The will of the Father what is it?

[Neogaia777]

Was Jesus in the kingdom while he was walking around on earth?
Are all true Christians in the kingdom right now?
Does the kingdom extend from every Christian all the way to heaven?
What makes you think the kingdom has to be visible?
Well earth ever be full of all and only Christians?

The kingdom is within you.

And what might seem incredibly large, is actually very small, until you become it and it becomes you.

Our bodies, or our form, is made in the image and likeness of the Most High God, who's body or form is like ours, and that likeness, or form, is the Kingdom, just like we are the Temple now also, which is also the Kingdom, it has the likeness or form of the bodies of both God and man, with all spirits/voices/personalities contained within, which is what the Kingdom is, or is made up of, etc. The angels did not have this likeness, but they were only pieces and parts, which is why some became jealous of us, and wanted what we have, and sought to take it from us through disharmony, and disunity, and corruption, etc.

God Bless.

 

[PloverWing]

Was Jesus in the kingdom while he was walking around on earth?
Are all true Christians in the kingdom right now?
Does the kingdom extend from every Christian all the way to heaven?
What makes you think the kingdom has to be visible?
Well earth ever be full of all and only Christians?

I'm doing a lot of guessing, because I want Jesus to make clear, unambiguous theological statements, and instead he tells stories about fish and sheep and agriculture. But I've been intrigued of late by the idea that when Jesus talks about the kingdom of God, maybe he means a state of the world where God is king -- not a figurehead, or a tyrant, but the kind of king who uses power to make things right, who will rescue us from all the things that corrupt and destroy us.

"Are all true Christians in the kingdom right now?": We seem to be in an in-between state, where the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus started something that is not yet complete.

"[Will] earth ever be full of all and only Christians?": That's the great question, isn't it? In the end, will every knee bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord? Perhaps.

 

[Strong in Him]

A good question. Possibly we are in a stage where God's kingdom has begun, but is not yet fully implemented. So we see the beginnings of God's reign -- first in Israel, then in the person of Jesus -- but we also look forward to a future time when God's reign will be a more visible reality, and earth will fully reflect God's will. Right now, the mustard plant is still small.

I admit that I wish the healing work of God in the world could proceed a little faster...

God's kingdom is both now, and not yet.
The Kingdom of God started with Jesus and the Apostles, who were preaching the Gospel.
God's kingdom is a place where people have been born again, John 3:3, and acknowledge Jesus as King. What that looks like, practically speaking, is that the hungry are fed, the sick, healed, the poor and homeless provided for - love in action, as Jesus did.
Over the centuries, Christians have founded charities, built hospitals and schools, embarked on prison reform, abolished slavery and taken the Good News to other people, and countries. Some of us may never do such things, or on such a big scale, but we can all be salt and light in our own communities. We, who have Jesus living in us, can take Jesus wherever we go.

What could you do to help to further God's healing work? How can you bring his healing to those around you?

 

[Soyeong]

The question is, though, what is the will of the Father?
God specifically called Moses, Deborah, David, Isaiah, Daniel etc etc to be prophets, judges or kings. That was his will - that those people lead/prophesy.
He doesn't necessarily call people to go to a certain church, work in a certain school or take a certain job. I am certain that if he did, there would be no unemployment amongst Christians, and no one whose job didn't work out.
I have come to believe that, far from finding the "right" job - that God wants you to have - he really wants his followers to be hs children, his witnesses and salt and light in their communities, whatever they happen to be doing.

Neither do I, but you'd be surprised how many people quote it in support of there being a special job that God wants you to do.

The will of the Father is that we believe in Jesus.
God spoke audibly from heaven 3x in Jesus' ministry. Two of those were his baptism and transfiguration - "this is my Son on whom my favour rests" and "this is my Son, listen to him". The 3rd occasion is in John 12:28, where God says he will glorify Jesus' name.
God's Son, Jesus, was God's plan to reconcile mankind to himself; forgive our sins, allow us to have fellowship with God and his children - of course God wanted, and wants, people to believe in, listen to and receive him. He wants people to know that his great love for them cost him his life.

Yes, the Kingdom of God is whenever, and wherever, God is recognised as King.
No one can enter that kingdom - and will therefore not recognise Jesus as King - unless they have been born again by the Spirit, John 3:3.

The will of the Father might include something like taking a certain job, but at the very least it includes doing what He has instructed, especially when He has instructed how to live as His child/how to believe in Jesus. This is also why we can the Gospel message to repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand with the children of God who have repented and are the ones who enter the Kingdom of God.

What we do comes from who were are; we love because God loved us. We can only obey Jesus' command to love as he loves, if we have first received his love.
The Kingdom is not primarily, or entirely, about deeds - because you don't even have to be Christian to feed the hungry, care for the poor, heal the sick etc etc. Humanists believe that the human being is the most powerful and important being; i.e. no God, no life after death. Humanists can, and have, founded charities etc, all without reference to God. The same is true of Mormons, JWs, Muslims who don't accept that Jesus was who he said he was.

The Kingdom of God is composed of citizens who are all children of Abraham and the children of Abraham are those who have been taught to do the same works as him (John 8:39). The way that we act shows what we believe, so someone can act in a way that shows that they believe in Jesus regardless of whether or not they recognize that is what they are doing.

Yes, and Jesus' NEW commandment was to love as he loves us.
Christ died for sinners - loved his enemies and gave his life for the ungodly. We can't love with that kind of divine, Agape love unless we have first received it and have it in our hearts.

The Bible often uses the same terms to describe aspects of God's nature as it does to describe aspects of the nature of God's law, such as with it being holy, righteous, and good, which is because it is God's instructions for how to act in accordance with those aspects of God's nature. So when we follow God's instructions for how to do what is holy, righteous, and good, we are expressing our love for those aspects of God's nature, which is why there are many verses in both the OT and the NT that connect our love for God with our obedience to His commandments, so everything that God chose to command was specifically commanded in order to teach us how to love a different aspect of God's nature. Jesus is the exact image of God's nature (Hebrews 1:3), so the way to love him is the same as the way to love the Father, which means that they have the same set of commandments.

Do you mean "law" as in 10 commandments, or "law" as in all the OT food and hygiene laws?
Because the latter were given to the Hebrew slaves who were rescued from slavery and death in Egypt, not to Gentiles.

All of the commandments that God has given should be trusted, not just ten of them. In 1 Peter 1:16, we are told to be holy for God is holy, which is a quote from Leviticus where God was giving instructions for how to do that, which includes refraining from eating unclean animals (Leviticus 11:44-45), so by following God's instructions for how to be holy as He is holy we are expressing our love for God's holiness, while someone who does not follow those instructions is expressing that holiness is an aspect of God's nature that they do not love. If God were not holy, then it would make no different to the way that they live, so they worship a God who is not holy, who is not the same as the God of Israel, who is holy. Those who love the God of Israel can choose to follow the instructions that He has given for how to love Him regardless of whether those instructions were given to them, especially because those instructions were given to equip Israel to be a light and a blessing to the nations by teaching the nations how to love the God of Israel in accordance with spreading the Gospel.

I didn't say otherwise.
We love because God first loved us. When someone has received Jesus, been born again and filled with his Spirit, they will want to go out and serve God, preach the Good News etc. Many, if not all, personal and church revivals have started when one person/a group of people have received the Spirit, or a new infilling of the Spirit, and gone out to serve. John Wesley was an Anglican clergyman, doing good works and preaching the faith. But at a Bible study at Aldersgate, he testified that his heart became "strangely warmed" and he felt that God DID love him - and he was on fire for God. His brother Charles, who had been healed of TB a few days earlier and received the Spirit, wrote 1000s of hymns and became one of the greatest hymnwriters. John Newton went from being an uncouth, drunken slave trader to campaigning for the abolition of slavery and writing one of the greatest hymns "amazing grace". Wilson Carlile was a materialistic non Christian until he met Jesus - then he became ordained and founded the Church Army, (like the Salvation Army but within the C of E).

Jesus reconciled us to God by offering his life as a sacrifice for our sin; he died for sinners, Romans 5:8.
We are not saved by Jesus' life but by his death - he came to give his life as a ransom for many, Mark 10:45, to seek and save the lost, Luke 19:10, to pour out his blood for the forgiveness of sins, Matthew 26:28.
Yes, he DID many fantastic things - but if he had not died and been raised again, we would all still be lost in our sins.

Our salvation is from sin (Matthew 1:21) and sin is the transgression of God's law (1 John 3:4), so while we do not earn our salvation as the result of obeying it, living in obedience to it through faith in Jesus is nevertheless intrinsically part of the concept of him saving us from not living in obedience to it. 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, so God graciously teaching us to do those works is itself the content of His gift of saving us from not doing those works. Furthermore, in Titus 2:14, Jesus gave himself 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 becoming zealous for doing good works in obedience to God's law is the way to believe in what he accomplished through the cross (Acts 21:20).

