All things are lawful for me

[YouAreAwesome]

What do you see as the difference?
The Mosaic law is God's instructions for how to do what is holy, righteous, and good (Romans 7:12) and how to avoid sin (Romans 7:7), and as part of the New Covenant, we are still instructed to do what is holy, righteous, and good, and to avoid sin (1 Peter 1:14-16, 1 John 3:4-10, Ephesians 2:10). Furthermore, that is what our salvation involves being trained by grace to obey (Titus 2:11-14). Our salvation is from sin, and sin is lawlessness, so we have been been redeemed from lawlessness in order to be free to become obedient slaves of God (Romans 6:16). Jesus set a perfect example of how to walk in obedience to the law and we are told to follow his example (1 Peter 2:21-22) and to walk in the same way that he walked (1 John 2:3-6). If Gentiles have never, ever, ever been required to obey God's law, then they have never, ever, ever needed Jesus to come and give himself to redeem them from lawlessness. What should be Bible 101 is that followers of God should follow God's laws and followers of Christ should follow his example.

Galatians 3:3 Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?

Flesh and law go hand in hand. Spirit and love go hand in hand.

Would you agree we are discussing post-salvation moral guidance? This comes from the Spirit Who teaches the law of love.

"If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, "Love your neighbor as yourself", you are doing right." (James 2:8)

Furthermore, just because love nearly always follows the moral laws presented to Moses, doesn't mean we look to the law for our moral guidance. In fact, if we do so, we come under its curse.

 

[Soyeong]

I kindly disagree. Having been raised an Adventist I know all the arguments for keeping the Mosaic law.

However, I did not understand covenants. I wonder where your journey takes you?

There are so many arguments presented throughout the NT telling us to get completely free from the curse of the law. Galatians 4:21-31 explains it well. V24 tells us Hagar is the Mosaic covenant. V30 tells us to throw it out.

According to 2 Peter 3:15-17, Paul is difficult to understand, but those who are ignorant and unstable twist his words to their own destruction and fall into the error of lawlessness, so the bottom line is that if you interpret Paul as being against obeying God's law, then you have misunderstood him. According to Deuteronomy 13:4-6, the way that we can tell whether someone is a messenger of God is if they teach God's people against following what He had commanded, so if Paul did that, then we should consider him to be a false prophet and disregard what he said. However, I'm going to try to prevent you from needing to do that by showing how your interpretation of him is not correct.

According to Deuteronomy 30:15-20, the law brings life and a blessing for obedience and death and a curse for disobedience, so being set free from the curse of the law is the same thing as being set free from our disobedience to the law, which is the same thing as being set free from sin because sin is defined as the transgression of the law (1 John 3:4). All the remains then is the freedom of life and a blessing that comes with obedience to the law.

In regard to Galatians 4:21-31, there is a difference between Jesus' yoke of the law that is light and easy where we will find rest for our souls (Matthew 11:28-30, Jeremiah 6:16-19) and the Pharisees' yoke of the law that amounted to slavery (Matthew 23:3-4). Abraham, didn't have any rabbis or sages to tell him how to obey God's charge, commandments, statutes, and laws, but rather he knew how to obey God because he listened to the voice of God (Genesis 26:5). This was the relationship that was intended to have with Israel through the Mosaic Covenant (Exodus 19:5, Jeremiah 31:34), but they turned down hearing the voice of God and instead they wanted to have a man teach them how to follow God, saying they wanted to listen to Moses as mediator instead (Exodus 20:19). So in Matthew 23:3-4, they had to listen to the Pharisees who sat in Moses' seat because that is what they agree to do, but Jesus did not want them to do what they did because by then the law had become a heavy burden obscured by a mountain of man-made traditions that were later recorded in the Mishna. Jesus criticized the Pharisees for setting aside the commands of God to follow their own traditions (Mark 7:6-13).

God's law does not require all Gentiles everywhere to become circumcised and God did not require anyone to obey it in order to become saved, so while God did require circumcision as a sign of the covenant, requiring Gentiles to become circumcised and follow all of their traditions in order to become saved is purely a man-made requirement which amounted to slavery rather than the freedom God's law was intended to be (Psalms 119:45, James 1:25). God wanted Israel to have the same freedom that Abraham had, but instead they got a covenant with many mediators between them in God that produces slaves. Ishmael was born through a lack of faith in God to bring about the seed that He promised and is a product of the flesh, so he represents trying to bring about what God has promises through your own effort, which is what the influencers were trying to get Gentiles to do.

While Hagar represents the Mosaic Covenant, Sarah does not represent the New Covenant, but rather she represents the covenant promise made to Abraham that all the nations would be blessed through his seed. The law given at Sinai and the New Covenant are both part and parcel of the promise given to Abraham, but the promise is superior because it was given first under no conditions. So Paul was comparing the Mosaic Covenant with the promise given to Abraham. This has everything to do with non-Jews and how they would enter into the promise of God, not through their own effort, not through works of the law, and not through becoming Jews, but through the promise given to Abraham of a seed represented by Sarah.

 

[Soyeong]

Galatians 3:3 Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?

The issue raise in Acts 15:1 and with the Galatians was that there was a group of Jews who wanted Gentiles to become circumcised and obey their customs in order to become saved. Nowhere does God require this, so this is purely a man-made requirement, though God did require circumcision as a sign of the Abrahamic covenant. If I were saying you needed to obey God's law or works of the law in order to become saved, then you would be right to throw this verse me, but I have said no such thing. The law has many purposes, but providing the means to becoming saved through our own efforts has never been one of them. Paul spent a lot of time hammering home the point that obedience to the law was not about becoming justified and that we are justified by faith apart from the law, yet today many people still think that obedience to the law is about becoming justified, only now they have compounded the error by concluding that therefore we don't need to obey it, whereas Paul concluded by saying that our faith does not abolish the law, but rather our faith upholds the law (Romans 3:27-31).

