What did Jesus mean when he said "I have fulfilled the law"?

Anguspure

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In Matthew 5:17 Jesus says:

"Do not think I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets. I have come not to destroy but to fulfill."

So, how exactly did Jesus fulfill the law? Was it because Jesus kept the law perfectly? If the law is fulfilled by Jesus how do we now keep the law? By loving our neighbor? Discuss.
Moses writes this about the righteousness that is by the law: “The person who does these things will live by them.”

Christ is the culmination of the law so that there may be righteousness for everyone who believes.

If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved. As Scripture says, “Anyone who believes in him will never be put to shame.”

Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set youa free from the law of sin and death.

For what the law was powerless to do because it was weakened by the flesh, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. (From Romans 10, 8)
 
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redleghunter

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The laws are not differentiated in the OT. In fact, read Leviticus 19 and you will see that all these categories are interspersed with no distinction made.

Which does not mean we can categorize for logical ease of understanding. What does the blood of bulls and rams have to do with stoning someone for adultery? It is obvious as the law was dispensed the elders of Israel knew there were laws they had to enforce as a state enforces (as agents of YHWH) and atonement offerings for sin the priest performed on a daily basis. As with singers and lamp trimmers and those who put the bread of presence out daily. That is what I'm getting at. Yes it is one Law but there are categories which we can logically ascertain.

As to the civil and judicial laws, Jesus told his JEWISH disciples that they should obey the Scribes and Pharisees (Matthew 23:1) because they have the authority to make legal rulings for the Jewish people.

Yes 70AD ended the enforcement of the Law by the Scribes and Pharisees. The daily/feast day/and annual sacrifices ended, no more Sanhedrin, no more civil state. Kind of supports what MacArthur and other Bible teachers have been teaching for centuries (John Gill and Matthew Henry etc.)

So what are we left with? Jesus fulfilled all the mandatory ceremonial laws and reaffirmed the moral law because that is how he lived on earth and how He wants us to walk. All the other laws dealt with Israel as a 'set apart' nation with a land.
 
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Bryce Harris

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In Matthew 5:17 Jesus says:

"Do not think I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets. I have come not to destroy but to fulfill."

So, how exactly did Jesus fulfill the law? Was it because Jesus kept the law perfectly? If the law is fulfilled by Jesus how do we now keep the law? By loving our neighbor? Discuss.
Jesus fulfilled the law by keeping it perfectly and died on the cross that we may live perfectly in the law through him just by having simple faith in what he did at the cross and the victory he won.
 
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toLiJC

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In Matthew 5:17 Jesus says:

"Do not think I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets. I have come not to destroy but to fulfill."

So, how exactly did Jesus fulfill the law? Was it because Jesus kept the law perfectly? If the law is fulfilled by Jesus how do we now keep the law? By loving our neighbor? Discuss.

Jesus is seen to be the most practical human being in the universe, He always sought what is most effective in salvation for people and souls in general, and His dedication to the work of overall salvation in the true God was so earnest that He even preferred sacrificing His life for that holiest cause (if necessary) to having undisturbed life in the world

so such a person as Him hardly relied on people to do everything by themselves, but He knew there is usually a need for sacrifice such as faith, prayer and fasting, because there must have been (a) priest(s) to offer gifts and render services, and He was aware that there is a need for someone and even for many to make prayers, intercessions, pleadings and blessings for the salvation of all people in the true God, for since the day of the Fall humans have needed such priests to help the true God hasten the process of overall salvation, because if God created man from scratch when the man's soul was not able even to think so as to hope to become and be a man or (to) be created as a man, then He should also be able to make humans become and be righteous and provide them with abundant and eternal life just as man has been able to perfectly set up, maintain and repair the machine he created

and all the Law of the true God is assigned to lead to overall salvation in Him, so Jesus had to fulfill that Law (according to all this teaching, the sound doctrine of overall salvation, the righteousness of God) so that as many people as possible might/could also began and continue to fulfill It to the last...

Blessings
 
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disciple1

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In Matthew 5:17 Jesus says:

"Do not think I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets. I have come not to destroy but to fulfill."

So, how exactly did Jesus fulfill the law? Was it because Jesus kept the law perfectly? If the law is fulfilled by Jesus how do we now keep the law? By loving our neighbor? Discuss.
Yes by loving you neighbor.