Jesus, not God's law, is the only Way to the Father, John 14:6.

The is contradictory because God's law is God's word and Jesus is God's word made flesh. God's law is His way (Psalms 119:1-3), the truth (Psalms 119:142), and the life (Deuteronomy 32:46-47), and the way to see and know the Father (Exodus 33:13), and Jesus embodied God's law by living in sinless obedience to it, so he is the embodiment of the way, the truth, and the life, and the way to see and know the Father (John 14:6-7), which is also why those who continue to practice sin in transgression of God's law have neither seen nor known him (1 John 3:4-6).

 

[Strong in Him]

The will of the Father might include something like taking a certain job, but at the very least it includes doing what He has instructed, especially when He has instructed how to live as His child/how to believe in Jesus.

If he has instructed, or told, us to to something, then yes.
I have been thinking more of the occasions when people have said "it is God's will for you to be a teacher/shop assistant/nurse" or whatever. God gives us gifts then asks/expects us to use them for him and his kingdom. I'm not sure that he micromanages that, so that he demands that we become a nurse when he really wants us to teach.

The Kingdom of God is composed of citizens who are all children of Abraham and the children of Abraham are those who have been taught to do the same works as him (John 8:39).

If a person has not been born again, they cannot enter the kingdom, John 3:3 - no matter what works they do.

All of the commandments that God has given should be trusted, not just ten of them. In 1 Peter 1:16, we are told to be holy for God is holy, which is a quote from Leviticus where God was giving instructions for how to do that, which includes refraining from eating unclean animals (Leviticus 11:44-45),

God gave that law to the people he had rescued from slavery in Egypt.
They were to show that they were holy - set apart - by not eating certain animals, not copying the other nations and worshipping idols, not marrying foreigners, who may have led them away from their faith. There are a host of other laws which God told them to obey too - like not wearing clothing made from two types of fabric, not planting a field with two types of crops, not touching people with skin diseases, unclean women or dead people, stoning to death anyone who did not keep the Sabbath.
Even they could not keep all these laws - there is no indication that Gentiles, who did not receive them, have to do so.

so by following God's instructions for how to be holy as He is holy we are expressing our love for God's holiness,

Why do we have to follow the instructions which were given to other people, when things have changed and we now have Jesus?
Jesus has told us how to be holy - set apart - and dedicated to God.
We are to seek first God's kingdom, rather than worrying about food and nice clothes, Matthew 6:25-33. We are to love our enemies, Matthew 5:44 and in fact to be perfect as God is perfect, Matthew 5:48. If we want to be thought of as great, we must become a servant, Matthew 23:11, we must not put on a big show or do things for effect, but pray to God in secret, , Matthew 6:6, and not let our left hand know what our right hand is doing, Matthew 6:3.
Paul told us us not to be conformed to the standard of the world, Romans 12:1, and John told us that anyone who loves the world is an enemy of God, 1 John 2:15-16.

Nowhere did anyone say that if we want to be holy we have to follow and keep Jewish hygiene laws.

Those who love the God of Israel can choose to follow the instructions that He has given for how to love Him regardless of whether those instructions were given to them,

If an instruction is not given to you, what makes you think it is for you?

Did/do people go ahead and drink alcohol because Paul told Timothy to stop drinking water but start drinking wine?
Would believers in Corinth followed all the teaching given to believers in Ephesus, even if their situations were completely different?
If God told the Hebrew slaves that a woman was unclean for several weeks if she gave birth to a baby girl, does that mean we are too?
Is it wrong to wear clothes made from 2 kinds of fabrics - e.g polyester and cotton - because this was wrong for the Hebrew slaves?

The is contradictory because God's law is God's word and Jesus is God's word made flesh.

So you would say that God's law = Jesus? That when we say "Jesus saves", it is equally true to say that God's law saves?
If that were the case, why did Jesus say he had come to fulfil the law? Why did God tell Jeremiah that he was going to bring a new covenant - one which involved putting his law into people's hearts? Why did the author of Hebrews talk of the Old Covenant being obsolete?

and Jesus embodied God's law by living in sinless obedience to it, so he is the embodiment of the way, the truth, and the life, and the way to see and know the Father (John 14:6-7), which is also why those who continue to practice sin in transgression of God's law have neither seen nor known him (1 John 3:4-6).

He IS the Way, the Truth and the life.
No one can go to the Father except by Jesus - if it wasn't for Jesus' death on the cross, we would not be reconcile to the Father.
Keeping the law perfectly does not give us forgiveness, nor does it save us.

 

[Soyeong]

If a person has not been born again, they cannot enter the kingdom, John 3:3 - no matter what works they do.

According to Matthew 7:21-23, 1 John 3:10, and John 3:3, those who are born again, enter the kingdom, and obey God's law are the same group of people. Everyone who is born again will enter the kingdom and obeys God's law, everyone who will enter the Kingdom is born again and obeys God's law, and everyone who obeys God's law is born again and will enter the Kingdom.

God gave that law to the people he had rescued from slavery in Egypt.
They were to show that they were holy - set apart - by not eating certain animals, not copying the other nations and worshipping idols, not marrying foreigners, who may have led them away from their faith. There are a host of other laws which God told them to obey too - like not wearing clothing made from two types of fabric, not planting a field with two types of crops, not touching people with skin diseases, unclean women or dead people, stoning to death anyone who did not keep the Sabbath.

In 1 Peter 1:16, Gentiles are also called to be holy as God is holy. In 1 Peter 2:9-10, Gentiles are included as part of God's chosen people, a holy nation, a royal priesthood, and a treasure of God's own possession, which are all terms used to describe Israel (Deuteronomy 7:6), so Gentiles also have the delight of getting to follow the instructions that God gave for how to fulfill those roles. It would be contradictory for someone to want to become part of a holy nation while wanting nothing to do with following God's instructions for how to live as part of a holy nation.

Even they could not keep all these laws - there is no indication that Gentiles, who did not receive them, have to do so.

In Deuteronomy 30:11-14, it says that God's law is not too difficult for us to keep, so many Israelites did keep it. Furthermore, there are examples of peoples of people who did keep it, such as those in Joshua 22:1-3, Luke 1:5-6, Revelation 14:12, and Revelation 22:14. However issue issue of how good of a job the Israelites did of keeping God's law is independent of the issue of whether Gentiles have the delight of getting to keep it. Israel has the role of being a light to the nations either by being an example for us to follow or by being an example for us to avoid, and in 1 Corinthians 10:1-13, we should learn from Israel's disobedience as being an example of what we should avoid doing.

Why do we have to follow the instructions which were given to other people, when things have changed and we now have Jesus?
Jesus has told us how to be holy - set apart - and dedicated to God.
We are to seek first God's kingdom, rather than worrying about food and nice clothes, Matthew 6:25-33. We are to love our enemies, Matthew 5:44 and in fact to be perfect as God is perfect, Matthew 5:48. If we want to be thought of as great, we must become a servant, Matthew 23:11, we must not put on a big show or do things for effect, but pray to God in secret, , Matthew 6:6, and not let our left hand know what our right hand is doing, Matthew 6:3.
Paul told us us not to be conformed to the standard of the world, Romans 12:1, and John told us that anyone who loves the world is an enemy of God, 1 John 2:15-16.

Nowhere did anyone say that if we want to be holy we have to follow and keep Jewish hygiene laws.

In Matthew 4:15-23, Jesus began his ministry with the Gospel message to repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand, which was a light to the Gentiles, and the Mosaic Law was how his audience knew what sin is (Romans 3:20), so repenting from our disobedience to it is a central part of the Gospel message. Jesus also set a sinless example of how to walk in obedience to the Mosaic Law and we are told to follow his example (1 Peter 2:21-22) and that those who are in Christ are obligated to walk in the same way he walked (1 John 2:6). So Jesus spent his ministry teaching his followers how to obey the Mosaic Law by word and by example and Gentiles can choose whether or not to follow him, but Gentiles can't follow him by refusing to follow what he taught. The Kingdom of God is made up of citizens who have repented and are obeying the Mosaic Law in accordance with the Gospel.

In Deuteronomy 4:2, it is a sin to add to or subtract from the Mosaic Law, so Jesus did not do that. Rather, loving our enemies is in accordance with verses like Exodus 23:4-5, Deuteronomy 23:7, Proverbs 24:17-18, and Proverbs 25:21-22. In Matthew 5:43-48, it is speaking about having a love that is whole or complete, where we don't just love those who love us, but also love our enemies. Again, in 1 Peter 1:16, it instructs to be holy as God is holy, which is a quote from Leviticus where God was giving instructions for how to do that, which includes retaining from eating unclean animals (Leviticus 11:44-45). The NT does not command us to keep hygiene laws straightforwardly because God did not command any hygiene laws.

