I obey the Torah because I love God -- the Old Covenant is my birthright as a Jew.
I accept the New Covenant because I am a human being, a sinner, in need of salvation.
openheart,
1. The Old Covenant is a contract separate from the New Covenant contract.
2. The reason they are separate is because it was done away and abolished.
2 Corinthians 3:7; glory was to be done away.
Verse 11; for if that which is done away was glorious.
Verse 14; which vail is done away in Christ.
Verse 13; and not as Moses which put a vail over his face, that the children of Israel could not steadfastly look to the end of that which was abolished.
3. If the Old Covenant had not been done away with or abolished then they would not be separate contracts.
Since they were, thus, a change of administration happened in the New Covenant.
4. Galatians 5:3; For I testify again to every man that is circumcised, that he is a debtor to all the law.
Circumcision was under the Old Covenant.
5. The commandments were mandatory to the letter though the physical circumcision could never save anyone.
6. Physical circumcision was a type replaced by the spiritual circumcision of the heart which Christ does in the act of salvation.
7. The law was a covenant of types and shadows and was abolished when the realities of those shadows appeared.
8. There are eternal truths throughout each age that are always applicable but sometimes set in a different context and administered differently etc.
9. The point is that one cannot do the whole Torah like in Moses day for we know that is plain that the sacrificial system of there ceremonial commandments were done away with Ephesians 2:15.
10. The Ten Commandments according to Moses ethic with specific judgements of curses just like stoning for adultery etc. like in the story of the adulterous woman.
11. The Ten Commandments according to Moses ethic was done away and abolished according to 2 Corinthians 3:7,11,13.
It could not be the meaning of the moral law within itself otherwise people would not be punished for sin.
It had to be the whole context of the covenant which in this case would be
the connection with the specific mandatory judgements of the blessing and cursing system.
12. Doing the letter of the law was performing the commandments so you would be blessed and if you failed you would be cursed which was all mandatory. This was do something to attain something. Today we do automatically because of Christ finished work and who we are in him.
13. Doing the commandments had a weakness because of the self effort mechanism that lost out to the law of sin and death Romans 7.
14. You can perform whatever part of the Torah is in the NC and it's standard.
15. Your birthright as a Jew is more of an implication to Commandments of general rules of living of Judaism as long as it is understood in the whole perspective of the NC and not as it applied o the Old understanding such as a type etc.
The law was given by Moses but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.
Moses had grace and truth and Christ has the law of Christ so it had to be talking in the whole of the context.
It would be better to say that you abide by the Torah according to the
NC standards and not the Old Covenant way of Moses.
Your birthright started with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob physically as a nation Genesis 12-15 and spiritually salvation without works Romans 4:5
and commandments of Moses in the context of the summary of the whole Torah Exodus 20 til the seed should come to bring the promises of Abraham Galatians 3:19 through the law of Christ Acts 13:39 Galatians 6:2 Jerry kelso