scene.

Jesus made a lot of changes to the Law. Rather than killing our enemies, we should love them. All that fighting in the OT, where the Children of Israel trekked to the promised land destroying cities along the way was part of the learning process. God wanted the Children of Israel to be the shining example of "His People" to the world and part of that meant demonstrating that he would protect his people and that he should be respected as their guardian.

God isn't afraid to crush his enemies, but he's not a God of perpetual war, either. That phase of growth was only meant to be temporary, too and the results showed that just crushing through the land unstoppable did not guarantee faith, either from the children of Israel or those looking on. Fantastic, mighty, unstoppable displays of power also didn't guarantee faith.

But it was important for God to go through those motions to offset the idea of bringing change through love. Now we can look back on the OT and say, "See, that course of action doesn't work; God wants us to try love now". Or, when it comes to one particular group being "God's chosen" and expecting faith to come as a result of being part of the special group, we can look back and say, "Well, it didn't work for the Jews, why should we think it will work now". Being part of the special group does not guarantee faith. We need something more.

And that's why the introduction of the Holy Spirit as the fulfillment of the Law was so important. Even in our own lives we can experiment with how the Law fails. Try to write out a list of rules governing just one day of your life, and you'll quickly see that you will be more busy writing out amendments and new rules as you go along than just living your life.

The Law can be helpful, but on it's own it is incomplete and stunted. The spirit is flexible and always moving. The spirit is what will help us to know how to apply the law fairly.

So now, after thousands of years of trudging progress, we're living in one of the most spiritually advanced times of history. Compare all the possibilities of ethics and morality we have now to the very simple life Adam had in the garden, where the only ethic he had to deal with was "don't eat from that one tree" (and quite possibly not expecting Eve to do all the tidying up).

I think it always comes across as strange when I say this, but Christianity is the purest form of anarchy. The Law is what Christianity is striving to get away from. We have things like "The Law" and even Jesus gave commands, but God wants us to get to the point where we don't need rules and commands to tell us what to do. He wants us to do the right thing because we want to and not just because we are told to. The Law, and rules, and guidelines etc are only important insofar as they work to make themselves obsolete as rules.

After the "Time of Jesus" (culminating in the Battle of Armageddon) there will be another phase. Jesus talked about the saints ruling the nations for 1000 years after he returns. We'll have new bodies, new relationships, and new authority. It will be time for us to put into practice all that we've learned in this life about faithfulness, fairness, and justice over the mortals who will remain.

And after that, there will be another phase of our learning. And after that, almost certainly another phase.

Great post, thanks for putting that all together. I guess I wonder if you think God's law was perfect (although I see you believe it was incomplete and I agree) such that disobeying it would be to si and how that applies to us today?

 

[Athée]

Jesus says, "Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given" (Matthew 13:11).

""Do not give what is holy to dogs, and do not throw your pearls before swine, or they will trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces." (Matthew 7:6 NASB) (cf. Psalms 119:162 and Proverbs 2:1-5).

Paul says,
3 "If any man ... consent not to ... the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which is according to godliness;
4 He is proud, knowing nothing," (1 Timothy 6:3-4).

Do you consent the words of Jesus Christ according to His Commandment to believe in Him? (1 John 3:23). If not, Paul says such a person who does not agree with the words of Jesus is a proud person who knows nothing. You can claim that I said this, but I didn't. I am merely relaying what the Bible says to you. I am just a messenger. So please do not shoot the messenger.

Anyways, if you were to have talked to me a long time ago when I was a wet behind the ears new Christian, I would have helped you. But experience and knowledge of God's Word has given me wisdom not to cast my pearls (i.e. My Precious Discovered Treasures from God's Word) before those who would not truly appreciate it (nor truly understand it).

In any event, if you truly want to know what God's Word says on this matter, repent and accept Jesus Christ as your Savior.


...

I have already agreed that your position is biblical, I would have said the same thing when I was a believer. Interestingly I was able to understand all of those verses you cited above to make your point, which rather undermines the point you were trying to make. In any event the offer is open, if you would like to verify if your belief is true you are welcome to substantiate it as I suggested earlier. It seems to me like you don't have as much confidence that it is true as you proclaim but again your willingness to find out if things are true is entirely up to you
I wish you the greatest joy in your faith and hope that someday you will have the confidence to try to confirm it as true.
A.

 

[Athée]

The Bible also says,

"Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness?" (2 Corinthians 6:14).


...