If an instruction is not given to you, what makes you think it is for you?

Did/do people go ahead and drink alcohol because Paul told Timothy to stop drinking water but start drinking wine?
Would believers in Corinth followed all the teaching given to believers in Ephesus, even if their situations were completely different?
If God told the Hebrew slaves that a woman was unclean for several weeks if she gave birth to a baby girl, does that mean we are too?
Is it wrong to wear clothes made from 2 kinds of fabrics - e.g polyester and cotton - because this was wrong for the Hebrew slaves?

If there exists instructions for how to do something and that is something that you want to do, then you should follow those instructions regardless of whether or not they were directly given to you. For example, someone wanted to replace a part on their car, then they should look up instructions for how to do that and follow them even though someone did not directly command them to follow those instructions.

Man would still be obligated to obey God even before God had made any covenants with man, so God's covenants are not the source of man's obligation, but simply inform us of what has always been and will always be man's obligation. God is sovereign, so we are obligated to act in accordance with His nature and to refrain from acting in a way that is contrary to His nature regardless of whether or not He has directly commanded us to do that. For example, the Sabbath is holy to God and what is holy to God should not be profaned by man, so we would still be obligated to keep the Sabbath holy even if God had never commanded anyone to do that. It can be situational whether taking a particular action is in accordance with or against God's nature, for example, there are situations where killing someone is committing murder and situations where it is not, but we should always refrain from committing murder regardless of whether or not we have been directly instructed not to do that.

Laws in regard to temple practice should only be followed in the situation that there is a temple in which to practice them. Without a temple someone is not able to be cleansed from being unclean, but the point of distinguishing between someone being clean clean and unclean was to determine who could enter the temple, though there can still be value in testifying about these truths even without a temple. Yes, we should refrain from mixing wool and linen as part of being holy as God is holy.

So you would say that God's law = Jesus? That when we say "Jesus saves", it is equally true to say that God's law saves?
If that were the case, why did Jesus say he had come to fulfil the law? Why did God tell Jeremiah that he was going to bring a new covenant - one which involved putting his law into people's hearts? Why did the author of Hebrews talk of the Old Covenant being obsolete?

I would say that embodying God's law = the one who is the embodiment of God's law. The Bible often uses the same terms to describe the nature of God as it does to describe the nature of God's law, such as with it being holy, righteous, and good (Romans 7:12), which is because it is God's instructions for how to act in accordance with those aspects of His nature. Jesus embodied God's law by expressing the nature of God through living in sinless obedience to it. In Hebrews 1:3, Jesus is the exact image of God's nature, so if God were to take aspect of His nature of holiness, righteousness, goodness, justice, mercy, faithfulness, and so forth, and personify them so that there was a human that embodied these aspects of His nature, then that is who Jesus would be, and what that would look like was a life lived in sinless obedience to His law. So to say that Jesus saves is the same as saying us embodying the nature of God through following his example of obedience to God's law saves. Our salvation is from sin and sin is the transgression of God's law, so while we do not earn our salvation as the result of obeying it, living in obedience to it through faith in Jesus is intrinsically part of the concept of Jesus saving us from not living in obedience to it, or in other words, embodying God's nature by putting our trust in the exact image of God's nature that the content of God's gift of saving us from not embodying His nature.

NAS Greek Lexicon: pleroo
"to fulfil, i.e. to cause God's will (as made known in the law) to be obeyed as it should be, and God's promises (given through the prophets) to receive fulfilment"

Jesus fulfilled the law by spending his ministry showing us how to correctly keep it by word and by example, or in other words, by showing us how to embody the nature of God.

In Hebrews 8:7-9, God found fault with the Mosaic Covenant, however, he did not find fault with His law or with His nature, but rather He found fault with the people for not keeping it, so His solution was not to do away with His law, but to do away with what was hindering us from keeping it, which is why the New Covenant involves putting His law in our minds and writing it on our hearts (Jeremiah 31:33), sending his Son to free us from sin so that we might be free to meet its righteous requirement (Romans 8:3-4), and sending His Spirit to lead us in obedience to it (Ezekiel 36:26-27).

He IS the Way, the Truth and the life.
No one can go to the Father except by Jesus - if it wasn't for Jesus' death on the cross, we would not be reconcile to the Father.
Keeping the law perfectly does not give us forgiveness, nor does it save us.

We do not earn our salvation even as the result of keeping God's law perfectly because it was never given as a means of doing that, however, that does not mean that we should not keep it for the goals for which it was given. It is not as though the fact that we don't earn our salvation by obeying God means that we don't need to obey God. God did not just teach the way, the truth, and the life, and the way to know Him through giving the gift of His law, but He also sent His Son to show us how to obey it. In Titus 2:14, Jesus gave himself 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 becoming zealous for doing good works in obedience to God's law is the way to believe in what he accomplished through the cross (Acts 21:20).

 

[Blade]

For me its easy.. what was Christ doing? The will of the Father which was? Seems of GOD says it.. that's His will? Maybe that bible Gods word is His will. Lets toss out maybe.

 

[Strong in Him]

According to Matthew 7:21-23, 1 John 3:10, and John 3:3, those who are born again, enter the kingdom, and obey God's law are the same group of people. Everyone who is born again will enter the kingdom and obeys God's law, everyone who will enter the Kingdom is born again and obeys God's law, and everyone who obeys God's law is born again and will enter the Kingdom.

Matthew 7:21-23 is the passage under discussion. The question was; why does no one use John 6:40 when talking about the will of the Father?
I agreed with that.

In 1 Peter 1:16, Gentiles are also called to be holy as God is holy. In 1 Peter 2:9-10, Gentiles are included as part of God's chosen people, a holy nation, a royal priesthood, and a treasure of God's own possession,

Yes - because we have Jesus, who reconciled us to God, Romans 5:12, made us his children, John 1:12, Romans 8:16-17 and through whom we have every spiritual blessing, Ephesians 1:3.

It would be contradictory for someone to want to become part of a holy nation while wanting nothing to do with following God's instructions for how to live as part of a holy nation.

It would be contradictory for someone to accept Jesus who makes us holy, receive eternal life and his Holy Spirit - so that GOD himself lives in us,
and then say "now, how should I live to show that I am holy? I know; I'll look in the OT, to a time before they had Jesus - that will show me."

In Deuteronomy 30:11-14, it says that God's law is not too difficult for us to keep, so many Israelites did keep it.

Some probably did.
Job, Noah, Moses, the prophets certainly did. Nut the nations of Israel and Judah BOTH ended up in exile, as punishment for their sins, because they broke God's covenant, worshipped idols, turned away from God etc etc.
Peter said that the Israelites had not been able to keep God's law, Acts 15:10.

If they hadn't broken the covenant again and again, God would not have told them that he was going to make a new one.

In Matthew 4:15-23, Jesus began his ministry with the Gospel message to repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand, which was a light to the Gentiles, and the Mosaic Law was how his audience knew what sin is

No, sin was in the world long before the Mosaic law.
Check out Noah's story.

In Deuteronomy 4:2, it is a sin to add to or subtract from the Mosaic Law, so Jesus did not do that.

Jesus fulfilled the law.
But according to the Pharisees, he also broke it; healing and eating corn on the Sabbath, touching people with skin diseases, a woman who was bleeding and someone who was dead, and refusing to condemn someone who had been caught breaking the law and who should have been stoned.

The NT does not command us to keep hygiene laws straightforwardly because God did not command any hygiene laws.

And yet they are all listed in Leviticus - along with things like stoning to death anyone who does not keep the Sabbath, not planting 2 types of crops in one field, not trimming your beard and so on.
Are you saying that you keep some of the laws in Leviticus, given by God, but not all of them?

If there exists instructions for how to do something and that is something that you want to do, then you should follow those instructions regardless of whether or not they were directly given to you.

So we follow God's law, whether or not it was given to us - but only if we want to?

Tell me, do I, as a woman, have to follow the laws for women given in Saudi Arabia?
Do I, as a British woman, have to follow the laws of Italy? Am I bound by the American constitution? Would I be prosecuted by the Australian government for criticising their laws/food/way of life?
If you went to a country with a strict no alcohol policy and took a bottle of whisky with you, would you be spared jail if you said "this isn't against our law and I felt like doing it"?

Man would still be obligated to obey God even before God had made any covenants with man,

That's just it though - Adam wasn't obligated to obey God. If he had been, he would have done and sin would not have entered the world.
He was given a command - rule/law. He wasn't forced to keep it, and he didn't.