I like what Jesus said in John chapter 7 verse 19 Has not Moses given you the law yet not one of you keeps it. And they did try very hard to keep it. And Jesus also said your righteousness would have to surpass that of the teachers of the law.
If you preach the law your condemning your self because you don't keep it.
It says in James chapter 2 verse 10 If anyone keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it.
I like what it says in Galatians chapter 5 verse 14 the entire law is summed up in a single command love your neighbor as yourself.
James chapter 2 verse 13 Judgement without mercy will be shown anyone who hasn't been merciful mercy triumphs over judgement.
 
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Soyeong

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Good day,

Yes
God gave a law (meditated by angels) knowing full well it could not be kept by the nation of Israel (his very) own.

We have a new mediator based on a promise, and in him the law is for-filled on behave of those he meditates for.

In Him,

Bill

Hello,

According to Deuteronomy 30:11-14, God said that what he commanded was not too difficult for us to obey, but that His Word is near us, in our heart and in our mouth so that we can do it, and Romans 10:5-10 quotes this passage in regard to what our faith says. So to say that God knew that we could not keep the Law is to call Him a liar and to deny what our faith says.
 
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Soyeong

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God gave the law to show man he could not keep it (no one but God can do what is required). Yeshua fulfilled the Law, having become the the Atonement for our sin.

The OT peoples looked forward to the day of atonement by the Kinsman-Redeemer Yeshua (on the cross) as the Sacrificial Offering acceptable by the Almighty. (We look back to the cross, they looked forward since He hadn't come yet.) They did this by offering the sacrifices as God spelled out in the Law. After Yeshua ha Meshiach atoned for sin, no longer was the Law necessary as He fulfilled the requirements for atonement, once and for ALL. :prayer:

According to Deuteronomy 30:11-14, God said that what he commanded was not too difficult for us to do, but that His Word is near us, in our hearts and in our mouth so that we can do it, and Romans 10:5-10 also quotes this passage in regard to what our faith says, so to say that man could not keep it is to call God a liar and deny what our faith says. If it were impossible to keep the Law, then we can not be held responsible for not keeping it. According to Deuteronomy 30:15-20, obeying the law brings life and a blessing, while disobedience brings death and a curse so choose life! So we have a real choice, but if it were impossible, then we would not have a choice and God would have given the Law to His children to order to put us under a curse. I think our loving Father knows how to give better gifts than that, especially when He said that it was commanded for our own good (Deuteronomy 10:12-13).

To fulfill the Law is defined as causing God's will (as made known in the Law) to be obeyed as it should be, and after Messiah said in Matthew 5:17 that he came to fulfill the Law, he then proceeded to fulfill it six times throughout the rest of the chapter by teaching how to correctly understand and obey it. According to Galatians 5:14, loving your neighbor fulfills the entire Law, so everyone who has ever loved their neighbor has fulfilled the entire Law, which means that it does not refer to something unique that Messiah did.
 
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Soyeong

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Good day,

I do not think Jesus's commandments are the same as the Law given to the nation of Israel.

Later a "law" of Christ is used by Paul, and I can assure you that is nothing like the national law of the Hebrews in the old covenant.

In Him,

Bill

Hello,

According to Deuteronomy 4:2, it is a sin to add to or subtract from what God had commanded, so if you think that Jesus did that, then you should think that he sinned and disqualified himself from being your Savior. However, there is nothing that indicates that Jesus was in disagreement with that Father about what conduct we should have, but rather whoever loves him will obey his teachings, which were not his own, but that of the Father (John 14:23-24), so Jesus did not depart from what the Father had taught. Jesus sinlessly lived in perfect obedience to the Law, so I don't see any reason to think that the Law of Christ is anything other than how he taught God's Law by word and by example. If God instructed Israel how to act in accordance with His righteousness, but now the law has changed so that action in longer in accordance with God's righteousness, or vice versa, then God's righteousness has changed, but God's righteousness is eternal (Psalms 119:142) and therefore all of his righteous laws are also eternal (Psalms 119:160).
 
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Soyeong

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The laws are not differentiated in the OT. In fact, read Leviticus 19 and you will see that all these categories are interspersed with no distinction made.

As to the civil and judicial laws, Jesus told his JEWISH disciples that they should obey the Scribes and Pharisees (Matthew 23:1) because they have the authority to make legal rulings for the Jewish people.

