Pithy definately would be welcomed here.
I interpret the Bible in a manner that disagrees with how many Christians interpret it, so if someone makes a point that I disagree with, then it is important to me to explain why I disagree with them and to make the strongest case that I can for how I think it should be interpreted, which tends to lead to longer posts. If you only want to respond to part of that post, then that would be appreciated too.
Hmmm, maybe, if you want to read into Galatians the opposite of what it is saying.
Paul was a servant of God, so it shouldn't make sense to you to interpret Galatians as speaking against following what God has commanded. The bottom line is that we must obey God rather then man, so if you think that Paul spoke against obeying what God has commanded, then you should be quicker to disregard everything he said than to disregard anything that God has commanded, though the reality is that Paul was a servant of God who never spoke against obeying anything that God has commanded.
Paraphrasing, Seyeong argues that placing yourself under the law is good, in spite of Paul/Galatians/The Holy Spirit saying that doing so places you under a curse, causes you to fall from grace, etc.
I thought we agreed that the fruit of the Spirit comes from the Spirit, and that walking in lock step with the Spirit produces the fruit. Walking in the Spirit is also the only way to avoid fulfilling the lusts of the flesh. But the command to walk in lock step with the Spirit is not another way of saying we must obey the law to please God. We please God when we walk with Him step-by-step as He leads the way from inside our hearts. This is what it meand to walk in the Spirit, and there are no laws against that.
In Deuteronomy 30:11-20, it says that God's law is not too difficult got to obey and that obedience brings life and a blessing while disobedience brings death and a curse, so choose life! Likewise, in Deuteronomy 27-28, it lists the blessings for relying on God's law and the curse for relying on it, so the law itself is not a curse, but rather it was given as a gift for our own good to teach us how to avoid being cursed (Deuteronomy 6:24, 10:12-13). God is not some sort of tyrant who gave the law in order to curse His children and put us into slavery, but rather God is a loving Father who knows how to give good gifts to His children. The Bible repeatedly offers a blessing for obedience and a curse for disobedience, so it should not make sense to you to interpret Galatians as quoting from Deuteronomy in order to support a point that is arguing against it. It also shouldn't make sense to you think that that God will curse us for obeying Him as if He doesn't want to be obeyed, especially when all throughout the Bible, He called for His people to repent and to return to obedience to Him. It also shouldn't make sense to you to think that God leading the way from inside our hearts is contrary to God leading the way through what He has instructed, especially when the righteous are those on whose heart is God's law (Isaiah 51:7).
In Romans 8:4-7, those who walk in the Spirit are contrasted with those who have minds set on the flesh who are enemies of God who refuse to submit to His law. In Galatians 5:19-23, everything listed as works of the flesh that are against the Spirit are also against God's law while all of the fruits of the Spirit are in accordance with it. In Ezekiel 36:26-27, the Spirit has the role of leading us to obey God's law.
In Psalms 119:29, he wanted God to be gracious to him by teaching him to obey His law, so that is what it means to be under grace, and you have incorrectly identified what Paul was saying was causing people to fall from grace. It would be absurd to think that he wanted God to be gracious to him by teaching him how to fall from grace.
I said I was paraphrasing. Here is a direct quote from him:
Seyeong said:
In
Acts 5:32, the Spirit has been given to those who obey God, so
obedience to what God has instructed is part of the way to receive the Spirit, however,
Galatians 3:1-2 denies that works of the law are part of the way to receive the Spirit, therefore the phrase
"works of the law" does not refer to obedience to what God has instructed.
He does not want to admit that the law is a curse, designed by God to convict us of our sinfulness and the impending doom of our souls so that seeing this we may search for a way out and find it in Christ. So, in this case, he uses Acts 5:32 to define "the works of the law" in Galatians to not be "obedience to what God has instructed". As a result, the requirement to obey all God's laws is maintained.
As you said, the law specifically includes the Ten Commanments. They are to teach us we are sinners in need of a Savior. Obeying them is not part of the way to receive the Spirit. Admitting that you fail to obey them and throwing yourself upon the mercy of God and the forgiveness available through Jesus' sacrifice for our sins is the only way to receive the Spirit. At no point until physical death does our need for Jesus' forgiveness ever change. We do not obey the law in the flesh, though in our spirits we adore it.
You are objecting to what I said, but you didn't show how anything that I said was wrong. In Romans 3:31, our faith upholds God's law, so it would be contradictory to interpret Galatians 3:10-12 as referring to God's law as not being of faith, especially when Jesus said in Matthew 23:23 that faith is one of the weightier matters of God's law.
In Matthew 7:23, Jesus said that he would tell those who are workers of lawlessness to depart from him, so the law leads us to Christ because it teaches us how to know him, or in other words, how to have a relationship with him. Moreover, in 1 John 2:4, those who say that they know Jesus, but don't obey his commands are liars, and in 1 John 3:4-6, those who continue to practice sin have neither seen nor known him. Sin is the transgression of God's law, so our Savior saving us from living in sin is leading us to obey it.
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 New King James Version (Ga 3:13–14). (1982). Thomas Nelson.
The curse of the law is living in disobedience to it (Deuteronomy 28), so redeeming us from the curse of the law is free us to enjoy the blessing of living in obedience to it. God's law is how the children of Abraham knew how to be blessed (Psalms 119:1-3), so the way that the blessing of Abraham comes upon the Gentiles in Christ Jesus is through teaching the Gentiles to obey it.
How can He redeem us from the curse of the law if the law does not bring a curse? And why do you and others seem to have a general aversion to discussing the ills of legalism as warned of in Galatians? There is so much to learn about verses like Gal 5:1 - "Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage." But there is virtually no discussion of it from the law people. All there seems to be is a defense of the law.
If God freed the Israelites from bondage in Egypt in order to put them under bondage to His law, then it would be for bondage that God sets us free, however, Galatians 5:1 says that it is for freedom that God sets us free. God does not put His people into bondage, so again you are not correctly identifying the yoke of bondage. In Psalms 119:142, God's law is truth, and in John 8:31-36, it is sin in transgression of God's law that puts us into bondage while it is the truth that sets us free. Furthermore, that means that your posts in this thread are opposed to following truth.