Flesh and law go hand in hand. Spirit and love go hand in hand.

Paul said that the law is spiritual (Romans 7:14) and that it is those who have a mind set on the flesh who refuse to submit to God's law (Romans 8:7). Everything listed in Galatians 5:16-23 as being works of the flesh that are against the Spirit are also against what the Mosaic law teaches, while everything listed as fruits of the Spirit are also in accordance with what the law teaches. Furthermore, the Spirit has the role of leading us to obey God's law (Ezekiel 36:26-27)

Would you agree we are discussing post-salvation moral guidance? This comes from the Spirit Who teaches the law of love.

"If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, "Love your neighbor as yourself", you are doing right." (James 2:8)

Jesus summarized the law as being about how to love God and how to love your neighbor (Matthew 22:36-40) and Paul said that love fulfills the entire law (Galatians 5:14), so teaching us to how to love is teaching us how to obey the Mosaic law.

The Bible speaks about our salvation in the past, present, and future tense (Ephesians 2:5, Philippians 2:12, Romans 5:9-10), so we have been saved from the penalty of sin, we are being saved from continuing to sin, and we will be saved from God's wrath on the day of the Lord. According to Titus 2:11-14, our salvation involves being saved from the penalty of sin by Jesus giving himself to redeem us from all lawlessness, but it also involves being saved from continuing to sin by God's grace training us to do what He has revealed to be godly, righteous, and good, and training us to renounce doing what He has revealed to be ungodly, sinful, and lawless, which is an accurate description of what the Mosaic law instructs us to do.

Furthermore, just because love nearly always follows the moral laws presented to Moses, doesn't mean we look to the law for our moral guidance. In fact, if we do so, we come under its curse.

Morality is in regard to what we ought to do and we ought to obey God, so all of God's commands are inherently moral laws, and it is absurd for a follower of God to say that we should not look to His commands for moral guidance, as though we shouldn't have faith in Him about how we should live. According to Deuteronomy 30:15-20, God's law brings live and blessing for obedience and death and a curse for disobedience, so the curse comes from not looking to God's law for moral guidance. Does it really make any sense to you that it is a bad thing to obey the laws of the God that you serve? God did not give the law to be a curse, but to be a blessing and He said that what He commanded was for His people's own good (Deuteronomy 10:13, Deuteronomy 6:24). The Israelites who believed that what God said is true and demonstrated that to be the case through living in obedience to His commands were living by faith, for the righteous shall live by faith (Habakkuk 2:4). Living by faith is about trusting God about how we should live and does not refer to some other manner of living that is not in obedience to His commands. Obedience to the law is not about how to become righteous, about how those who have been made righteous should live by faith.

 

[ToBeLoved]

The issue raise in Acts 15:1 and with Galatians was that there was a group of Jews who wanted Gentiles to become circumcised and obey their customs in order to become saved. Nowhere does God require this, so this is purely a man-made requirement. If I were saying you needed to obey God's law or works of the law in order to become saved, then you would be right to throw this verse me, but I have said no such thing. The law has many purposes, but providing the means to becoming saved through our own efforts has never been one of them. Paul spent a lot of time hammering home the point that obedience to the law was not about becoming justified and that we are justified by faith apart from the law, yet today many people still think that obedience to the law is about becoming justified, only they have compounded the error by concluding that there we don't need to obey it, whereas Paul concluded by saying that our faith does not abolish the law, but rather our faith upholds the law (Romans 3:27-31).



Paul said that the law is spiritual (Romans 7:14) and that it is those who have a mind set on the flesh who refuse to submit to God's law (Romans 8:7). Everything listed in Galatians 5:16-23 as being works of the flesh that are against the Spirit are also against what the Mosaic law teaches, while everything listed as fruits of the Spirit are also in accordance with what the law teaches. Furthermore, the Spirit has the role of leading us to obey God's law (Ezekiel 36:26-27)



Jesus summarized the law as being about how to love God and how to love your neighbor (Matthew 22:36-40) and Paul said that love fulfills the entire law (Galatians 5:14), so teaching us to how to love is teaching us how to obey the Mosaic law.



Morality is in regard to what we ought to do and we ought to obey God, so all of God's commands are inherently moral laws, and it is absurd for a follower of God to say that we should not look to Him for moral guidance, as though we shouldn't have faith in God about how we should live. According to Deuteronomy 30:15-20, God's law brings live and blessing for obedience and death and a curse for disobedience, so the curse comes from not looking to God's law for moral guidance. Does it really make any sense to you that it is a bad thing to obey the laws of the God that you serve? God did not give the law to be a curse, but to be a blessing and He said that what He commanded was for His people's own good (Deuteronomy 10:13, Deuteronomy 6:24). The Israelites who believed that what God said is true and demonstrated that to be the case through living in obedience to His commands were living by faith, for the righteous shall live by faith (Habakkuk 2:4). Obedience to the law is not about how to become righteous, about how those who have been made righteous should live.

I'm glad that you find such solace in the law.

But for any New Testament person that claims salvation through Christ's blood and sacrifice, we know is an abomination to be under the law, and not realizing the better covenant and the death and sacrifice of the Messiah.

Galatians 2:20-21
20 I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me. 21 I do not set aside the grace of God. For if righteousness comes through the Law, Christ died for nothing.”

12For I will forgive their iniquities, and remember their sins no more.” 13In speaking of a new covenant,” He has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and aging will soon disappear.