I guess my wife should divorce me then... Oh wait 1 Corinthians 7:15 never mind.

 

[Athée]

It is like a criminal being convicted of a crime and sentenced by the honorable Court to "supervised probation" or as the scriptures say "under the supervision of the law" As a result for a period of time a legal agent is appointed to monitor the convict progress in society. If the sinner violates the "requirements of the law" his freedom may be taken he may be thrown into jail. However when Yeshua came the criminal is "made free indeed" if he walks by faith the Court may suspend his supervision if the honorable Court finds the criminal bear fruits worthy of repentance. Luke 3:8

OK so the sentence of parol is commuted but that doesn't change the fact that this new free citizen should still obey the laws, even if they know they will be forgiven over and over for breaking them. Right?

 

[Athée]

What you are not doing is attempting to understand the teachings of Jesus as understood by those who were hand-picked by Him to spread His gospel. So here you are, some unbeliever about 2000 years after the fact, and you are going to try to understand this gospel apart from the understanding of those Jesus hand-picked and taught and commissioned. That is where you are going wrong. If you were really after truth, you would be looking hard at what His followers wrote and taught. According to what you seem to be implying, they all got it wrong.

I am not implying they got it wrong, I am asking you what you male of Jesus ear teaching in Matthew. If you want to support your reading with the words of some of his followers that is fine by me I am just curious about how you read those verses, why and what support you have for your position.

 

[Athée]

Jesus knew it would be and is impossible for us to truly fulfill or live up to or keep the law in the way and manner that everything prior had been taught, and was being taught, by the Pharisees, about it... Jesus wanted us to have a better chance attaining to it, by and with and through "Love", and being perfect and perfected in love, gave and gives us the one and only way, and only true chance to truly attaining to it...

He did not do away with the Law, but the old way of trying to attain or live up to it, and instituted a new and better way... Paul is not in conflict with this either, he attacks all of the old ways of trying to attain to it that do not work... Which is what Jesus wanted him to do...

God Bless!

Fair enough, so do you believe that you should be trying to follow the law today as best you are able?

 

[mark kennedy]

Thank you for the kind words, I am also enjoying this thread
I agree with your position as you state it, what I wonder is do you think those laws, like the dietary ones should still be followed as ana act of reverence. Not for salvation, just as a way to live a life pleasing to God?

Well I know the Jews follow it even if they are atheists, tradition is a big deal to them. Supposedly it is healthier and I have no problem with someone who wants to avoid pork, I actually stopped eating catfish because of those dietary laws. I didn't do it to please God it just tasted dirty to me after that but I've never been a big fan of fish or sea food anyway. You wouldn't be able to eat any lobster or crab legs or shrimp.

As far as pleasing God Jesus had this to say:

What goes into someone's mouth does not defile them, but what comes out of their mouth, that is what defiles them." (Matt. 15:11)
​

Grace and peace,
Mark

 

[Athée]

Athée, you consistently try to make it out that the New Covenant laws simply must be some kind of a repeat/enhancement of the Old. But did Jesus not speak of putting new wine in new wine-skins, rather than the old ones? Let me make a recommendation. Please go to a bible-search website like biblegateway.com, enter the word "covenant" and a preferred bible like the NKJV, then filter the resulting search over the New Testament, and then read each and every passage listed carefully. When Jesus died, He fulfilled the Old Covenant and by His blood He instituted a New Covenant. You can try to pour that new wine into those old wineskins all you want, but as Jesus Himself said, they will not hold it.

Fair enough and I will do so when I have a chance. The said I am making a distinction between law and covenant. Obeying the law can be a condition of a covenant but it is not synonymous and so when Jesus initiates the new covenant it is not the same, necessarily, as doing away with the law.
At least that is how it seems to me, and this is consistent with the Matthew 5 verses.
Thoughts?

 

[Athée]

Well I know the Jews follow it even if they are atheists, tradition is a big deal to them. Supposedly it is healthier and I have no problem with someone who wants to avoid pork, I actually stopped eating catfish because of those dietary laws. I didn't do it to please God it just tasted dirty to me after that but I've never been a big fan of fish or sea food anyway. You wouldn't be able to eat any lobster or crab legs or shrimp.