The wording in Matthew 23:1-4 is confusing where he is telling his disciples to do what they say, not not to follow their example, and then later in he said that the Pharisees shut up the Kingdom in people's face, but we're still supposed to do whatever they say? However, according to Shem Tov's Hebrew Matthew, there is one small change that changes the passage from being confusing to making perfect sense, and if for no other reason I think that lends credibility to the translation. In Matthew 23:2-3, it says that the teachers of the Law sit in Moses' seat, so be careful to do everything he said, but do not do what they do for they do not practice what they preach. In others, Jesus was saying that they sit in Moses' seat, so their authority comes from Moses, so do what Moses said, not all of these rabbinic enactments, which are a heavy burden that they have placed on the people. I recommend this video:

 
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yeshuaslavejeff

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So to say that God knew that we could not keep the Law is to call Him a liar and to deny what our faith says.
Yes, I think, in the way you mean this,
but remember (agree?) that God gave TORAH to expose sin in everyone and lead them to Christ Jesus Messiah Savior King of the Jews....
No one could keep the TORAH perfectly in order to never sin - they could and can keep it on a daily basis, but that never prevented them from needing the atonement of the BLOOD OF THE LAMB, forgiveness, redemption, and everything Yahweh Planned and Provided in and through the SAVIOR JESUS.....

Besides everyone being born consigned to sin, so everyone could be shown grace who loves God and is called according to His Purpose,

Everyone is born "natural man", not "spiritual",
and thus unable to inherit the KINGDOM of GOD unless they are born again and also clothed with the RIGHTOUESNESS, via the perfect faithfulness of JESUS.
HALLELUYAH !
 
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Soyeong

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I would agree with you and think you are reflecting on this; 1 John 2:7-11 Brethren, I write no new commandment to you, but an old commandment which you have had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word which you heard from the beginning. 8 Again, a new commandment I write to you, which thing is true in Him and in you, because the darkness is passing away, and the true light is already shining.
9 He who says he is in the light, and hates his brother, is in darkness until now. 10 He who loves his brother abides in the light, and there is no cause for stumbling in him. 11 But he who hates his brother is in darkness and walks in darkness, and does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes.
Isn't John saying the new is the old commandment, and he is stating again this new commandment, love the Lord your God with all your heart and your neighbor as yourself, the whole law is fulfilled in this. :scratch: Is this right?

There is nothing brand new about the command to love our neighbor (Leviticus 19:18), but what is new about it is the quality of the example by which we are to love our neighbor, as Christ loved us, rather than as we love ourselves, and indeed the Greek word used refers to newness with respect to quality rather than with respect to time.
 
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Soyeong

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GALATIANS.3: =
The Law Brings a Curse
10 For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse; for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who does not continue in all things which are written in the book of the law, to do them.” 11 But that no one is justified by the law in the sight of God is evident, for “the just shall live by faith.” 12 Yet the law is not of faith, but “the man who does them shall live by them.”

13 Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”), 14 that the blessing of Abraham might come upon the Gentiles in Christ Jesus, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.

The phrase "work of the law" does not have a definitive article in the Greek, so it is literally translated as "work of law", which means that the phrase does refer to a definitive set of laws, such as the Law of Moses, but rather Paul used it as a catch-all phrase to refer to large body of Jewish oral law, traditions, rulings, and fences that exist in the 1st century, which would eventually be recorded in the Mishna. The phrase "work of law" is also used in this way in the Qumran Text 4QMMT.

In Matthew 15:2-3, Jesus was asked why his disciples broke the traditions of the elders and he responded by asking them why they broke the command of God for the sake of their tradition. He went on to say that for the sake of their tradition they made void the Word of God (Matthew 15:6), that they worshiped God in vain because they taught as doctrines the commands of men (Matthew 15:8-9), and that they were hypocrites for setting aside the commands of God in order to establish their own traditions (Mark 7:6-9), so it is important to understand that Jesus criticized the Pharisees for not following the Mosaic Law and for teaching their own traditions instead, which means that we need to be careful not to take something that was against following the laws of men as being against following the Law of our God. I linked a video in my previous post by an ex-Pharisee that does an excellent of giving an overview of the issues that Jesus was facing with the Pharisees. They were even teaching that they had a higher authority than God to interpret Scripture, and this is something Jesus had a problem with.

In Romans 3:27-31, Paul differentiated between a law that was of works, which is works of law, and a law that is of faith, which is God's Law, and he said that our faith upholds God's Law. In Matthew 23:23, Jesus said that faith was one of the weightier matters of the Law, so again God's Law is of faith, and obedience to it is straightforwardly about trusting God to guide us in how to rightly live. So getting back to Galatians 3, man-made works of law are not of faith, but the Book of the Law is of faith, so who rely on works of law are under a curse because they are failing to live by faith in God and are therefore failing to do everything in the Book of the Law.