1Now the main point in what has been said is this: we have such a high priest, who has taken His seat at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens,2a minister in the sanctuary and in the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, not man. 3For every high priest is appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices; so it is necessary that this high priest also have something to offer. 4Now if He were on earth, He would not be a priest at all, since there are those who offer the gifts according to the Law; 5who serve a copy and shadow of the heavenly things, just as Moses was warned by God when he was about to erect the tabernacle; for, “SEE,” He says, “THAT YOU MAKE all things ACCORDING TO THE PATTERN WHICH WAS SHOWN YOU ON THEMOUNTAIN.” 6But now He has obtained a more excellent ministry, by as much as He is also the mediator of a better covenant, which has been enacted on better promises.



A New Covenant

7For if that first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no occasion sought for a second.

8For finding fault with them, He says,
“BEHOLD, DAYS ARE COMING, SAYS THE LORD,
WHEN I WILL EFFECT A NEW COVENANT
WITH THE HOUSE OF ISRAEL AND WITH THE HOUSE OF JUDAH;

9NOT LIKE THE COVENANT WHICH I MADE WITH THEIR FATHERS
ON THE DAY WHEN I TOOK THEM BY THE HAND
TO LEAD THEM OUT OF THE LAND OF EGYPT;
FOR THEY DID NOT CONTINUE IN MY COVENANT,
AND I DID NOT CARE FOR THEM, SAYS THE LORD.

10“FOR THIS IS THE COVENANT THAT I WILL MAKE WITH THE HOUSE OF ISRAEL
AFTER THOSE DAYS, SAYS THE LORD:
I WILL PUT MY LAWS INTO THEIR MINDS,
AND I WILL WRITE THEM ON THEIR HEARTS.
AND I WILL BE THEIR GOD,
AND THEY SHALL BE MY PEOPLE.

11“AND THEY SHALL NOT TEACH EVERYONE HIS FELLOW CITIZEN,
AND EVERYONE HIS BROTHER, SAYING, ‘KNOW THE LORD,’
FOR ALL WILL KNOW ME,
FROM THE LEAST TO THE GREATEST OF THEM.

12“FOR I WILL BE MERCIFUL TO THEIR INIQUITIES,
AND I WILL REMEMBER THEIR SINS NO MORE.”

13When He said, “A new covenant,” He has made the first obsolete. But whatever is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to disappear.

 

[YouAreAwesome]

Very good. Much of what you say I agree with and it took me a long time to get here! So it's great to read your post and agree with much of it. Nevertheless I will reply to a few points:

According to 2 Peter 3:15-17, Paul is difficult to understand, but those who are ignorant and unstable twist his words to their own destruction and fall into the error of lawlessness

The royal law of love is the greatest and only law of the new covenant. Lawlessness is when a person lives according to their own desires and lusts and not by the Spirit of love.

According to Deuteronomy 13:4-6, the way that we can tell whether someone is a messenger of God is if they teach God's people against following what He had commanded

Deuteronomy is a dangerous place to go searching for how to weigh up a "messenger of God" because the covenant is different today. Today we weigh up what is prophesied, and all may prophesy! Back then, if you prophesied in error you were killed.

All the remains then is the freedom of life and a blessing that comes with obedience to the law.

Yes, obedience to the law of love. Never should we enter back into the law of death.

The law given at Sinai and the New Covenant are both part and parcel of the promise given to Abraham

There was neither covenant at the time of Abraham. He was given a grant covenant, similar to the new covenant, but very very different to the Mosaic covenant, which was a kinship covenant. I don't understand why you would write this after everything else you've written?

Just to make sure I'm understanding you, you believe all the laws in the bible from beginning to end apply to the new covenant believer?

 

[Soyeong]

The royal law of love is the greatest and only law of the new covenant. Lawlessness is when a person lives according to their own desires and lusts and not by the Spirit of love.

Lawlessness is straightforwardly acting against what the law instructs, and acting according to our desires and lusts is lawless because it is acting against what the law instructs. Jesus summarized the law as being about how to love God and how to love your neighbor and that all of the other laws hang on those two, or in other words, all of the other laws are examples of how to correctly obey the greatest two commands and through obeying the other commands we are obeying the greatest two. If you say all we need to do is follow the command to love, so we can disregard all of God's commands for how He wants us to love, then you are missing the point. For what it's worth, Jesus was saying a similar thing to what a contemporary rabbi had said:

---
One famous account in the Talmud (Shabbat 31a) tells about a gentile who wanted to convert to Judaism. This happened not infrequently, and this individual stated that he would accept Judaism only if a rabbi would teach him the entire Torah while he, the prospective convert, stood on one foot. First he went to Shammai, who, insulted by this ridiculous request, threw him out of the house. The man did not give up and went to Hillel. This gentle sage accepted the challenge, and said:

"What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor. That is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation of this--go and study it!"
---

Deuteronomy is a dangerous place to go searching for how to weigh up a "messenger of God" because the covenant is different today. Today we weigh up what is prophesied, and all may prophesy! Back then, if you prophesied in error you were killed.

Deuteronomy 13 says that they were to consider them to be a false prophet even if they performed signs and wonders, so you are putting the cart before the horse. If you have a group of Jews who are under the Old Covenant and they reject Paul as a false prophet because he was teaching them against obeying God's law, then they were rightfully acting according to the instructions that God had given them. In Acts 17:11, the Bereans were praised because they checked everything that Paul said against OT Scripture to see if it was true, so if you understand Paul as teaching against the law, then you understand him differently than the people who walked and talked with him. Paul quoted or alluded to the OT thousands of times to show that it supported what he said and that he did not deviate from it and Amos 3:7 says that God does nothing that He has not first revealed to the prophets, so if your interpretation of Paul can't be supported by the OT, then you have misunderstood him. There is a theme throughout the Bible that we must obey God rather than man, so if God said to do one thing and you think Paul said not to obey God, then you should obey God instead.

