What are Jesus Christ's commandments?

Victor in Christ said:

Isaiah 8:20 "To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them."

John 14:15 " If ye love me, keep my commandments.

1 John 5:3, Matthew 11:30, Matthew 23:4, John 14:15, john 14:21, John 14:23, 2 John 1:6

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If what Christ commanded was the same same as what the Father commanded, then that would mean that he was in disagreement with the Father about which commandments we should follow, and I see no indication of this. On the contrary, in John 14:24, Jesus said that his teachings were not his own, but that of the father, so he taught the same commandments as the Father. Jesus set a sinless example for us to follow of how to walk in obedience to the Mosaic Law and did not hypocritically preach something other than what he practiced.

Victor in Christ said:

are you referring to dietary laws, etc?

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Indeed, dietary laws are part of what the Father commanded, which Jesus taught by word and by example, and was not in disagreement with the Father about. Sin is the transgression of God's law (1 John 3:4), so all someone needs to do to teach obedience to God's dietary laws is to teach repentance from our sins.

Victor in Christ said:

If i innocently, had no other option to survive, or simply liked the taste of some morsel of pork, crab, shrimp, prawn would the Lord's grace and mercy through his pure atoning shed blood for our sins not be enough for that sin?...or do i need to go backwards into bondage again in order to move forward as a Christian?

Paul had problems with such issues regarding circumcission of the flesh, need i also go back to bondage to renew my outward flesh again to prove to some man or woman i am a Christian?

Jeremiah 31:32-33
Ezekiel 36:26-27

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You can't innocently disobey God's commands, though there are instances where one command takes priority over obeying another command, such as with the preservation of life. In John 8:31-36, it is sin in transgression of God's law that puts us in bondage, and in Romans 8:3-4, Jesus had freed us from bondage to sin so that we might be free to fulfill the righteous requirement of the law, so we do not need to go back to bondage to sin. The way to move forward as a Christian is to repent from our sins and obey God's law. If you think that Paul had a problem with obeying God, then you need to make a decision about whether he or God has the higher authority and which one to follow, though the areality is that he never spoke against obeying God. In Jeremiah 31:33, the New Covenant still involves following God's law, and in Ezekiel 36:26-27, the Spirit had the role of leading us to obey His law.

Soyeong said:

You can't innocently disobey God's commands, though there are instances where one command takes priority over obeying another command, such as with the preservation of life. In John 8:31-36, it is sin in transgression of God's law that puts us in bondage, and in Romans 8:3-4, Jesus had freed us from bondage to sin so that we might be free to fulfill the righteous requirement of the law, so we do not need to go back to bondage to sin. The way to move forward as a Christian is to repent from our sins and obey God's law. If you think that Paul had a problem with obeying God, then you need to make a decision about whether he or God has the higher authority and which one to follow, though the areality is that he never spoke against obeying God. In Jeremiah 31:33, the New Covenant still involves following God's law, and in Ezekiel 36:26-27, the Spirit had the role of leading us to obey His law.

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"The way to move forward as a Christian is to repent from our sins and obey God's law" is not accurate. 1) We are supposed to rest from our works intended to please God, as He already loves us in His Son. 2) As Christians we are freed from God's law; we are under His grace. "There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; for anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from their works, just as God did from his." Hebrews 4:9-10

pescador said:

"The way to move forward as a Christian is to repent from our sins and obey God's law" is not accurate. 1) We are supposed to rest from our works intended to please God, as He already loves us in His Son. 2) As Christians we are freed from God's law; we are under His grace. "There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; for anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from their works, just as God did from his." Hebrews 4:9-10

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Far from being incorrect, Jesus began his ministry with the Gospel message to repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand (Matthew 4:17-23), and the Mosaic Law was how his audience knew what sin is, so repenting from our disobedience to it is an integral part of the Gospel message, which Jesus prophesied would be proclaimed to all nations (Matthew 24:12-14). In Titus 2:11-14, our salvation is described as being trained by grace to do what is godly, righteous, and good, and to renonce doing what is ungodly, which is what the Mosaic Law was given to instruct how to do. Furthermore, Titus 2:14 does not say that Jesus gave himself to free us from God's law, but in order to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people of his own possession who are zealous for doing good works, so saying that we are freed from God's law undermines both Christ's ministry and what he accomplished on the cross. In Psalms 119:29, David wanted God to be gracious to him by teaching him to obey His law, so that is what being under grace looks like.