ROMANS.7: =
Law Cannot Save from Sin
13 Has then what is good become death to me? Certainly not! But sin, that it might appear sin, was producing death in me through what is good, so that sin through the commandment might become exceedingly sinful. 14 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal, sold under sin. 15 For what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do. 16 If, then, I do what I will not to do, I agree with the law that it is good. 17 But now, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. 18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find. 19 For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice. 20 Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me.

21 I find then a law, that evil is present with me, the one who wills to do good. 22 For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man. 23 But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. 24 O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!

So then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin.

In Romans 7, it is again important to distinguish which law Paul was talking about. In verses 21-25, he said that he delighted in obeying God's Law and that he served it with his mind, but contrasted that with the law of sin that held him captive that he served with his flesh, so throughout Romans 5-8, we need be careful to determine from the context which of the two laws he is talking about.

1JOHN.4: = 10 In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _

The Law or Moses Law shows us to be born inherently sinful/evil/satanic and deserving to be sent to hell by God when we die - the consequence of Adam's Original Sin(ROMANS.5:12, LEV.17:11, HEB.9:22, MATT.5:27-30).
... As for the Jews, no amount of keeping the Law will save them from hell, ie not committing idolatry, murder, adultery, rape, stealing, lying/cheating, etc will not justify them for being saved from hell or salvation = hence, Law vs Grace(= justified by faith in Christ, and not by the keeping of the Law).

IOW, the Law could not save people from hell, only Christ could. That was how Jesus Christ fulfilled the Law, ie He fulfilled what the Law could not fulfill, by being the required sacrificial Lamb of God who was crucified on the Cross, in order to wash away our inborn and outborn sins and to clean and prepare us for the kingdom of heaven.
.

P S - At most, the Law can only fulfill a good and long life on earth for good and law-abiding Jews or even Gentiles.(cf; MATT.19:23, ROM.2:10)

The purpose of God revealing our sin was to lead us to repentance and back to obedience to His Law. The Law instructs us how to do what is righteous in accordance with God's righteousness, but no amount of doing what is righteous will ever cause someone to become righteous because the Law was never given for that purpose. Rather, the one and only way that there has ever been to become righteous is by grace through faith, and by the same grace through the same faith we are therefore required to be careful to obey all of God's commands.

God was not acting against His grace when He gave to Law, but rather giving the Law was how God how showed His grace to us. In Psalms 119:29, David asked God to show his grace to him by teaching him to obey His Law. In Titus 2:11-14, it says that our salvation involves being trained by grace to do what is godly, righteous, and good and to refrain from doing what is ungodly and sinful, which is an accurate description of what the Law was given to instruct how to do. In Roman 1:5, we have received grace in order to bring about the obedience that faith requires, so there is no conflict between God's grace and God's Law, as though a house divided against itself could stand. The Law was never given as a means of becoming justified, but as instructions for how those who have been justified should therefore act.
 
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Soyeong

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Paul is very explicit about "the Law" ... read the letter to the Romans.
Before Christ fulfilled the law, He spoke to the Jews through and lived by the Law. But after His resurrection, it is very clear that the "NEW COVENANT" did not include the law, but GRACE. Our salvation comes from Yeshua ha Machiach and not through the Law.


According to Jeremiah 31:33, the New Covenant involves God putting his Law in our minds and writing it on our hearts, so it is very much included in the New Covenant. God has always been a God of grace (Exodus 34:6-7) and has show his grace to people throughout the OT (Genesis 6:8-9), and the way that God showed his grace was by teaching to obey His Law (Psalms 119:29). Likewise, according to Titus 2:11-14, our salvation involves being trained by grace to do what is godly, righteous, and good, and to renounce doing what is ungodly and sinful, which is an accurate description of what God's Law was given to instruct how to do. According to Romans 1:5, we have received grace in order to bring about the obedience that faith requires. So it is true that the New Covenant is a covenant of grace, but it is false if the implication is that God's other covenants are not. Likewise, it is true that the Mosaic Covenant is a covenant of Law, but there are 1,050 commands in the NT, so it is false if the implication is that the New Covenant is not. The NT is full of exhortation to repent and obey.

Jesus did not abolish the moral and ethical laws that had been in effect from the time of Moses. He affirmed and expanded upon those principles, but He said obedience must be from the heart (attitudes and intentions) rather than just technical observance of the letter of the law (Matthew 5:21-22, 27-28, 31-32, 33-34, 38-42, 43-44, etc.).