Yes, obedience to the law of love. Never should we enter back into the law of death.

The Mosaic law is the law of love, it is practicing disobedience to it that brings death.

There was neither covenant at the time of Abraham. He was given a grant covenant, similar to the new covenant, but very very different to the Mosaic covenant, which was a kinship covenant. I don't understand why you would write this after everything else you've written?

While it is true that neither covenant was around at the time of Abraham, they are nevertheless still part of the fulfillment of the promise that God would bless all nations through his seed.

Just to make sure I'm understanding you, you believe all the laws in the bible from beginning to end apply to the new covenant believer?

Indeed. God has always been holy, righteous, and good, so the way to act in line with God's character existed from the beginning and is not dependent on any covenant, though it was revealed through later covenants. So for example, 1 Peter 1:13-16 says that we are to have a holy conduct not because we are under the Mosaic Covenant or because we should be like Jews, but because God is holy, so it is about identifying with God's holiness. God's holiness does not change, which means the way to act in line with His holiness does not change, so if anyone wants to find out how to have a holy conduct, then they can find out by reading God's instructions for how to do so in the Mosaic law, starting with where verse 16 is quoting from.

 

[Soyeong]

I'm glad that you find such solace in the law.

But for any New Testament person that claims salvation through Christ's blood and sacrifice, we know is an abomination to be under the law, and not realizing the better covenant and the death and sacrifice of the Messiah.

God has always been holy, righteous, good, so the way to act in line with God's character has existed from the beginning independently of any covenant, though it was revealed in later covenants, so there is a difference between God's law and a covenant agreement to abide by God's law. I am in complete agreement that we are under a New Covenant and should not go back under the Mosaic Covenant, but we are not under a new God, so we should still follow God's instructions for how to what is holy, righteous, and good (Romans 7:12), as we are instructed to do as part of the New Covenant (1 Peter 1:13-16, 1 John 3:4-10, Ephesians 2:10).

I am also in agreement that we should not be under the law, but there is an issue of correctly understanding which law that we are not under. Paul spoke about a number of different categories of laws, such as the law of God (Romans 3:31, Romans 7:22-25, Romans 8:7), the law of sin (Romans 7:23-25), the law of sin and death (Romans 8:2), the law of the Spirit (Romans 8:2), the law of faith (Romans 3:27), the law of righteousness (Romans 9:31), the law of Christ (1 Corinthians 9:21), and works of law (Galatians 3:10), so we need to look at the context to figure out which law he was talking about.

In Galatians 5:16-23, everything that is listed as being works of the flesh that are against the Spirit are also against the Mosaic law and everything listed as being fruits of the Spirit are in accordance with the Mosaic law, so it doesn't make any sense to interpret verse 18 as saying that we are not under the Mosaic law if we are led by the Spirit, especially when the Spirit has the role of leading us in obedience to God's law (Ezekiel 36:26-27). Rather, it is the law of sin that stirs up the works of the flesh.

Romans 6:14 For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.

Similarly, it is the law of sin where sin had dominion over us, not God's law. In Romans 7, Paul said that God's law is holy, righteous, and good, that it is the good he sought to do and delighted in doing, but contrasted that with a law of sin that stirred up sin and caused him not to do the good that he wanted to do, so the law of sin is opposed to the Mosaic law.

Galatians 2:20-21
20 I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me. 21 I do not set aside the grace of God. For if righteousness comes through the Law, Christ died for nothing.”

The law has many purposes, but bringing about our righteousness has never been one of them. It does not follow that because we shouldn't obey the law for a purpose for which it was never given that therefore we shouldn't obey it for the purposes for which it was given. We are not to obey the law in order to become righteous, but because we have been made righteous.

12For I will forgive their iniquities, and remember their sins no more.” 13In speaking of a new covenant,” He has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and aging will soon disappear.

Indeed, the Mosaic covenant is obsolete, but God's holiness, righteousness, and goodness have not become obsolete. The New Covenant is based upon superior promises and has a superior mediator, but it does not come with a superior law because it does not come with a superior God.

1Now the main point in what has been said is this: we have such a high priest, who has taken His seat at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens,2a minister in the sanctuary and in the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, not man. 3For every high priest is appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices; so it is necessary that this high priest also have something to offer. 4Now if He were on earth, He would not be a priest at all, since there are those who offer the gifts according to the Law; 5who serve a copy and shadow of the heavenly things, just as Moses was warned by God when he was about to erect the tabernacle; for, “SEE,” He says, “THAT YOU MAKE all things ACCORDING TO THE PATTERN WHICH WAS SHOWN YOU ON THEMOUNTAIN.” 6But now He has obtained a more excellent ministry, by as much as He is also the mediator of a better covenant, which has been enacted on better promises.



A New Covenant

7For if that first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no occasion sought for a second.

8For finding fault with them, He says,
“BEHOLD, DAYS ARE COMING, SAYS THE LORD,
WHEN I WILL EFFECT A NEW COVENANT
WITH THE HOUSE OF ISRAEL AND WITH THE HOUSE OF JUDAH;

9NOT LIKE THE COVENANT WHICH I MADE WITH THEIR FATHERS
ON THE DAY WHEN I TOOK THEM BY THE HAND
TO LEAD THEM OUT OF THE LAND OF EGYPT;
FOR THEY DID NOT CONTINUE IN MY COVENANT,
AND I DID NOT CARE FOR THEM, SAYS THE LORD.