As far as pleasing God Jesus had this to say:

What goes into someone's mouth does not defile them, but what comes out of their mouth, that is what defiles them." (Matt. 15:11)
​

Grace and peace,
Mark

Well done as soon as I hit post on theast one I thought to myself that dietary laws were a bad example for this exact reason. Although it does raise an interesting question. It was sinful to eat these things in the ot, but not sinful after Jesus. Jesus sais God cleansed them implying that something has changed. I wonder what changed, what element is no longer present that made them sinful to eat, unclean. What about law categories that Jesus didn't expressly address. Should we still follow those out of obedience do you think?

 

[DingDing]

Who gets to declare who is "righteous"?...

Could not help but notice that you did not address Luke 1:6. So, no mention of a righteous person there? Okay, what then about Malachi 3:18? It would seem God has declared a great many people as being righteous. Did God give any indication in either passage as to why these people were declared righteous?

 

[DingDing]

I am not implying they got it wrong, I am asking you what you male of Jesus ear teaching in Matthew. If you want to support your reading with the words of some of his followers that is fine by me I am just curious about how you read those verses, why and what support you have for your position.

I recognize that Jesus' words can have both a near-term and far-term application. To the Jew living before the Old Covenant ended, they were to live by faith under that covenant; to those living afterward under the New Covenant, they are to live by faith under that covenant. As the scriptures say, the righteous shall live by faith. (Try to connect this post with my previous post concerning Luke 1:6 and Malachi 3:18.)

 

[mark kennedy]

Well done as soon as I hit post on theast one I thought to myself that dietary laws were a bad example for this exact reason. Although it does raise an interesting question. It was sinful to eat these things in the ot, but not sinful after Jesus. Jesus sais God cleansed them implying that something has changed. I wonder what changed, what element is no longer present that made them sinful to eat, unclean. What about law categories that Jesus didn't expressly address. Should we still follow those out of obedience do you think?

Well there was a prohibition against Hebrews marrying Gentiles but David's grandmother was a Gentile.

"You shall not marry them (the gentiles, about which the Bible speaks in the previous verses), you not give your daughter to their son and you shall not take his daughter for your son." (Deut. 7:3)​

Let me describe a scene from Nehemiah, the Israelites have returned to Jerusalem and nearly completed the Temple and Wall rebuilding. There’s just one problem, they are marrying foreign wives, so they all have to come to Jerusalem, stand outside the Temple in the rain, and repent:

Then all the men of Judah and Benjamin gathered themselves together unto Jerusalem within three days… and all the people sat in the street of the house of God, trembling because of this matter, and for the great rain. And Ezra the priest stood up, and said unto them, Ye have transgressed, and have taken strange wives, to increase the trespass of Israel. Now therefore make confession unto the Lord God of your fathers, and do his pleasure: and separate yourselves from the people of the land, and from the strange wives. (Neh. 10:9-11)
​

Then there's Rahab the prostitute that took the spies in, in the time of Joshua, in the city of Jericho. She is not only in Jesus family line but also mentioned in the Hebrews 11 hall of faith line up.

These two prohibitions were somehow related and if there is one thing God complained about in the Old Testament is when they would draw near with their lips but their hearts where far from him. The oblations, sacrifices, sacred convocations, even circumcision and the Sabbath God set aside because what is partial must give way to what is complete. Just like one of these days creation will wear out like an old pair of jeans:

And: “In the beginning, Lord, You laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the work of Your hands. They will perish, but You remain; They will all wear out like a garment. You will roll them up like a robe; like a garment they will be changed; but You remain the same, and Your years will never end.” (Heb. 1:11)
​

I don't think we are going to need any Bibles in heaven, because now we know in part but one day we will know him, even as we are known:

For we know in part, and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away. When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things. For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.(1 Cor. 13:10-12)
​

The temporal (temporary) must give way to the eternal, the shadow to the substance, the partial to the complete. The biggest problem with the dietary laws isn't that they were a bad idea, it's because they spent all their time keeping the minute details and couldn't hear the weightier elements of the law.

But go and learn what this means: 'I desire mercy, not sacrifice.' For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners." (Matt. 9:13)
​

They want to know why Jesus is hanging around with sinners, actually it's because the sinners were repenting and those strictly obeying every minute detail to the point of obsessive, compulsive narcissism that hated him. The Pharisees would fast twice a week minimum, Tuesdays and Thursdays like clock work and most of them would have been better off cooking out. The Sabbath was never more then a day when everyone, including slaves and beasts of burden did no work. Guess what they did? Turned it into a works righteousness.

What changed? They were missing the whole point. So enjoy your pork chops, I know I do.

Grace and peace,
Mark