In Hebrew 4:6, they did not enter God's rest because of their disobedience, and in 4:11, we should strive to enter that rest so that no one may fall away by the same sort of disobedience, so you using entering into God's rest to justify the same sort of disobedience is exactly what the opposite of what was being said. Christ set a sinless example for us to follow of how to walk in obedience to the Mosaic Law, he did not hypocritically preach something other than what he practiced, and as Christians we are obligated to follow what Christ taught by word and by example. In Matthew 11:28-30, Jesus was inviting people to come to him for rest and to learn from him, not inviting people to refuse to follow what he taught. By saying that we would find rest for our souls, he was referencing Jeremiah 6:16-19, where the Mosaic Law is described as the good way were we will find rest for our souls. This rest for our souls comes from having faith in God to guide us in how to rightly live through His law, not from taking a break from following God's guidance.

Victor in Christ said:

If a Gentile/Hebrew saved and washed by the blood of the lamb is stranded on a desert island, with no other form of food to survive on but crab, lobster, goat, pig..... Is God going to cast that believer into eternal damnation because they ate a piece of that meat, or does his mercy and Love for that believer prevail over a dietary law in the OT, which to the best of my knowledge was designed to discipline the Israelites. The dietary laws were God's form of punishment for disobedience. God used the spiritual stick to drive the donkey/Mule further toward the carrot (the promised land/heaven)

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No earthly father gives instructions to their children with the goal of punishing them, but rather they give their children instructions for their own good in order to bless them, and it is that much more true of our Heavenly Father (Deuteronomy 6:24, 10:12-13). Again, there are a number of instances where one law takes priority over another, which is why Jesus said the priests who performed their duties on the Sabbath were held innocent and why he ruled that it is lawful to heal on the Sabbath, so there are a number of instances where the preservation of life takes priority over other laws.

Victor in Christ said:

Soyeong, tell us what foods we should avoid, is there anything else? should we be circumcised in the flesh, what feasts do we have to obey, what size of the moon, sun should we do them on, etc.

Isaiah 1:10-18

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According to Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14, unclean animals are not good and should not be eaten, while clean animals are permitted to be eaten as food.

Either there are correct and incorrect reasons for someone to become circumcised or according to Galatians 5:2, Paul caused Christ to be of no value to Timothy when he had him circumcised, and Christ is of no value to roughly 80% of the men in the US who are circumcised. In Acts 15:1, they were wanting to require all Gentiles to become circumcised in order to become justified, however, that was never the purpose for which God commanded circumcised, so the problem was that circumcised was being used for a man-made purpose that went above and beyond the purpose for which God commanded it. So the Jerusalem Council upheld God's law by correctly rejecting that requirement, and a ruling against requiring something that God never commanded should not be mistaken as being a ruling against obeying what God has commanded.

Do you think that Isaiah 1:15 is speaking against prayer?

Soyeong said:

Far from being incorrect, Jesus began his ministry with the Gospel message to repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand (Matthew 4:17-23), and the Mosaic Law was how his audience knew what sin is, so repenting from our disobedience to it is an integral part of the Gospel message, which Jesus prophesied would be proclaimed to all nations (Matthew 24:12-14). In Titus 2:11-14, our salvation is described as being trained by grace to do what is godly, righteous, and good, and to renonce doing what is ungodly, which is what the Mosaic Law was given to instruct how to do. Furthermore, Titus 2:14 does not say that Jesus gave himself to free us from God's law, but in order to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people of his own possession who are zealous for doing good works, so saying that we are freed from God's law undermines both Christ's ministry and what he accomplished on the cross. In Psalms 119:29, David wanted God to be gracious to him by teaching him to obey His law, so that is what being under grace looks like.

In Hebrew 4:6, they did not enter God's rest because of their disobedience, and in 4:11, we should strive to enter that rest so that no one may fall away by the same sort of disobedience, so you using entering into God's rest to justify the same sort of disobedience is exactly what the opposite of what was being said. Christ set a sinless example for us to follow of how to walk in obedience to the Mosaic Law, he did not hypocritically preach something other than what he practiced, and as Christians we are obligated to follow what Christ taught by word and by example. In Matthew 11:28-30, Jesus was inviting people to come to him for rest and to learn from him, not inviting people to refuse to follow what he taught. By saying that we would find rest for our souls, he was referencing Jeremiah 6:16-19, where the Mosaic Law is described as the good way were we will find rest for our souls. This rest for our souls comes from having faith in God to guide us in how to rightly live through His law, not from taking a break from following God's guidance.