10“FOR THIS IS THE COVENANT THAT I WILL MAKE WITH THE HOUSE OF ISRAEL
AFTER THOSE DAYS, SAYS THE LORD:
I WILL PUT MY LAWS INTO THEIR MINDS,
AND I WILL WRITE THEM ON THEIR HEARTS.
AND I WILL BE THEIR GOD,
AND THEY SHALL BE MY PEOPLE.

11“AND THEY SHALL NOT TEACH EVERYONE HIS FELLOW CITIZEN,
AND EVERYONE HIS BROTHER, SAYING, ‘KNOW THE LORD,’
FOR ALL WILL KNOW ME,
FROM THE LEAST TO THE GREATEST OF THEM.

12“FOR I WILL BE MERCIFUL TO THEIR INIQUITIES,
AND I WILL REMEMBER THEIR SINS NO MORE.”

13When He said, “A new covenant,” He has made the first obsolete. But whatever is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to disappear.

God found fault the Mosaic Covenant, but the fault was not with His righteous standard or with the terms of the covenant, but with the hardness of His people's hearts because they did not obey His law. So God solved this problem not by lowering His righteous standard, but by making a New Covenant where He would take away our hearts of stone, give us hearts of flesh, put his law in our minds and write it on our hearts so that we will obey it, send His Spirit to lead us in obedience to the law (Ezekiel 36:26-27), and send His Son to free us from lawlessness so that we would be free to obey His law that we might meet its righteous requirement (Romans 8:4).

 

[YouAreAwesome]

Lawlessness is straightforwardly acting against what the law instructs, and acting according to our desires and lusts is lawless because it is acting against what the law instructs. Jesus summarized the law as being about how to love God and how to love your neighbor and that all of the other laws hang on those two, or in other words, all of the other laws are examples of how to correctly obey the greatest two commands and through obeying the other commands we are obeying the greatest two. If you say all we need to do is follow the command to love, so we can disregard all of God's commands for how He wants us to love, then you are missing the point. For what it's worth, Jesus was saying a similar thing to what a contemporary rabbi had said:

---
One famous account in the Talmud (Shabbat 31a) tells about a gentile who wanted to convert to Judaism. This happened not infrequently, and this individual stated that he would accept Judaism only if a rabbi would teach him the entire Torah while he, the prospective convert, stood on one foot. First he went to Shammai, who, insulted by this ridiculous request, threw him out of the house. The man did not give up and went to Hillel. This gentle sage accepted the challenge, and said:

"What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor. That is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation of this--go and study it!"
---



Deuteronomy 13 says that they were to consider them to be a false prophet even if they performed signs and wonders, so you are putting the cart before the horse. If you have a group of Jews who are under the Old Covenant and they reject Paul as a false prophet because he was teaching them against obeying God's law, then they were rightfully acting according to the instructions that God had given them. In Acts 17:11, the Bereans were praised because they checked everything that Paul said against OT Scripture to see if it was true, so if you understand Paul as teaching against the law, then you understand him differently than the people who walked and talked with him. Paul quoted or alluded to the OT thousands of times to show that it supported what he said and that he did not deviate from it and Amos 3:7 says that God does nothing that He has not first revealed to the prophets, so if your interpretation of Paul can't be supported by the OT, then you have misunderstood him. There is a theme throughout the Bible that we must obey God rather than man, so if God said to do one thing and you think Paul said not to obey God, then you should obey God instead.



The Mosaic law is the law of love, it is practicing disobedience to it that brings death.



While it is true that neither covenant was around at the time of Abraham, they are nevertheless still part of the fulfillment of the promise that God would bless all nations through his seed.



Indeed. God has always been holy, righteous, and good, so the way to act in line with God's character existed from the beginning and is not dependent on any covenant, though it was revealed through later covenants. So for example, 1 Peter 1:13-16 says that we are to have a holy conduct not because we are under the Mosaic Covenant or because we should be like Jews, but because God is holy, so it is about identifying with God's holiness. God's holiness does not change, which means the way to act in line with His holiness does not change, so if anyone wants to find out how to have a holy conduct, then they can find out by reading God's instructions for how to do so in the Mosaic law, starting with where verse 16 is quoting from.

Just to be clear. Are you talking about all the ceremonial laws too? Or just the moral laws? If just the moral laws, how do you determine which are moral? And if you include the ceremonial laws, do you still make sacrifices?

 

[ToBeLoved]

Indeed, the Mosaic covenant is obsolete, but God's holiness, righteousness, and goodness have not become obsolete. The New Covenant is based upon superior promises and has a superior mediator, but it does not come with a superior law because it does not come with a superior God.

The New Covenant commandments come from God Himself, Jesus Christ and His Words. Also, the New Testament is clear that the Old Covenant and the law will pass away and be gone. So I think that is a clear indication of what God thought about the law and if it was for New Covenant believers.

 

[ToBeLoved]

God found fault the Mosaic Covenant, but the fault was not with His righteous standard or with the terms of the covenant, but with the hardness of His people's hearts because they did not obey His law. So God solved this problem not by lowering His righteous standard, but by making a New Covenant where He would take away our hearts of stone, give us hearts of flesh, put his law in our minds and write it on our hearts so that we will obey it, send His Spirit to lead us in obedience to the law (Ezekiel 36:26-27), and send His Son to free us from lawlessness so that we would be free to obey His law that we might meet its righteous requirement (Romans 8:4).

Actually God did find fault with the righteous standard of the law in that no one could keep it. It had to be kept perfectly. When one broke one law, one broke all of the law. The Old Testament patriarch's had been imputed righteousness by faith, not that they kept the law. So with the New Covenant we do not have to perfectly adhere to the law, which no one could do, but God has written His Word on our hearts. He has also restored our relationship with God as we now have the indwelling Holy Spirit to convict us of our sin among other things.