Everything in the Bible is there to teach us about God and how to have a relationship with Him. God has always disdained it when His people outwardly obeyed His Law while their hearts were far from Him because they were missing their entire point of the Law, so God has always been primarily concerned with obedience coming from our heart, and technical observance to the letter of the Law has always been a perversion of it.

In Matthew 5, Jesus was not expanding on anything, but rather he was simply teaching the Law as it was originally intended to be understood in correction to what the people had heard the teachers of the Law teaching about how to obey it. For example:

Matthew 5:43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’

While the Law certainly commands us to love our neighbor (Leviticus 19:18), it does not command us to hate our enemy, which what correcting what was wrongly being taught about how to obey the Law.

Salvation comes from believing the Gospel of Jesus. We are justified by grace through faith (3:21-5:11).

According to Matthew 4:17-23, Gospel message of Jesus was to repent from our sins for the Kingdom of God is at hand, the people would not have known what sin was if it weren't for the Law (Romans 7:7), so repenting from our disobedience to the Law is an integral part of what it means to believe the Gospel of Jesus. There one and only way that there has ever been to become justified is by grace through faith.

The Bible clearly states that we are not under the law. Romans 6:14
says, "For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace." Since we are under grace, we are not under the law. The two are mutually exclusive.


I completely agree that we are not under the law, but are under grace, but Romans 6:14 specifies that the law that we are not under was one that sin had dominion over us. This perfectly fits Paul's description of the law of sin, but does not at all fit his description of God's holy, righteous, and good Law. If no longer being under God's law meant that sin no longer had dominion over us, then God's Law would be sin, but Paul said that God's Law is not sin, but reveals what sin is (Romans 7:7). Furthermore, would not make any sense to say in Romans 6:14-15 that we are not under God's Law, but that we are still required to refrain from doing what God's Law reveals to be sin. None of the surrounding context over verses 12-19 support us being free from having to obey God's instructions for how to do what is righteous and to refrain from sin, but just the opposite. So I see no grounds to think that Romans 6:14 is referring to God's Law, and it wouldn't make any sense to say that God was acting against His grace when He gave His Law, but rather it is the law of sin that we are not under when we are under grace.

It does not negate doing good and following God's outlines for righteous living, but both the OLD and NEW Covenants are about salvation in Christ.

I agree, the goal of obeying the Law is a relationship with Christ for righteousness for everyone who has faith (Romans 10:4).
 
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Soyeong

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Good Day, Soyeong

Yes, I do as it relates to the OC (with all it's faults) and the correct use of the law with in that covenantal context with the Hebrew nation ( of which he served as human king). Do I think David had understanding of the complete fullness and purposes of NC and the fullness of the better promise... No I do not I think so.

In Him,

Bill

Good day.

If people under the Mosaic Covenant were under grace, then that does not represent a shift to us now being under grace in the New Covenant. Rather God has always been a God of grace (Exodus 34:6-7) and has showed His grace to people throughout the OT (Genesis 6:8-9) and shows His grace to us by teaching us to obey His Law (Psalms 119:29). According to Titus 2:11-14, our salvation involves being trained by grace to do what is godly, righteous, a good, and to refrain from doing what is ungodly and sinful, which is an accurate description of what God's Law was given to instruct how to do. According to Romans 1:5, we have received grace in order to bring about the obedience that faith requires. Strong's defines "grace" as "the divine influence upon the heart, and its reflection in the life" and when God's will is reflected in our lives, it straightforwardly takes the form of obedience to His commands.

The Law was ineffective in saving because it was never given for that purpose in the first place, but rather it was given as to those who had been saved as instructions for how we should therefore act. It was given to teach us how to walk in God's ways (Deuteronomy 10:12-13) in accordance with His attributes. Instruction for how to act in accordance with God's righteousness can't be nullified without first nullifying God's righteousness, but God's righteousness is eternal (Psalms 119:142), so therefore also are all of God's righteous laws (Psalms 119:160). The New Covenant is based on superior promises with a superior mediator, but it was not based upon superior laws because that would involve following a superior God with superior righteousness, but rather the New Covenant involves God putting His Law in our minds and writing in on our hearts so that we will obey it (Jeremiah 31:33).
 
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Soyeong

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I know this will be a heated discussion, but he completed the law, thus brought it to perfection in himself. The law is sealed within him since He is the Law. There fore all who trust in him are also sealed with him in the completed law.