For example, the Sabbath is holy to God and what is holy to God should not be profaned by man, so we would still be obligated to keep the Sabbath holy even if God had never commanded anyone to do that.

1. I try to keep every day holy - that is, set apart for God.
2. If God had never told anyone to do that, no one would know they had to - so they wouldn't.

Yes, we should refrain from mixing wool and linen as part of being holy as God is holy.

So that law, written in Leviticus, is one way we show that we are holy, but other laws, written in Leviticus aren't - because God did not give any hygiene laws??

I would say that embodying God's law = the one who is the embodiment of God's law.

Jesus fulfilled the law - not that Gentiles were under it anyway.
He was the sacrifice for sin.
He makes us holy and reconciles us to God.
He fulfilled OT prophecies about him, and the feasts.

so His solution was not to do away with His law, but to do away with what was hindering us from keeping it, which is why the New Covenant involves putting His law in our minds and writing it on our hearts (Jeremiah 31:33), sending his Son to free us from sin so that we might be free to meet its righteous requirement (Romans 8:3-4), and sending His Spirit to lead us in obedience to it (Ezekiel 36:26-27).

We weren't saved from sin and set free from slavery so that we could become slaves to the law - a burden which even the Jews could not bear, Acts 15:10.

We do not earn our salvation even as the result of keeping God's law perfectly because it was never given as a means of doing that, however, that does not mean that we should not keep it for the goals for which it was given.

Yes it does.
Jesus died for our sins, reconciles us to God, gives us eternal life and makes us holy and righteous.
How do you want to show that you are holy? By keeping laws which weren't given to you and which were fulfilled in Jesus.

Jesus commanded us to love as he loves, to preach the Good News, to seek first the Kingdom of God, to "do this in memory of me" and many other things.
He did not say "wear clothes made from only one fibre - this is how you will show others that you are holy." He didn't command Gentiles to read the OT and put themselves under the Jewish law. Paul, and the other Apostles, taught that circumcision was not necessary, and that it was ok to eat food that had been offered to idols. There is no evidence that they went around examining the material used in peoples' robes to find out whether or not it was pure and not mixed.

so becoming zealous for doing good works in obedience to God's law is the way to believe in what he accomplished through the cross (Acts 21:20).

You don't seem to have even decided what God's law is - wearing clothes of mixed fibres, yes; hygiene laws, no.

I don't follow any of those, yet I most certainly believe in Christ's death on the cross.

 

[Carl Emerson]

Hey... If the opposing sides of this discussion were hearing Him and following His will - the discussion would end.

 

[Carl Emerson]

becoming zealous for doing good works in obedience to God's law is the way to believe in what he accomplished through the cross (Acts 21:20).

Really ???

Read the whole passgage and see that those promoting this legalistic approach also proposed to murder Paul... Go figure !!!

 

[Soyeong]

Really ???

Read the whole passgage and see that those promoting this legalistic approach also proposed to murder Paul... Go figure !!!

Do you agree or disagree that Jesus gave himself to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people of his own possession who are zealous for doing good works? Do you agree or disagree that the Jews in Acts 21:20 who were zealous for doing good works in obedience to God's law were acting in accordance with what Jesus gave himself to accomplish in Titus 2:14? The fact they were angry with Paul doesn't change the fact of what Jesus accomplished through the cross or the fact that being zealous for doing good works in obedience to God's law is in accordance with what Jesus accomplished, though they were angry because they had heard false rumors about Paul that he was teaching against God's law, which he planned to take steps to disprove.

 

[Soyeong]

Matthew 7:21-23 is the passage under discussion. The question was; why does no one use John 6:40 when talking about the will of the Father?
I agreed with that.

In Matthew 7:21-23, Jesus contrasted those who do the will of the Father with those who are workers of lawlessness, so there is no need to go to a different book in order to figure out what God's will is, plus it is straightforward that God has made His will known through what He has commanded, though John 6:40 is saying the same thing in a different way because God's commands are His instructions for how to believe in the name of the Son, which is in accordance with those who are born again, who enter the Kingdom, and who obey God's law all referring to the same group of people.

Yes - because we have Jesus, who reconciled us to God, Romans 5:12, made us his children, John 1:12, Romans 8:16-17 and through whom we have every spiritual blessing, Ephesians 1:3.

Indeed, while we are reconciled to God because of Jesus it is still true that Gentiles are also called to be holy as God is holy, and are included as part of God's chosen people, a holy nation, a royal priesthood, and a treasure of God's own possession, so Gentiles also have the delight of getting to follow God's instructions for how to fulfill those roles. It is contradictory for Gentile to want to be included in having those roles while wanting nothing to do with following God's instructions for how to fulfill them.

It would be contradictory for someone to accept Jesus who makes us holy, receive eternal life and his Holy Spirit - so that GOD himself lives in us,
and then say "now, how should I live to show that I am holy? I know; I'll look in the OT, to a time before they had Jesus - that will show me."

To have a character trait is to be someone who chooses to take actions that express it while it would be contradictory for someone to have a character trait who chooses not to express it. For instance, to say that someone is courageous is to say that they choose to take actions that express courage while it would be contradictory for someone to be courageous while being someone who chooses not to express courage, and the same goes for being someone who is holy. For example:

Leviticus 11:44-45 For I am the Lord your God. Consecrate yourselves therefore, and be holy, for I am holy. You shall not defile yourselves with any swarming thing that crawls on the ground. 45 For I am the Lord who brought you up out of the land of Egypt to be your God. You shall therefore be holy, for I am holy.”

So refraining from eating unclean animals is directly connected to what it means to be holy for God is holy. Someone can't be holy and live as part of a holy nation while refusing to follow God's instructions for how to do that, which is why the Holy Spirit has the role of leading us to obey the Mosaic Law (Ezekiel 36:26-27). Jesus is God's word made flesh, so someone can't accept him while refusing to follow God's word.

Some probably did.
Job, Noah, Moses, the prophets certainly did. Nut the nations of Israel and Judah BOTH ended up in exile, as punishment for their sins, because they broke God's covenant, worshipped idols, turned away from God etc etc.
Peter said that the Israelites had not been able to keep God's law, Acts 15:10.

If they hadn't broken the covenant again and again, God would not have told them that he was going to make a new one.

In Deuteronomy 30:1-14, it prophesies about a time when the Israelites would return from exile, God would circumcise their hearts, and they would return to obedience to the Mosaic Law. In Jeremiah 31:33 and Ezekiel 36:26-27, they are speaking in regard to the New Covenant, the return of the Israelites from exile, God circumcising their hearts by means of the Spirit, and returning to obedience to the Mosaic Law by saying that God will take away our hearts of stone, give us hearts of flesh, and send His Spirit to lead us to obey the Mosaic Law, and where He will put the Mosaic Law in our minds and write it on our hearts. In Romans 2:25-29, the way to recognize that a Gentile has a circumcised heart is by observing their obedience to the Mosaic Law, which is the same way to tell for a Jew, and circumcision of the heart is a matter of the Spirit, which is in contrast with Acts 7:51-53, where those with uncircumcised hearts resist the Spirit and do not obey the Mosaic Law. So the New Covenant is all about Israel returning to obedience to the Mosaic Law.

If Acts 15:10 had been speaking about the Mosaic Law as being a burden that no one could bear, then they would have been in direct disagreement with God in Deuteronomy 30:11-14, but rather Acts 15:11 makes it clear that what they were referring to as a burden that no one could bear was an alternative to salvation by grace, namely salvation by circumcision that was proposed in Acts 15:1.

No, sin was in the world long before the Mosaic law.
Check out Noah's story.

In Romans 3:20, it directly states that it is by the Mosaic Law that we have knowledge of sin, so that is how Christ's audience knew what sin is, and you have not given an alternative for how else they knew what sin is if not through the Mosaic Law. Sin was in the world before the Mosaic Law was given, so there were no actions that became sinful when it was given, but rather it revealed what has always been and will always be sinful.

Jesus fulfilled the law.
But according to the Pharisees, he also broke it; healing and eating corn on the Sabbath, touching people with skin diseases, a woman who was bleeding and someone who was dead, and refusing to condemn someone who had been caught breaking the law and who should have been stoned.

Jesus fulfilled the Mosaic Law by spending his ministry teaching how to correctly obey it by word and by example. It is contradictory to think both that Jesus was correct about it being lawful to heal on the Sabbath and that the Pharisees were correct in thinking that Jesus had broken the Sabbath by healing on it. Jesus was sinless, so while some Pharisees thought that he had broken the Mosaic Law, they were incorrect. It is not a sin to touch someone who is death, who has tzaraat, or who is suffering from bleeding, but rather that just means that they have become unclean and are not permitted to enter the temple until they have come clean. The Mosaic Law requires both of the people accused of adultery to be brought before a judge who does a thorough investigation and with no one being put to death without two or three witness, so if Jesus had condemned her, then he would have sinned by breaking the Mosaic Law.

