No, it is because I don't want to face the penalty of breaking it. I don't want to go to jail.
My point is that since you ARE under the law, you have to try and keep it. Likewise, if I were under the ten commandments, I would have to try and keep them - and therein lies the problem -
If Sin leads to death then why should i want to transgress the law.
You don't WANT to transgress the law, the law is good. But when the commandment comes, sin springs to life. When Adam and Eve were forbidden to eat a certain fruit, that was the snake's opportunity. Did it maybe not look tempting? When you tell a child that he's not allowed to do something, what will he start thinking about? Doing what you told him not to do. When God said, "do not covet", what did Paul start thinking about? Things to covet.
So the commandment is good, but it's also the power of sin. The more law, the more power for sin. That's because the law will take your eyes OFF God and OFF righteousness, and make you focus on sin and on yourself. If your goal is to "keep the law" as best as you can, you are in reality only pouring petrol on the fire.
Different to the Royal Law. Moses made mention to a specific set of laws here. The text says for "it is written". Where is it written.
Gal 3:10 For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse: for it is written, Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them.
Deu 27:26 Cursed be he that confirmeth not all the words of this (specific) law to do them. And all the people shall say, Amen.
Deu 27:1 And Moses with the elders of Israel commanded the people, saying, Keep all the commandments which I command you this day.
Deu 27:10 Thou shalt therefore obey the voice of the LORD thy God, and do his commandments and his statutes, which I command thee this day.
If you read the whole chapter you will realize that Moses outlined all of the curses for the violations of the laws mentioned in the chapter. It seems to me like a specific set of laws. The fact is that a covenant was defined there and those were the laws of the covenant.
Deu 28:15 But it shall come to pass, if thou wilt not hearken unto the voice of the LORD thy God, to observe to do all his commandments and his statutes which I command thee this day; that all these curses shall come upon thee, and overtake thee:
Deu 29:1 These are the words of the covenant, which the LORD commanded Moses to make with the children of Israel in the land of Moab, beside the covenant which he made with them in Horeb.
I just decided to read on and arrived at the above verse which makes it even clearer to me. The covenant made in Horeb was about the 10 commandments (Deut 5). This covenant contains a different set of laws. And if they violated those laws which they did they would have been cursed as they were.
I see your point, but I don't agree
While the ten commandments can be called the "backbone" or the base of the entire law, the law was still a whole.
But when I think of it, maybe it doesn't matter. People often call the ten commandments "the moral law" and we gentiles were never under the mosaic law anyway. But we were under "the demands of the law, written in their hearts" - just because we weren't given the law, we still had knowledge of good and evil and were morally culpable.
Why would God make the law to make us stand guilty. That is a result but that was not his motive. That to me is an insult to God.
Well, that's what the bible says though...
Romans 7:13
Did that which is good, then, become death to me? By no means! But in order that sin might be recognized as sin, it produced death in me through what was good, so that through the commandment sin might become utterly sinful.
The thing is, God gave the law because people asked for it. We aren't created to know about good and evil, we are created to know Him - period. It's the very knowledge of good and evil that destroys us. But people would rather live
religiously. "Tell us what to do and we shall do it!" "Tell us how to achieve perfection and holiness!" Well, God answered that prayer. He gave them His standard. Not in order that they should achieve holiness, but to make it abundantly clear that we CAN'T. To make it clear that we must trust in HIM to GIVE us righteousness.
But even to this day, people are trying to KEEP the law, believing that it will somehow make them better people. But again, the reality is the exact opposite - it doesn't make you any better, rather it reveals your nakedness, just like with Adam and Eve. And it will continue to do that as long as you insist on trying to keep it.
Then David and Daniel and the saints in Revelation are real hardcore sinners then. True the commandments is the power of sin will not have dominion over us because we are under grace and not condemned by the law.
It's not the condemnation of the law that makes us sinners. It condemns us when we sin in the first place. When you are under the law you will be a slave to sin. Paul said that apart from the law, sin is dead. So when you DIE to the law and stop having anything to do with it, sin also dies. I see it in my own life all the time. The more I try to live according to some rule or commandment, the more I sin. And the more I live according to the knowledge of righteousness, the
less I sin.
But you said yourself that being under the law means to be under the condemnation of the law or to be a slave to sin. The carnal man cannot keep the law and always sins. He is a slave to sin. He is under the law. He cannot please God. Sin is the transgression of the law. He always transgresses the law, he always sins. He is not subject to it meaning that he is not obedient to it. The greek word for subject according to strong's dictionary is hupotasso which means to subordinate, to obey and to be subdue to.
I see I misunderstood what you meant by "subject to".
But I agree with what you say. The carnal man is under the law, and under condemnation. It is impossible to please God by means of trying to keep the law.
When I look at the text in Timothy I must consider all that is said about the law. And Timothy 1 verse 8 says that the law is good if a man uses it lawfully. How can the Law be good for a sinner?
It's good in the sense that it KILLS the sinner so that he may be born again. It doesn't make him more righteous, it only makes him even more sinful. The law is supposed to kill us. That would be the "lawful" use of the law, if you ask me.
It must be good for the righteous. I am trying to understand verses 7 and 8 which confuses me when read together. Since you have need referring to this text since day one since i've been on this forum you can probably clear that up for me.
In both my interpretation and my experience, the law is not at all good for the righteous. The law is still the power of sin. And hey, I AM righteous, what should I need the law for anyway?
I think that the beginning of 1 Timothy is talking about all those who are trying to teach each other from, or based on, the law. Teaching each other how to live, based on what the law says. Which is futile and actually contrary to the gospel, because the gospel isn't "do this" or "don't do that", but simply "
believe in Him whom He has sent!"
We are supposed to live not according to the written code, but according to the Spirit. We are supposed to have the knowledge of righteousness, not the knowledge of good and evil.