 

[Soyeong]

Just to be clear. Are you talking about all the ceremonial laws too? Or just the moral laws? If just the moral laws, how do you determine which are moral? And if you include the ceremonial laws, do you still make sacrifices?

Morality is in regard to what we ought to do and we ought to obey God, so all of God's laws are inherently moral laws and He has given no laws that are not moral laws. Ceremonial laws are essentially God's instructions for how to have a holy conduct, and in 1 Peter 1:13-16, we are told to have a holy conduct because God is holy, which is a reference to Leviticus where God was giving ceremonial laws, such as Leviticus 11:44-45.

The only vow in the Bible that involves shaving your head is a Nazarite vow (Numbers 6), which involves making offerings. Paul took such a vow in Acts 18:18 and was going to pay the expenses of others who had taken the vow in Acts 21:20-24 in order show that he continued to live in accordance with the law and to disprove false rumors that he was teaching against obey it. He was acting at the direction of James and Stephen was also falsely accused of teaching against the law (Acts 6:13), so if no one in leadership was teaching against the law, then for roughly the first 7-15 years after Christ's ascension, up until the inclusion of Gentiles in Acts 10, all Christians were Torah observant Jews, and I think this is the way that Christianity has always been meant to be followed, but with the inclusion of Gentiles. Jesus did not come to start a new religion, but was born a Jew, raised a Jew, become a Jewish rabbi, had Jewish disciples, fulfilled Jewish prophecy, is the Jewish Messiah, will return as the Lion of Judah, and came bring fullness to Judaism. There originally was no distinction between Judaism and Christianity, but they drifted apart over time with Jews following the Torah, but not the Messiah, with Christians following the Messiah, but not the Torah, and with both following only half the truth. The law is the way (Jeremiah 6:16-19, Psalms 119:1), the truth (Psalms 119:142), and the life (Deuteronomy 30:15-20, Matthew 19:17), Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life (John 14:6), the law is God's Word, and Jesus is God's Word made flesh.

In any case, Paul continued to make offerings, so they did not stop with the death, resurrection, or ascension of Jesus, but with the destruction of the temple, so the only reason why they stopped is that there is no longer a temple in which to do them. However, the Bible prophecies a time when the third temple will be built and sacrifices will resume (Ezekiel 44-46).

 

[ToBeLoved]

In any case, Paul continued to make offerings, so they did not stop with the death, resurrection, or ascension of Jesus, but with the destruction of the temple, so the only reason why they stopped is that there is no longer a temple in which to do them. However, the Bible prophecies a time when the third temple will be built and sacrifices will resume (Ezekiel 44-46).

Show me one verse where Paul made an offering for sin?

 

[YouAreAwesome]

Morality is in regard to what we ought to do and we ought to obey God, so all of God's laws are inherently moral laws and He has given no laws that are not moral laws. Ceremonial laws are essentially God's instructions for how to have a holy conduct, and in 1 Peter 1:13-16, we are told to have a holy conduct because God is holy, which is a reference to Leviticus where God was giving ceremonial laws, such as Leviticus 11:44-45.

The only vow in the Bible that involves shaving your head is a Nazarite vow (Numbers 6), which involves making offerings. Paul took such a vow in Acts 18:18 and was going to pay the expenses of others who had taken the vow in Acts 21:20-24 in order show that he continued to live in accordance with the law and to disprove false rumors that he was teaching against obey it. He was acting at the direction of James and Stephen was also falsely accused of teaching against the law (Acts 6:13), so if no one in leadership was teaching against the law, then for roughly the first 7-15 years after Christ's ascension, up until the inclusion of Gentiles in Acts 10, all Christians were Torah observant Jews, and I think this is the way that Christianity has always been meant to be followed, but with the inclusion of Gentiles. Jesus did not come to start a new religion, but was born a Jew, raised a Jew, become a Jewish rabbi, had Jewish disciples, fulfilled Jewish prophecy, is the Jewish Messiah, will return as the Lion of Judah, and came bring fullness to Judaism. There originally was no distinction between Judaism and Christianity, but they drifted apart over time with Jews following the Torah, but not the Messiah, with Christians following the Messiah, but not the Torah, and with both following only half the truth. The law is the way (Jeremiah 6:16-19, Psalms 119:1), the truth (Psalms 119:142), and the life (Deuteronomy 30:15-20, Matthew 19:17), Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life (John 14:6), the law is God's Word, and Jesus is God's Word made flesh.

In any case, Paul continued to make offerings, so they did not stop with the death, resurrection, or ascension of Jesus, but with the destruction of the temple, so the only reason why they stopped is that there is no longer a temple in which to do them. However, the Bible prophecies a time when the third temple will be built and sacrifices will resume (Ezekiel 44-46).

Please explain this
Gal 3:19 "Why, then, was the law given at all? It was added because of transgressions until... " why until and not just forever ?

 

[food4thought]

I wanted to ask, what do you believe is the meaning of these passages by the apostle?

1 Corinthians 6:12, 1 Corinthians 10:23

Does this mean that there is no law against anything he does? How are "all things lawful" to him? At Romans 7:19 he talks about the "evil that he does": is the "evil that he does" lawful for him to do? I'm curious as to what "all things are lawful for me" means in relation to, the law and the works of the law? And how this relates to, "sin" and the "legality" of sin in the eyes of God.

We are not under law. Paul says that where there is no law, sin is not imputed (Rom 5:13). That doesn't mean it isn't still sin, it just means that sin is no longer imputed to us who are under grace. Therefore all things are lawful, but not all things edify.