And yet they are all listed in Leviticus - along with things like stoning to death anyone who does not keep the Sabbath, not planting 2 types of crops in one field, not trimming your beard and so on.
Are you saying that you keep some of the laws in Leviticus, given by God, but not all of them?

And yet nowhere does the Bible state that any of the laws commanded in Leviticus were commanded because God wanted the Israelites to have good hygiene. No, that is not what I am saying.

So we follow God's law, whether or not it was given to us - but only if we want to?

Tell me, do I, as a woman, have to follow the laws for women given in Saudi Arabia?
Do I, as a British woman, have to follow the laws of Italy? Am I bound by the American constitution? Would I be prosecuted by the Australian government for criticising their laws/food/way of life?
If you went to a country with a strict no alcohol policy and took a bottle of whisky with you, would you be spared jail if you said "this isn't against our law and I felt like doing it"?

David said many times throughout the Psalms that he loved the Mosaic Law and delighted in obeying it, which Paul also did (Romans 7:22), so we should obey it because we want to, though the whole world is obligated to refrain from sin, so we are still obligated to obey God regardless of whether or not we want to. Different countries exist independently and have the authority to create their own laws, which is not the same as God giving laws for how to walk in His way in accordance with His nature that everyone who wants to walk in His way in accordance with the Gospel should follow.

That's just it though - Adam wasn't obligated to obey God. If he had been, he would have done and sin would not have entered the world.
He was given a command - rule/law. He wasn't forced to keep it, and he didn't.

If Adam had no obligation to obey God, then he wouldn't have had any restriction about which tree he could eat from and it wouldn't have been a sin for him to eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. God commanded Adam, so he was obligated to obey it, and he failed to meet his obligation when he did not.

1. I try to keep every day holy - that is, set apart for God.
2. If God had never told anyone to do that, no one would know they had to - so they wouldn't.

The purpose of making a day holy is to set it apart from other days, so if you try to treat every day in the same way, then you aren't treating any of them as holy. If we did on every day what God wants us to do on the Sabbath, then we would do no work, but God also wants us to work during the other days. God could have commanded His people to rest on every day, but He did not do that, so you should not act like you know better than God. In Mark 7:6-9, Jesus criticized the Pharisees as being hypocrites for setting aside the commands of God in order to establish their own traditions.

I was speaking about if God had blessed the Sabbath and made it holy, so that we knew about it, but He hadn't commanded anyone to keep it holy. In Hebrews 4:10, whoever entered into God's rest has rest from his works as God rested from His, so we should follow His example. We should take actions in accordance with God's nature because He is sovereign, not because He commanded us to, so His commands simply inform us of what has always been our obligation.

So that law, written in Leviticus, is one way we show that we are holy, but other laws, written in Leviticus aren't - because God did not give any hygiene laws??

There aren't any hygiene laws written in Leviticus.

Jesus fulfilled the law - not that Gentiles were under it anyway.
He was the sacrifice for sin.
He makes us holy and reconciles us to God.
He fulfilled OT prophecies about him, and the feasts.

Jesus fulfilled the law by spending his ministry teaching us how to correctly obey it by word and by example.

If Gentiles weren't under God's law, then Gentiles would have no need to repent from their sins, would have no need of grace, would have no need of salvation would have no need of the Gospel, would have no need of Jesus to have given himself to redeem us from all lawlessness.

Being made holy is being made into someone who does what is holy in obedience to God's law.

In 1 Corinthians 5:6-8, Paul spoke in regard to how Passover foreshadowed Christ by drawing the connection of him being our Passover Lamb, however, instead of concluding that we should no longer observe Passover, he concluded by saying that we should therefore continue to observe it. The only way that we should no longer observe Passover is if what it testifies about Jesus is no longer true.

We weren't saved from sin and set free from slavery so that we could become slaves to the law - a burden which even the Jews could not bear, Acts 15:10.

Sin is living in transgression of God's law, so being set free from living in sin is being set free to live in obedience to it. In other words, the freedom that we have in Christ is the freedom from living in sin, not the freedom to live in sin.

Yes it does.
Jesus died for our sins, reconciles us to God, gives us eternal life and makes us holy and righteous.
How do you want to show that you are holy? By keeping laws which weren't given to you and which were fulfilled in Jesus.

Speaking against doing for something for an incorrect purpose should not be mistaken as speaking against doing it for a correct purpose. For example, speaking against using a car to drive across the ocean should not be mistaken as speaking against using a car to drive on roads. To say that God is holy is to say that He chooses to take actions that express holiness while it would be inaccurate to say that God is holy if He choses not to do that, so there is not such thing as being made holy without being made into something who does what is holy in obedience to God's law, and it is contradictory for someone to want to become holy without wanting to become someone who does what is holy.

Jesus commanded us to love as he loves, to preach the Good News, to seek first the Kingdom of God, to "do this in memory of me" and many other things.
He did not say "wear clothes made from only one fibre - this is how you will show others that you are holy." He didn't command Gentiles to read the OT and put themselves under the Jewish law. Paul, and the other Apostles, taught that circumcision was not necessary, and that it was ok to eat food that had been offered to idols. There is no evidence that they went around examining the material used in peoples' robes to find out whether or not it was pure and not mixed.

In Matthew 22:36-40, Jesus summarized the Mosaic Law as being about how to love God and our neighbor, so that he how he expressed his love and how we are to love as he loved. In Matthew 4:15-23, the Gospel that Jesus taught called for us to obey the God's law. God's law is His instructions for how to seek first His Kingdom. Those who want nothing to do with repenting from transgressing God's law want nothing to do with the Gospel.

While Paul spoke against requiring circumcision for an incorrect purpose, he did not speak against obeying it for the purposes for which it was given, especially because he did not have the authority to countermand God. While Paul spoke against eating meat from the altar, it is not idolatry to eat meat that has been previously sacrificed to idols. Paul was not in disagreement with God about which laws we should follow.

You don't seem to have even decided what God's law is - wearing clothes of mixed fibres, yes; hygiene laws, no.

I don't follow any of those, yet I most certainly believe in Christ's death on the cross.

God's law consists of the laws that He has commanded in the Bible, however, there aren't any hygiene laws commanded by God in the Bible.

In Titus 2:14, Jesus gave himself 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 becoming zealous for doing good works in obedience to God's law is the way to believe in what Jesus accomplished through the cross (Acts 21:20) while returning to the lawlessness that he gave himself to redeem us from is the way to refuse to believe in his death on the cross.

 

[Strong in Him]

Indeed, while we are reconciled to God because of Jesus it is still true that Gentiles are also called to be holy as God is holy,

Yes.
And if we believe in, accept and live for God - which is only possible through Jesus - we ARE holy. Holy means "set apart for, and dedicated to divine use".
The world does not put God and his kingdom first, Matthew 6:33.
The world does not say "the first shall be last and the last first", Matthew 20:16.
The world does not say love your enemies, Matthew 5:44.
The world does not say that is is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God, Luke 18:24.

The world says, look after number 1; make a name for yourself, seek the best, get these possessions.
The world says it's ok to sleep with someone before marriage - "everybody does it" - or have an affair or a threesome. That if it works for you and makes you happy, it's fine.
The world says it's fine, and normal, to want to get revenge.
The world says that a person is defined by their job - so a surgeon commands more respect than a bin man.
The world says that you can do good deeds and earn a place in heaven.

and are included as part of God's chosen people, a holy nation, a royal priesthood, and a treasure of God's own possession, so Gentiles also have the delight of getting to follow God's instructions for how to fulfill those roles. It is contradictory for Gentile to want to be included in having those roles while wanting nothing to do with following God's instructions for how to fulfill them.

We have every spiritual blessing in Christ, Ephesians 1:3.
If we accept Christ we become God's children, John 1:12 and heirs together with Christ, Romans 8:16-17.
If we accept Christ we have eternal life, John 3:16, John 6:40.
If we live in Christ we bear fruit, John 15:5.
If we are born again through the Spirit, we enter the Kingdom of God, John 3:3.
If we have the Spirit, he is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance, 2 Corinthians 1:22, 2 Corinthians 5:5.

Paul and the other apostles taught that those who taught that circumcision was necessary for salvation, were false teachers. Nowhere did they, or Jesus, say "now that you are reconciled to God, you are free to keep, and must keep, the law."