We have not been given the righteousness of God so that we will hide it under a bushel, but so that we will let it shine, and the way to let it shine is to follow His instructions for how to do that, not to consider them completed. If we trust God to guide us in how to rightly live, then we will live in accordance with His instructions.
 
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Steve Petersen

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The wording in Matthew 23:1-4 is confusing where he is telling his disciples to do what they say, not not to follow their example, and then later in he said that the Pharisees shut up the Kingdom in people's face, but we're still supposed to do whatever they say? However, according to Shem Tov's Hebrew Matthew, there is one small change that changes the passage from being confusing to making perfect sense, and if for no other reason I think that lends credibility to the translation. In Matthew 23:2-3, it says that the teachers of the Law sit in Moses' seat, so be careful to do everything he said, but do not do what they do for they do not practice what they preach. In others, Jesus was saying that they sit in Moses' seat, so their authority comes from Moses, so do what Moses said, not all of these rabbinic enactments, which are a heavy burden that they have placed on the people. I recommend this video:


The Shem Tov Matthew is problematic.

Why Nehemiah Gordon is Wrong about Matthew 23:3
 
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drjean

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If the people could keep the Law there would have been no need for sacrifices for sin.

The law was given for a few reasons, one being so that future generations would be educated about the existence of God:

6:20 “When your son asks you in time to come, saying, ‘What is the meaning of the testimonies, the statutes, and the judgments which the Lord our God has commanded you?’ 21 then you shall say to your son: ‘We were slaves of Pharaoh in Egypt, and the Lord brought us out of Egypt...

Why did God give the Law? Paul shows us that God gave the Law to reveal His standard of absolute righteousness to convict us all of our true guilt before Him, so that we would see our need for the gospel.

Colossians 2:17 tells us the law was given as a foreshadowing of Christ: " which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ." We need the ultimate sacrifice. OT sacrifices were temporary, even the blood atonement of the animal was only good for one year.

James 2:10 points out, “For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all.”

Jesus said (Matt. 22:37-40) that the entire Law rests on the two great commandments: “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets.”

But back to the OT: Luke 24:44, "These are my words which I spoke to you . . . that everything written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms must be fulfilled."
 
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Steve Petersen

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If the people could keep the Law there would have been no need for sacrifices for sin.

The law was given for a few reasons, one being so that future generations would be educated about the existence of God:

6:20 “When your son asks you in time to come, saying, ‘What is the meaning of the testimonies, the statutes, and the judgments which the Lord our God has commanded you?’ 21 then you shall say to your son: ‘We were slaves of Pharaoh in Egypt, and the Lord brought us out of Egypt...

Why did God give the Law? Paul shows us that God gave the Law to reveal His standard of absolute righteousness to convict us all of our true guilt before Him, so that we would see our need for the gospel.

Colossians 2:17 tells us the law was given as a foreshadowing of Christ: " which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ." We need the ultimate sacrifice. OT sacrifices were temporary, even the blood atonement of the animal was only good for one year.

James 2:10 points out, “For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all.”

Jesus said (Matt. 22:37-40) that the entire Law rests on the two great commandments: “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets.”

But back to the OT: Luke 24:44, "These are my words which I spoke to you . . . that everything written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms must be fulfilled."

The sin sacrifice was part of the Law. God commanded them! Bringing a sin offering after INADVERTENTLY breaking the Law is keeping the Law!
 
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Steve Petersen

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If the people could keep the Law there would have been no need for sacrifices for sin.

The law was given for a few reasons, one being so that future generations would be educated about the existence of God:

6:20 “When your son asks you in time to come, saying, ‘What is the meaning of the testimonies, the statutes, and the judgments which the Lord our God has commanded you?’ 21 then you shall say to your son: ‘We were slaves of Pharaoh in Egypt, and the Lord brought us out of Egypt...

Why did God give the Law? Paul shows us that God gave the Law to reveal His standard of absolute righteousness to convict us all of our true guilt before Him, so that we would see our need for the gospel.

Colossians 2:17 tells us the law was given as a foreshadowing of Christ: " which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ." We need the ultimate sacrifice. OT sacrifices were temporary, even the blood atonement of the animal was only good for one year.

James 2:10 points out, “For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all.”

Jesus said (Matt. 22:37-40) that the entire Law rests on the two great commandments: “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets.”

But back to the OT: Luke 24:44, "These are my words which I spoke to you . . . that everything written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms must be fulfilled."

If the Law was given by God to mock Israel's ability to keep it, then He is a liar because He said that it was NOT too difficult (Deuteronomy 30:11.)
 
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