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There is no use distorting Scripture. When Jesus addressed people in person there was not a single Christian on the entire planet. When He died on the cross He paid the penalty for violations of the Mosaic law for everyone. So, the requirements of the law no longer apply to Christians!

Until you understand this most basic principle of Christianity there is no point in my continuing to discuss this with you. It saddens me that you are not under grace but remain under the law, and try to keep others there with you. 8^(

Victor in Christ said:

I can never say if eating such foods is a sin in the eyes of God, but i will state a REAL truth. I went away for 2 weeks to get away from my troubles/the world and all i had was water, mixed beans, canned fish, no bread, etc (an un-planned diet where i went into the shop and grapped). My outward appearance and health after those 2 weeks was better. During that time, i started to read the book of Daniel (which i've never read before) and the 1st chapter over and over. It clicked with me (that's possibly why my health/body is good)

Now,..... don't take that as the way to Salvation because its not, but its something i hold close to me for health reasons.

God Bless

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I'm glad to hear it. There are certainly night and day differences between how healthy it is to eat clean and unclean animals and there are many diseases and parasites that have been transferred to humans through eating unclean animals, such as COVID 19, however, God associated refraining from eating unclean animals with His holiness, so there is much more to it than that. In 1 Peter 1:16, we are told to have a holy conduct for God is holy, which is a quote from Leviticus where God was giving instructions for how to have a holy conduct, which includes refraining from eating unclean animals (Leviticus 11:44-45), so doing that is testifying about God's holiness while eating unclean animals is bearing false witness against God. Our salvation is from sin (Matthew 1:21) and sin is the transgression of God's law (1 John 3:4), which includes the command against eating unclean animals, so while we do not earn our salvation by obeying God's law, living in obedience to God's law is nevertheless what salvation from living in transgression of God's law looks like.

Victor in Christ said:

In the context with what Isaiah is speaking about, the prayers of those people will not be answered.

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Indeed, the problem wasn't with their prayers or with them keeping God's holy days, but with the fact that they were doing those things while their hands were full of blood.

pescador said:

There is no use distorting Scripture. When Jesus addressed people in person there was not a single Christian on the entire planet. When He died on the cross He paid the penalty for violations of the Mosaic law for everyone. So, the requirements of the law no longer apply to Christians!

Until you understand this most basic principle of Christianity there is no point in my continuing to discuss this with you. It saddens me that you are not under grace but remain under the law, and try to keep others there with you. 8^(

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A Christian is by definition a follower of Christ and Christ did have followers, so it is appropriate to refer to them as Christians. It's not like anyone during the time of Jesus spoke a word of English.

The fact that Jesus gave himself to pay for our violation of the Mosaic Law should make us want to go and sin no more, not consider ourselves to be free to sin. Jesus freed us from sin so that we could be free to obey God's law, not the other way around. It saddens me that you refuse to come under grace and God's law and try to keep others there with you. In Titus 2:11-14, our salvation is described as being trained by grace to do what is godly, righteous, and good, and to renounce doing what is ungodly, which is what God's law was give to instruct us to do, yet for some reason you want God to be gracious to you instead of training you to do that things.

Victor in Christ said:

More importantly there's a spiritual message in the dietary laws we must take on board, for such a person will not enter the kingdom of Heaven. A person who is inwardly a goat, a pig, a person who's a crab/lobster and wears a shield of iron instead of a breastplate of righteous Agape LOVE, a person who's full of leavened bread/puffed up/boastful by their own self-righteousness/yeast.....etc,etc. Be humble/meek/the salt of the earth with savour/burning yet flourishing on our Christian walk along the narrow path to Heaven's Glory.

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I would agree that there is significance in regard to why certain animals are unclean while others are not and that there are lessons that we can learn from the nature of unclean animals. I would go so far as to say that God created things for the purpose of being a symbol, though not everything that can be symbolized is something that God is teaching us.

If God's law were His instructions for how to become self-righteous and God does not want us to become self-righteous, then it would follow that God therefore does not want to be obeyed, which is absurd, especially considering that all throughout the Bible, God wanted His people to repent and to return to obedience to His law, and even Jesus began his ministry with that message. Therefore God's law is not God's instructions for how to become self-righteous, but His instructions for how to express His righteousness through our actions. People have sadly treated righteousness and holiness as being bad things accusing those who are righteous and holy as being self-righteous and holier than thou.