So refraining from eating unclean animals is directly connected to what it means to be holy for God is holy. Someone can't be holy and live as part of a holy nation while refusing to follow God's instructions for how to do that,

God's will, work and instructions for having eternal life, are to believe in Jesus.
He has not instructed us to receive, accept and believe in his Son and then look to the OT - a time when they did not have Jesus - for instructions on how to live. Jesus said "whoever puts my words into practice" not "whoever obeys the OT law perfectly, which I have enabled you to do."

If Acts 15:10 had been speaking about the Mosaic Law as being a burden that no one could bear, then they would have been in direct disagreement with God in Deuteronomy 30:11-14,

But they clearly couldn't keep it.
Read the book of Judges - when Israel had a godly judge, they believed in God; when they didn't, they turned to idols and sinned.
Read the OT - God gave his law and made a covenant with the nation; they accepted it and prospered, disobeyed it, were punished, repented, were restored, kept it for a while and then broke it again - and again. They were told that they would be sent into exile as punishment for their sins, and they were. Even then, God said he would restore them one day and make a NEW Covenant.
Jesus' blood was of the NEW Covenant, Matthew 26:28.

In Romans 3:20, it directly states that it is by the Mosaic Law that we have knowledge of sin,

No, it says "law", not "Mosaic law".

so that is how Christ's audience knew what sin is, and you have not given an alternative for how else they knew what sin is if not through the Mosaic Law.

Scripture says that it is through the law that we know what sin is, not "through the Mosaic law".
The LAW that Adam was given was that the tree in the middle of the garden was out of bounds and its fruit could not be eaten. He disobeyed that law and sin came into the world.
In Genesis 6 we are told that there was much evil in the world and God sent the flood to destroy sinners and wickedness. They did not have the Mosaic law - so according to your argument, they had not sinned.

Jesus fulfilled the Mosaic Law by spending his ministry teaching how to correctly obey it by word and by example.

Jesus fulfilled the Mosaic law by offering his perfect life as a sin offering for us - the perfect Lamb of God died for the sins of the world, John 1:29, 1 Peter 1:19-20, John 3:16.
Jesus has made us clean, 1 John 1:9 and righteous before God, 2 Corinthians 5:21.

David said many times throughout the Psalms that he loved the Mosaic Law

No, he said "law" - you have added the word "Mosaic".
And David lived in OT times - he did not know, or have, Jesus. In OT times they believed that anyone who looked at God would die - they had no idea that one day God would walk on earth and all would be able to see, look at and touch him, 1 John 1:1-3.
In OT times God soke through his prophets - in NT times God came to men and spoke to them face to face, through Jesus.

There aren't any hygiene laws written in Leviticus.

Leviticus 12:1-7.
Leviticus 13:1-46
Leviticus 14:1-32.
Leviticus 15:1-32.

Touching blood, people with skin diseases, people who were dead, made a Jew unclean. They had to follow procedures in order to be declared clean again.
Avoiding dirty things = knowing how to keep yourself clean = hygiene.

Jesus fulfilled the law by spending his ministry teaching us how to correctly obey it by word and by example.

Jesus fulfilled the law by becoming a sin offering for us.
We are cleansed form sin and guilt, can have fellowship with God, have peace with him and can give thanks to him because of Jesus, who died - the perfect Lamb of God - to make that possible.

Those who want nothing to do with repenting from transgressing God's law want nothing to do with the Gospel.

So if someone eats pork, wear clothes of mixed fibres and does not worship God on a Saturday, and they do not repent for doing/not doing those things, they want nothing to do with Jesus, the Son of God who died to reconcile us to God?

Nonsense.

While Paul spoke against requiring circumcision for an incorrect purpose, he did not speak against obeying it for the purposes for which it was given,

Yes he did.
He said that those who circumcised should be castrated, Galatians 5:12 and that if men let themselves be circumcised it meant that Christ meant nothing to them, Galatians 5:2.
Previously he spoke of Sarah and Hagar who represented the 2 covenants. Hagar represented the covenant made from Mt Sinai - she was a slave girl; the covenant represents slavery, Galatians 4:21-25. However, Abraham also had a son by a free women - Sarah - who represents the covenant from above, which is free. In Galatians 5:1 he says that as Christ has set us free we are to live as free people and not let ourselves be burdened by slavery.

so becoming zealous for doing good works in obedience to God's law is the way to believe in what Jesus accomplished through the cross (Acts 21:20) while returning to the lawlessness that he gave himself to redeem us from is the way to refuse to believe in his death on the cross.

No.
I believe in what Jesus accomplished through the cross. I believe it because I was taught it, because I have read it for myself and because I trust Jesus who said that that was what he had come to do, Mark 10:45, Luke 19:10, Matthew 26:28, John 12:27.
I do not keep the laws of the Old Covenant - except the 10 commandments - which were not given to me.
I am not unholy because I wear socks made from polyester and cotton.
I am not a disobedient sinner because I worship and praise God on a Sunday - and in fact, every day of the week.
Eating pork does not mean that I want nothing to do with the Gospel.

 

[Soyeong]

No, it says "law", not "Mosaic law".

Indeed, it says "law" rather than "Mosaic Law", though I justifiably interpret as referring to the Mosaic Law because it is through the Mosaic Law that God taught the Israelites what sin is and there are no other options through which God taught that to the Israelites. In Romans 7:7, Paul said that he would not have known what sin is if it were not for the law and then gave coveting as an example, which is one of the Mosaic laws. There are many examples of God's laws being given prior to when the Mosaic Law was given, for example, it was a sin to commit adultery in Genesis 39:9, so the fact that that command was later included as part of the Mosaic Law does not mean that they couldn't sin before the Mosaic Law was given.

No, he said "law" - you have added the word "Mosaic".
And David lived in OT times - he did not know, or have, Jesus. In OT times they believed that anyone who looked at God would die - they had no idea that one day God would walk on earth and all would be able to see, look at and touch him, 1 John 1:1-3.
In OT times God soke through his prophets - in NT times God came to men and spoke to them face to face, through Jesus.

The Hebrews word "Torah" specifically refers to the Mosaic Law. Hebrews 11 lists examples from the OT of people who had saving faith and the only way to the Father is through Jesus, so they knew Jesus. And yet they saw God (Exodus 24:10).

Jesus fulfilled the Mosaic law by offering his perfect life as a sin offering for us - the perfect Lamb of God died for the sins of the world, John 1:29, 1 Peter 1:19-20, John 3:16.
Jesus has made us clean, 1 John 1:9 and righteous before God, 2 Corinthians 5:21.

NAS Greek Lexicon: pleroo
"to fulfil, i.e. to cause God's will (as made known in the law) to be obeyed as it should be, and God's promises (given through the prophets) to receive fulfilment"

After Jesus said that he came to fulfill the law in Matthew 5:18-19, he then proceeded to do that six times throughout the rest of the chapter by teaching how to correctly obey it as it should be.

But they clearly couldn't keep it.
Read the book of Judges - when Israel had a godly judge, they believed in God; when they didn't, they turned to idols and sinned.
Read the OT - God gave his law and made a covenant with the nation; they accepted it and prospered, disobeyed it, were punished, repented, were restored, kept it for a while and then broke it again - and again. They were told that they would be sent into exile as punishment for their sins, and they were. Even then, God said he would restore them one day and make a NEW Covenant.
Jesus' blood was of the NEW Covenant, Matthew 26:28.

According to Galatians 5:14, anyone who has ever loved their neighbor has fulfilled the entire law, so there have been countless people who did keep it. In regard to Israel's redemption cycles, there were a number of good kings who tended to live for much longer than the evil kings did, so while they were far from perfect, they were even further from being a complete failure to keep it. Israel has the role of being a light to the nations either by being an example for us to follow or by being an example for us to avoid, so we should take the times when Israel was disobedient to the Torah as an example of what we should avoid doing rather than as an example for us to follow (1 Corinthians 10:1-13). In Jeremiah 31:33, the New Covenant still involves following the Torah.

We have every spiritual blessing in Christ, Ephesians 1:3.
If we accept Christ we become God's children, John 1:12 and heirs together with Christ, Romans 8:16-17.
If we accept Christ we have eternal life, John 3:16, John 6:40.
If we live in Christ we bear fruit, John 15:5.
If we are born again through the Spirit, we enter the Kingdom of God, John 3:3.
If we have the Spirit, he is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance, 2 Corinthians 1:22, 2 Corinthians 5:5.

In 1 John 2:6, those who are in Christ are obligated to walk in the same way he walked, and he walked in obedience to the Torah, so those verses are only true of people who are also walking in obedience to the Torah.

