You said, earlier, that following someone means living like them - I just wanted to know how far you took that.
Jesus took people further than the law; e.g, the law said "an eye for an eye .....". If a person was living purely by the law, if someone punched them and took their eye out, they had the right to do the same to them. But Jesus taught us to turn the other cheek, that if someone tried to sue you for your coat to let him have your shirt as well and that we should treat others as we would like them to treat us. The law said "do not commit adultery", but Jesus said that to even look at a woman lustfully was committing adultery in the heart.
The Law and Prophets teach to turn the other cheek. To not hate your brother in your heart, to love one another, to not lust after another man's wife in your heart.
God's Laws taught all these things, but the "them of old time" did not teach these parts of God's Law.
Matt. 23:
23 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith: these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone.
Mal. 2:
7 For the priest's lips should keep knowledge, and they should seek the law at his mouth: for he is the messenger of the LORD of hosts.
8 But ye are departed out of the way; ye have caused many to stumble at the law; ye have corrupted the covenant of Levi, saith the LORD of hosts.
9 Therefore have I also made you contemptible and base before all the people, according as ye have not kept my ways, but have been partial in the law.
Jesus Himself said He came back for the lost sheep. Why were they lost, according to the Holy Scriptures? Many, who come in Christ's Name, would have us believe they were lost because they kept God's Commandments. This is the serpent's doctrine, not the God of the Bible.
Jer. 50:
6 My people hath been lost sheep: their shepherds have caused them to go astray, they have turned them away on the mountains: they have gone from mountain to hill, they have forgotten their restingplace.
They were lost because the Priests God placed over them didn't teach God's Word, they despised and polluted His Laws and created their own religion.
We are all influenced by the religions of the land we were born into. The teaching that Jesus considered His Father's Laws incomplete, or not worthy of honor, and that HE created HIS own Laws different than what the Law and Prophet's taught is an insidious falsehood that can easily be exposed by simply following the instructions of the Christ Himself.
"Man shall not Live By bread alone, but by Every Word which proceeds from the mouth of God".
If a man trusted God enough to be a "Doer" of HIS Law and not a hearer only, he would know, not only "Thou shall not Kill", but He would also know these truths about God's Law"
Lev. 19:
17 Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thine heart: thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbour, and not suffer sin upon him.
18 Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD.
And they would know these instructions as well.
Proverbs 20:22
Say not thou, I will recompense evil; but wait on the Lord, and he shall save thee. (Turn your cheek)
Proverbs 25:21 If thine enemy be hungry, give him bread to eat; and if he be thirsty, give him water to drink. (Love your enemy)
Proverbs 24:28 Be not a witness against thy neighbour
without cause; and deceive not with thy lips. 29
Say not, I will do so to him as he hath done to me: I will render to the man according to his work. (Do unto others as you would have them do unto you)
Prov. 6:24 To keep thee from the evil woman, from the flattery of the tongue of a strange woman. 25
Lust not after her beauty in thine heart; neither let her take thee with her eyelids. (Don't lust after another man's woman in your heart)
Jesus did not create new laws. He took over the Priesthood and became "The restorer of paths to walk in" as the Scriptures teach, not "the creator of new paths to walk in" as the religions of the land preach. He taught what the Priests were supposed to teach all along, as some, like Zechariah's did.
Is. 58:
12 And they that shall be of thee shall build the old waste places: thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations; and thou shalt be called, The repairer of the breach, The restorer of paths to dwell in.
Please don't fall for the deception that the "them of old time" was God and Moses, and His Son taught something different. The "Them of old time" in Matt. 5 were the Shepherds which caused Israel to go astray because they were "Partial" in the Law or "omitted" important truths about God's Gospel. But Jesus wasn't "partial" in the Law. He didn't depart out of the way of God. He didn't omit the weightier matters of the Law. He lived by "Every Word of God".