Hope this helps

 

[John Hyperspace]

The problem with the Corinthians was that they had become puffed up by their knowledge and were using their knowledge to justify or excuse their sin. For example, they were freely committing sexual sins, which was a big problem that Paul was coming against, so it was their position that everything was lawful that Paul was quoting to argue against. Considering that there are 1,050 commands in the NT, many of which were instructed by Paul, it is absurd to interpret this as Paul saying that everything was lawful, especially when he criticized the Corinthians for not obeying the law, such as is 1 Corinthians 6:9-10. In Romans 3:31, Paul said that our faith does not abolish God's law, but rather our faith upholds it, and in Romans 7, Paul said that God's law is holy, righteous, and good, and that it is the good he sought to do and delighted in doing.

Galatians 2:16 (YLT) having known also that a man is not declared righteous by works of law, if not through the faith of Jesus Christ, also we in Christ Jesus did believe, that we might be declared righteous by the faith of Christ, and not by works of law, wherefore declared righteous by works of law shall be no flesh.'

There no definitive article in the Greek, so it is not "works of the law", but "work of law" as the YLT translates it, which means it does not refer to any specific set of laws. Paul used the phrase to refer to Jewish traditions, customs, rulings, and fences for how they taught to obey God's law. The same idea is expressed in how the phrase is used in the Qumran text 4QMMT. At the time, there were some groups of Jews that were teaching that people had to obey God's law according to their customs in order to be saved (Acts 15:1, Galatians), so it was these man-made laws that Paul was arguing against, not against God's law. Paul spoke strongly against sin and we would not know what sin is if it weren't for God's law (Romans 7:7).

Thanks for your reply. Could you tell me what are the "laws" that Christians need obey? And, what happens if they do not perfectly obey these laws?

 

[mark kennedy]

I wanted to ask, what do you believe is the meaning of these passages by the apostle?

1 Corinthians 6:12, 1 Corinthians 10:23

Does this mean that there is no law against anything he does? How are "all things lawful" to him? At Romans 7:19 he talks about the "evil that he does": is the "evil that he does" lawful for him to do? I'm curious as to what "all things are lawful for me" means in relation to, the law and the works of the law? And how this relates to, "sin" and the "legality" of sin in the eyes of God.

Grace almost seems like a paradox, it's apart from works and when sin abounds, grace abounds. Some were saying this is what Paul taught, let us do evil that good will come of it:

But if our unrighteousness brings out God’s righteousness more clearly, what shall we say? That God is unjust in bringing his wrath on us? (I am using a human argument.) Certainly not! If that were so, how could God judge the world? Someone might argue, “If my falsehood enhances God’s truthfulness and so increases his glory, why am I still condemned as a sinner?” Why not say—as some slanderously claim that we say—“Let us do evil that good may result”? Their condemnation is just! (Romans 3:6-8)
​

The narrow path has two ditches on either side, legalism on the left and licentiousness (grace is a license to sin) on the right. With a question like this always consult the context. Paul says yes, all things are lawful but not all things are helpful, in this context he is talking about fornication:

"I have the right to do anything," you say--but not everything is beneficial. "I have the right to do anything"--but not everything is constructive. (1 Cor. 10:23)
​

Paul had addressed this at length earlier:

“I have the right to do anything,” you say—but not everything is beneficial. “I have the right to do anything”—but I will not be mastered by anything. You say, “Food for the stomach and the stomach for food, and God will destroy them both.” The body, however, is not meant for sexual immorality but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. (1 Cor. 6:12, 13)​

In Corinth they had Temple prostitutes who plied their trade to bring money into the Temple. That's why in this context they are talking about eating meat sacrificed to idols, all things are lawful the Corinthians were saying. Paul says yes, all things are lawful but not all things are beneficial, then he gets to the bottom line and says, flee fornication:

Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a person commits are outside the body, but whoever sins sexually, sins against their own body. Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies. (1 Cor. 6:18-20)
​

There was a saying about Corinth, 'not every man can afford a night in Corinth'. This is a tongue in cheek reference to the high price temple prostitutes. Don't take my word for it, check the context, a text without a context is a pretext the old saying goes. The thing I have always loved about the Bible is it is very good at explaining itself. You have to think about what you are saved from and for, not just the means which is grace. You are saved from sin and death by grace for righteousness and holiness. You can be carnal and still be saved but there will be no reward on judgment day, you would be saved as by fire. If something endures final judgment there is a reward. Sometimes its a name no one else can learn, or a song no one else can sing. Those who lead many to righteousness will shine as the sun according to the prophecy in Daniel. Grace saves, grace sanctifies, grace empowers for service. The word for gift in 1 Corinthians 12 is charisma which literally means gift of grace. When Paul was asked how he worked harder then all the other apostles he told them, in effect, it took more grace to save me because I persecuted the church. Yet it was not me but the grace working in me:

But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them--yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me. (1 Cor. 15:10)​

The American Revolution and the Bloodless Revolution in England came in the wake of a revival starting with Jonathan Edwards sermon, sinners in the hands of an angry God. The message is literally fire and brimstone and it started what has become known as the Great Awakening 1 and 2, that sandwiched the American Revolution.

You ask a simple question and indeed the answer is simple enough a child could understand. At the same time Protestants and Christians have struggled with this profound doctrine of justification by grace through faith from the Jerusalem Council, throughout the Protestant Reformation and to this day. You have a choice, be a slave to sin or a slave to righteousness (Rom. 6). Jesus speaking of the law says if your eye causes you to sin pluck it out and throw it away, better to lose a member then have the whole body cast into hell.

I could go on and on with this and never get to the bottom of it. Grace saves us from sin, not for it.

Grace and peace,
Mark

 

[Soyeong]

Thanks for your reply. Could you tell me what are the "laws" that Christians need obey? And, what happens if they do not perfectly obey these laws?