Yes.
And if we believe in, accept and live for God - which is only possible through Jesus - we ARE holy. Holy means "set apart for, and dedicated to divine use".
The world does not put God and his kingdom first, Matthew 6:33.
The world does not say "the first shall be last and the last first", Matthew 20:16.
The world does not say love your enemies, Matthew 5:44.
The world does not say that is is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God, Luke 18:24.

The world says, look after number 1; make a name for yourself, seek the best, get these possessions.
The world says it's ok to sleep with someone before marriage - "everybody does it" - or have an affair or a threesome. That if it works for you and makes you happy, it's fine.
The world says it's fine, and normal, to want to get revenge.
The world says that a person is defined by their job - so a surgeon commands more respect than a bin man.
The world says that you can do good deeds and earn a place in heaven.

None of that detracts from the fact that Gentiles are called to be holy for God is holy, which is a quote from Leviticus where God was go sing instructions for how to that. The Bible frequently connects our belief in God with our obedience to Him, such as in Revelation 14:12, where those who kept faith in Jesus are the same as those who kept God's commandments, which is because it is God's instructions for how to believe in him.

God's will, work and instructions for having eternal life, are to believe in Jesus.
He has not instructed us to receive, accept and believe in his Son and then look to the OT - a time when they did not have Jesus - for instructions on how to live. Jesus said "whoever puts my words into practice" not "whoever obeys the OT law perfectly, which I have enabled you to do."

The way that we choose to live expresses what we believe to be true about the nature of who God. For example, the way to believe that God is good is by doing good works that testify about His goodness, which is why our good works bring glory to God (Matthew 5:13-16). We are trusting in the nature of God as being the model for how we should live our lives. We have a choice between leaning on our own understanding of right and wrong by doing what is right in our own eyes or trusting in God with all of our heart to correctly make that distinction through what He has commanded (Proverbs 3:5-7) and that is what it means to believe in God, which is why there are many verses that connect doing God will, having eternal life, and believing in Jesus with obeying God's commands. The Son is God's word made flesh so we can't accept and believe in God's Son and then look be to reject God's word.

In John 5:39-40, Jesus said that they searched the Scriptures because they thought that in them they will find eternal life, and they testify about him, yet they refuse to come to him that they might have life. In Matthew 19:17 and Luke 10:25-28, Jesus said that the way to enter eternal life is by obeying God's commandments, so eternal life can be found in the Scriptures, and they were correct to search for it there, but they needed to recognize that the goal of everything in Scripture is to testify about how to know Jesus and come to him for eternal life, so people in the OT who di recognize that did have Jesus.

Yes he did.
He said that those who circumcised should be castrated, Galatians 5:12 and that if men let themselves be circumcised it meant that Christ meant nothing to them, Galatians 5:2.

Either there are correct or incorrect reasons for becoming circumcised and Paul only spoke against the incorrect reasons, or according to Galatians 5:2, Paul caused Christ to be of no value to Timothy when he had him circumcised right after the Jerusalem Council (Acts 16:4) and Christ is of no value to roughly 80% of the men in the US. In Acts 15:1, they were wanting to require all Gentiles to become circumcised in order to become saved, however, that was never the purpose for which God commanded circumcision, so the Jerusalem Council upheld the Mosaic Law by correctly ruling against requiring circumcision for an incorrect purpose. The Jerusalem Council did not have the authority to countermand God, so their ruling should not be mistaken as being a ruling against obeying what God has commanded

Previously he spoke of Sarah and Hagar who represented the 2 covenants. Hagar represented the covenant made from Mt Sinai - she was a slave girl; the covenant represents slavery, Galatians 4:21-25. However, Abraham also had a son by a free women - Sarah - who represents the covenant from above, which is free. In Galatians 5:1 he says that as Christ has set us free we are to live as free people and not let ourselves be burdened by slavery.

If God saved the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt in order to put them under slavery to the Torah, then it would be for slavery that God sets us free, however, Galatians 5:1 says that it is for freedom that God sets us free. In Psalms 119:142, the Torah is truth, and in John 8:31-36, it is sin in transgression of the Torah that puts us into slavery while it is the truth that sets us free. Furthermore, the Mosaic Covenant came through the line of the free woman, not the line of the slave woman, so you're missing Paul's point.

Leviticus 12:1-7.
Leviticus 13:1-46
Leviticus 14:1-32.
Leviticus 15:1-32.

Touching blood, people with skin diseases, people who were dead, made a Jew unclean. They had to follow procedures in order to be declared clean again.
Avoiding dirty things = knowing how to keep yourself clean = hygiene.

None of those verses say that the goal of obeying them is to have good hygiene. Ritual purity is not about having good hygiene. It is not as though if an Israelite scrubbed a pig throughly with soap and water then it becomes a clean animal that is good to eat. When someone gets baptized, then there is dirt and sweat that is washed off of their body, but the purpose of becoming baptized is not so that we will have good hygiene. If someone took a shower where they throughly washed themselves so that they were at the peak of having good hygiene, then that would not remove their need to get baptized, so you're mixing two different concepts.

So if someone eats pork, wear clothes of mixed fibres and does not worship God on a Saturday, and they do not repent for doing/not doing those things, they want nothing to do with Jesus, the Son of God who died to reconcile us to God?

Nonsense.

God commanded His people to be holy for He is hoy, so when someone follows God's instruction for how to do that they are living in a way that testifies about His holiness and when someone refuses to follow those instructions, then they are bearing false witness against God by living in a way that testifies that the God that they follow is not holy. Likewise, when we live in a way that testifies about an aspect of God's nature, then we are expressing our love for that aspect of God's nature, which is why there are many verses that connect our love for God with our obedience to His commandments, so everything that God chose to command was specifically commanded to teach us how to love a different aspect of His nature. The Son is the exact image of God's nature (Hebrews 1:3), so if someone refused to follow God's instructions for how to act in accordance with His righteousness and justice, then they would be living in a way that testifies that the God that they follow is not righteous or just, they would be expressing that righteousness and justice are aspects of God's nature that they do not love, and they would not be believing in God's righteousness and justice, and the same goes for holiness and other aspects of God's nature.

In other words, the laws that God has instructed teach us about the nature of who He is, so if God had commanded his people to commit adultery, then that would have revealed something different about His nature than commanding against it. Likewise, God's commands to keep the Sabbath holy and against eating unclean animals or wearing clothing that mixes wool and linen teach us about aspects of the nature of who Jesus is, which you simply do not love.

No.
I believe in what Jesus accomplished through the cross. I believe it because I was taught it, because I have read it for myself and because I trust Jesus who said that that was what he had come to do, Mark 10:45, Luke 19:10, Matthew 26:28, John 12:27.
I do not keep the laws of the Old Covenant - except the 10 commandments - which were not given to me.
I am not unholy because I wear socks made from polyester and cotton.
I am not a disobedient sinner because I worship and praise God on a Sunday - and in fact, every day of the week.
Eating pork does not mean that I want nothing to do with the Gospel.

It is contradictory for you to say that you believe in what Jesus accomplished through the cross while rejecting what Titus 2:14 says that he accomplished through the cross. Those who trust in Jesus do not argue against following God's instructions for how to trust in Him. In Jeremiah 31:33, the New Covenant involves following the Torah, but you argue against following it. The Israelites praised and worshiped God on every day of the week in addition to obeying God's command to keep the Sabbath holy, so there is nothing wrong with you following your own tradition of doing that on Sunday, but you should not hypocritically set aside God's command to keep the Sabbath holy in order to establish your own tradition (Mark 7:6-9). It is impossible to worship and praise God by refusing to follow His instructions for how to do that. Jesus spread the Gospel calling for repentance to other Israelites and there are no other candidates other than the Mosaic Law for how his audience knew what they should be repenting from transgressing. If you asked anyone who practices Judaism, then they will tell you that the Torah is how God revealed what sin is, and we are called to repent from doing what God has revealed to be sin.

 

[Lost Witness]

There would be No "New" covenant, were the children of GOD called to live under the former.

 

[Strong in Him]

Indeed, it says "law" rather than "Mosaic Law", though I justifiably interpret as referring to the Mosaic Law because it is through the Mosaic Law that God taught the Israelites what sin is

Sin came into the world when Adam disobeyed God.
Cain sinned when he killed his brother.
By Noah's time, sin and wickedness were so widespread that God sent a flood.
Joseph's brothers sinned when they sold him to to Ishmaelites and then lied to their father that he had died. They knew it was wrong, because they later said that they were being punished for the way they had treated him, Genesis 42:21.

God did not need to devise a series of laws just to show people that they were sinners. They were sinning long before Sinai.

and there are no other options through which God taught that to the Israelites.

He didn't need an "option".
When Adam disobeyed God, sin came into the world; from then onwards, people had sinful natures. Paul said that sin and death entered the world through one man and death came to all because all sinned, Romans 5:12. He stated that sin was in the world before the law was given - but that "it is not charged to anyone's account where there is no law", Romans 5:13.
It wasn't that no one knew what sin was before Moses - they did, they just weren't held accountable for it. Paul said that even if people did not break a command, sin was still in the world, Romans 5:14.

According to Galatians 5:14, anyone who has ever loved their neighbor has fulfilled the entire law, so there have been countless people who did keep it.

And yet the nation of Israel was sent into exile because of their sins.
When God told Hosea to marry a prostitute, that was a picture of how God, the loving husband, was bound to an adulterous wife - the nation of Israel. They turned away from God again and again. They were punished, forgiven, restored and sinned again. Doubtless, God's prophets kept his word, so did various Godly leaders. But most people didn't.

The concept, "if you obey my law you will prosper, if you don't, you will face the consequences" was simple. People had experience of obeying God and being blessed by him. But it didn't last. Isaiah, Jeremiah and others were mocked or ignored because they prophesied that God would punish his people for their disobedience. It was believed that God's people had special protection and privileges - whatever they did. That's why, when they were in exile, the people complained that God had left them.

In 1 John 2:6, those who are in Christ are obligated to walk in the same way he walked, and he walked in obedience to the Torah,

1 John 2:6 doesn't even mention the Torah.

It is your interpretation that "live as Jesus did" means obeying the Torah.
It doesn't. Otherwise women who wanted to "live as Jesus did" would have to transition to become men, be circumcised etc. And Cristian men who wanted to lives as Jesus did, would first have to become Jews.
"Live as Jesus did" means to live a life of obedience to God. Do what God wants - which is that everyone should believe in Jesus, John 6:29, John 6:40. It means love God above all and follow him as Jesus did - even though that path led to the cross.

The way that we choose to live expresses what we believe to be true about the nature of who God.

Yes, we show our faith in action - agreed.
I believe that God so loved the world that he sent his Son to die for us, and that everyone who believes in Jesus has eternal life, John 3:16. So I live as someone who has eternal life, whose home is not in this world and should not be shaped by this world. I believe that the cross showed us how much God loves us, 1 John 3:16, Romans 5:8. God could have said "you are sinners, you have rejected me , I am going to destroy you". He didn't - he sent his Son to offer his perfect life as a sacrifice for us, so that we could be forgiven.
So I try to live my life as someone who has been set free from sin, who is a child of God and an heir with Christ.

For example, the way to believe that God is good is by doing good works that testify about His goodness, which is why our good works bring glory to God

Many people do good works, without even believing in God. Atheists and humanists would not say "I am doing good works to show you that I believe that God is good" - they don't even believe in him.

In Matthew 19:17 and Luke 10:25-28, Jesus said that the way to enter eternal life is by obeying God's commandments, so eternal life can be found in the Scriptures,

Yes, because the Scriptures point to, and prophesy about, Jesus. Jesus taught the couple on the way to Emmaus what the Scriptures said about him - beginning with Moses and all the prophets, Luke 24:27.

That doesn't mean that keeping the Torah gives eternal life.

None of those verses say that the goal of obeying them is to have good hygiene. Ritual purity is not about having good hygiene.

If they ate pork, they were eating an unclean animal. If they touched someone with a skin disease or who was bleeding, they were unclean.
The laws are about not doing things that make you unclean.
And touching someone who was bleeding, or who had weeping sores, could have been very unhygienic - that's how disease is spread.

God commanded His people to be holy for He is hoy, so when someone follows God's instruction for how to do that they are living in a way that testifies about His holiness and when someone refuses to follow those instructions, then they are bearing false witness against God by living in a way that testifies that the God that they follow is not holy.

Well if you believe that they only way that you can be holy is to follow laws that were not given to you - ignoring the fact that Jesus never told us to follow those laws; go for it. If you believe that you HAVE to obey the law, if you do not do that, then, for you, that is sin, James 4:17.
I don't believe that.
I follow Jesus, who gave his life for me so that I could be God's child. Jesus said "no one comes to the Father except by me", John 14:6. He did NOT say, "now I have reconciled you to God, you have to keep the Old Covenant", he gave his blood which was of the NEW Covenant.

It is contradictory for you to say that you believe in what Jesus accomplished through the cross while rejecting what Titus 2:14 says that he accomplished through the cross. Those who trust in Jesus do not argue against following God's instructions for how to trust in Him.

"Follow the OT law" is not God's instruction for how to follow, and trust, Jesus.

 

[Mark Quayle]

In Matthew 7:21-23 Jesus talks about the will of the Father. There is only one other place in the Bible where Jesus talks about the will of the Father and that is John 6:37-40.

In John 6:37-40 we learn that not one of God's sheep will be lost and that the Father's will is that all who truly believe in Jesus will be saved.

Now I've heard of many wills of the Father from preachers and youtubers and across my scripture studies on the internet. It's very popular in these circles to make up something that is meant here and almost every preacher and person I've come across almost never talks about John 6:37-40 as the definitive proof text as to just what Matthew 7:21-23 means. Why is that? I mean, it couldnt be any clearer the passage means just what Jesus has said from the beginning. That there are sheep and there are goats. The sheep are forever saved the goats are not.

So why doesn't virtually anyone go by what Jesus says in John 6:37-40? Even Paul Washer teaches something different in his sermons. I'm not calling these people heretics or false prophets. I'm just wondering why virtually nobody teaches people what scripture says about the Will of the Father. Why does almost everyone talk about something completely different. I mean the will of the Father is right there in black and white for everyone to see. Everyone who is in the book of life that was written before the foundation of the world will be saved. EVERYONE. Everyone that is not in the book Jesus will deny on the day of Judgemenr. Its very simple. The Bible isn't cryptic and Jesus did not leave us with no word of God to go with.

So why do we all come up with our own interpretations of scripture and call some of the saved not saved? Or call some of the lost saved? It makes no sense. It just doesnt.

Whether the word, "will" is used or not, in Scripture it is pretty obviously implied many places, and in at least two ways:

1. God has told us what to do. This is called God's will. We often think of this as 'what God wants to happen', but that also can be used to describe #2 below, which is pretty obviously not the same thing. The Reformed refer to this as 'God's revealed will', or 'God's command' or other similar phrases.

2. In creating, God's will, (we say "God's will for the ages"), was done, and is being done. We can call this will, "his plan". We don't know quite what it is, but we have snippets of information, and generalities to go by for understanding enough about it. And we have the simple logic that nothing comes to pass that he didn't know would come to pass, and that therefore he intended to come to pass when he created what resulted in it coming to pass. The Reformed describe this with, 'God's hidden will', or 'God's decree' or other phrases.

But it becomes apparent by the same simple logic. If it comes to pass, it was intended to come to pass. Therefore even every tiniest detail that comes to pass is God's will.

This (#2) does not imply that everything will happen 'automatically' as some suggest is implied. It only means it is SURE to happen. The SHEEP are sure to be saved, in the end. And the GOATS are sure to not be saved, in the end.

 

[Presbyterian Continuist]

In Matthew 7:21-23 Jesus talks about the will of the Father. There is only one other place in the Bible where Jesus talks about the will of the Father and that is John 6:37-40.

In John 6:37-40 we learn that not one of God's sheep will be lost and that the Father's will is that all who truly believe in Jesus will be saved.

Now I've heard of many wills of the Father from preachers and youtubers and across my scripture studies on the internet. It's very popular in these circles to make up something that is meant here and almost every preacher and person I've come across almost never talks about John 6:37-40 as the definitive proof text as to just what Matthew 7:21-23 means. Why is that? I mean, it couldnt be any clearer the passage means just what Jesus has said from the beginning. That there are sheep and there are goats. The sheep are forever saved the goats are not.

So why doesn't virtually anyone go by what Jesus says in John 6:37-40? Even Paul Washer teaches something different in his sermons. I'm not calling these people heretics or false prophets. I'm just wondering why virtually nobody teaches people what scripture says about the Will of the Father. Why does almost everyone talk about something completely different. I mean the will of the Father is right there in black and white for everyone to see. Everyone who is in the book of life that was written before the foundation of the world will be saved. EVERYONE. Everyone that is not in the book Jesus will deny on the day of Judgemenr. Its very simple. The Bible isn't cryptic and Jesus did not leave us with no word of God to go with.

So why do we all come up with our own interpretations of scripture and call some of the saved not saved? Or call some of the lost saved? It makes no sense. It just doesnt.

The Scripture says, "This is the will of God, that we believe on Him whom He has sent", and "This is the will of God, even our sanctification." When we are putting our full trust in Christ and His finished work on the Cross, and are working with the Holy Spirit to develop sanctification, then we can be confident that we are walking and living in God's will for us.