There has never been a single person who was responsible for obeying all of God's laws. Some laws were given to the King, High Priest, priests, judges, men, women, widows, children, people living in the land, strangers living among them, and for everyone. For example, Jesus was not required to obey the laws in regard to giving birth or to a woman's period. A large portion of the law was only meant to be obeyed by priests or are only in regard to temple practice. Many laws also have specific conditions under which they should be obeyed, such as only keeping the Sabbath when it is the 7th day, or only keeping the laws in regard to temple practice when there is a temple in which to practice them. Correctly understanding which laws apply to you and how they apply is a matter of careful study and prayer. Most Christians already keep many of the Mosaic laws, so most of the disagreement is in regard to whether we should keep God's Sabbath, Feasts, and some of the dietary laws.

While our goal should be to live in perfect accordance with what the law requires of us because we love God and have faith in Him about how we should live, the Bible does not place any sort of special emphasis on the need to achieve something through perfect obedience. The law itself come with guidelines for what we should do when we don't keep it perfectly, so while practicing obedience is expected, there is no expectation of perfect obedience. There are no examples in the Bible of God being angry at someone who practiced obedience to His law, but didn't do it perfectly, but rather God's anger was directed at those lived unrepentantly in disregard of His law. If we break any of the laws, then we become a lawbreaker, which simply means that we need to repent and turn back to obedience. Our sanctification is about being made to be more like Christ in only doing what is holy, righteous, and good in accordance with the law, as he did, but it is not a process that will be completed until the day of Christ Jesus (Philippians 1:6).

 

[YouAreAwesome]

Romans 3:31 says to "uphold the law/establish the law" etc and is often quoted by those encouraging us to keep the old laws such as Soyeong. The question is, how does one establish the law? How does one uphold it? The answer is: by faith. By faith we hear God (Romans 8:14; 10:17). By faith He daily writes His law on our heart (Hebrews 8:10). And His law is love (Romans 13:8).

The New Living Translation translates Romans 3:31"only when we have faith do we fulfill the law".

 

[Soyeong]

Romans 3:31 says to "uphold the law/establish the law" etc and is often quoted by those encouraging us to keep the old laws such as Soyeong. The question is, how does one establish the law? How does one uphold it? The answer is: by faith. By faith we hear God (Romans 8:14; 10:17). By faith He daily writes His law on our heart (Hebrews 8:10). And His law is love (Romans 13:8).

One thing that everyone mentioned in Hebrews 11 had in common was that they all heard to voice of God give them instructions for how to live and they obeyed by faith. Living by faith is demonstrating that you trust God about how you should live through living in obedience to His instructions, and that is the way that the Israelites upheld the law, for the righteous shall live by faith (Habakkuk 2:4). The Spirit has the role of leading us in obedience to God's law by faith (Ezekiel 36:26-27). Jesus summarized the Mosaic law as being about how to love God and how to love your neighbor (Matthew 22:36-40) and love fulfills the entire law (Galatians 5:14), so the Mosaic law precisely is the law of love and if you say we just need to follow the command to love so we can disregard all God's commands about how He wants us to love, then you are missing the point. Moses was justified by faith apart from the law, so the law was never needed nor given for that purpose, yet he upheld the law by faith.

The New Living Translation translates Romans 3:31"only when we have faith do we fulfill the law".

If anyone can fulfill the law by faith, and likewise anyone who loves their neighbor fulfills the entire law, then it should be clear that fulfilling the law does not refer to something unique that Jesus did to do away with it. Jesus fulfilled the law in the same sense that Romans 15:18-19 says that Paul fulfilled the gospel, namely that he taught full obedience to it, not that he did away with it. Loving your neighbor fulfills the law because that is demonstrating a full understanding of what the law is essentially about how to do and faith fulfills the law because it is only by faith that we can truly obey it.

 

[YouAreAwesome]

One thing that everyone mentioned in Hebrews 11 had in common was that they all heard to voice of God give them instructions for how to live and they obeyed by faith. Living by faith is demonstrating that you trust God about how you should live through living in obedience to His instructions, and that is the way that the Israelites upheld the law, for the righteous shall live by faith (Habakkuk 2:4). The Spirit has the role of leading us in obedience to God's law by faith (Ezekiel 36:26-27). Jesus summarized the Mosaic law as being about how to love God and how to love your neighbor (Matthew 22:36-40) and love fulfills the entire law (Galatians 5:14), so the Mosaic law precisely is the law of love and if you say we just need to follow the command to love so we can disregard all God's commands about how He wants us to love, then you are missing the point. Moses was justified by faith apart from the law, so the law was never needed nor given for that purpose, yet he upheld the law by faith.



If anyone can fulfill the law by faith, and likewise anyone who loves their neighbor fulfills the entire law, then it should be clear that fulfilling the law does not refer to something unique that Jesus did to do away with it. Jesus fulfilled the law in the same sense that Romans 15:18-19 says that Paul fulfilled the gospel, namely that he taught full obedience to it, not that he did away with it. Loving your neighbor fulfills the law because that is demonstrating a full understanding of what the law is essentially about how to do and faith fulfills the law because it is only by faith that we can truly obey it.

I can understand why you believe this, but I disagree.

How does your view fit with Acts 15? In verse 3 we are told of Gentiles converting. In verse 5 the Pharisees want the Gentiles to keep the law of Moses and be circumcised. In verse 10 Peter argues against this idea calling it a "yoke neither us or fathers were able to bear". Notice these Gentiles are already saved and filled with the Spirit highlighted in verses 7-8. They are discussing post-salvation law keeping just as we are. The conclusion is NOT to teach them to keep the law of Moses but to steer clear of sexual immorality, food offered to idols, strangled meat and blood (Verse 20). They came up with this list on their own with the direction of the Holy Spirit!!! This is pretty significant don't you think?