BigDave said:
6'10" and 300 lbs big here. We need to start a CF Basketball team! (oh man, I can't believe I just assumed somebody who is tall plays basketball..sorry...it is a stereotypical necessity).
Let me clarify. I am not saying the New Covenant (NewC) does away with all law, or does away with all laws in the Mosaic law. Obviously, there are many thing which directly carry over into what might be called "the law of Christ". Instead, what I am saying is that the Mosaic law is now obsolete in its entirety as a system. We are no longer under the law of Moses any more than a USA citizen is under the law of Britian even though there are many similarities and basically the same source. Thus, since the law of Moses is obsolete as a system (Heb 8:13)
Indeed, but the Sabbath came before Moses or his law. Just as we don't read about Adam receiving the law, but Cain knew it was wrong to murder etc. they clearly understood the law. It was internal before, and will be again.
So my contention is simply that the Sabbath, being before the Mosaic law, which was certainly an agreement with the Israelites, is still an issue. Moreover, while the 10 commandments were put in terms they could understand, they transcend those particular terms and are enduring principles. The Sabbath is simply a principle to remember our Maker. Romans 1 records that men knew God as Creator, that it was obvious to all, but they willfully turned away from it. The Sabbath is the opposite, it is remembering and giving thanks.
Not necessarily. This is only true if the New is merely the Old remade. If however, the New was the 'ultimate and intended covenant' from the beginning, and the Old was merely a shadow of the New, the the question is moot - the New is what is to be looked to and the Old is merely a shadow of this.
Now in this we agree in one respect. The old covenant was never about salvation. It was always impossible to be saved by the law. David and Abraham were saved by faith, not law. Because no one can be perfect due to our sin.
The old covenant was about the relationship that the Israelites had with God.
However, please note that the sacrifices too came before Moses. They were already in place and were not themselves the covenant, though keeping them was certainly part of it. They were a means of pointing to the Savior. The covenant was the agreement to keep God's law, be a part of that special relationship, and to thereby be blessed, drawing all nations to marvel at the power of God.
Now you are right in saying that we were always to keep the law spiritually. In fact, people forget the new covenant was quoted from the OT! The prophets spoke of circumcision of the heart, etc. But with the coming of Jesus, and the fulfillment of all the shadows, the means of that obedience was now more clear. Jesus overcame, ministers in our behalf, overcomes the sinful nature, forgives our sins, etc. The old shadows were no longer necessary because we have a more perfect High Priest who has a better covenant. But the question still remains though, what is the covenant an agreement to?
It clearly states God promises to write the law on the hearts. So the purpose hasn't changed. But the means have. The relationship is still the point, and the guiding principles of that relationship are still the moral principles of the law. But now it is internal, willing, "not burdensome" as John says. And now we clearly see the forgiveness of God when we violated those principles.
Agreed....however on what basis would one establish that he includes the rest. The thing with Paul is that he consistently views the Law as a whole. While he may use the concept of the 10 Cs, he uses them to refer to the whole. That being the case, if the law is written on our hearts, then this is just as true of laws about clean and unclean food as much as it is about coveting.
Very well, but then you still have to answer what he actually did mean. Did he mean that all the law was now written on our hearts? Something was, and it included thou shall not covet. I don't think that was the ONLY one, because he clearly said it was an example.
That we keep it fully? According to Hebrews the sacrificial system was done away with. And as I read it the clean and unclean laws were in fact dealing with temple holiness.
But the Sabbath, instituted to remember creation, was not pointing to sacrifices at all. It was pointing back.
Agreed. However, since obediance comes from the heart the form the laws take no longer matter. So, we still are to observe the Sabbath...but we no longer need observe all the specifics of Sabbath observance (ie. not cooking, traveling, etc.), nor do we need to observe it on a specific day. In the case of the Sabbath, 'true obedience' comes in the form of considering *every* day to be God's day - and insisting on placing one day over another is merely a reversion to obedience by the letter instead of the heart.
While we undoubtedly do worship God every day, it still does not make sense to say that we would keep the principle by doing away with a day to spend completely with God. We obviously can't keep every day as a literal Sabbath, and there is a practical reason to not only rest, but finding "your delight in the Lord' (Isaiah 58). If the gift of the Sabbath was a gift for man (The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath) , then eliminating it does away with that gift. Jesus reformed the gift back to where it should have been, pointing out the abuses of the scribes in loading it down with too many rules, but also preserving it as a day for God, and for doing good.
The spirit never goes against the letter. It simply goes beyond.
Here we very much disagree. God did not merely rework the basis for the people being able to keep the promises of the covenant:
1) He also made new and better promises Himself. Whereas the Old only promised health and long life in the land, the New promises eternal life.
Ok, first of all I agree that His promises were better. But are you saying that eternal life was not offered even before? Or that Job, or David etc. did not recognize that? It seems they did. Again, the old covenant never could be about salvation, because salvation is always by faith. If David, according to Romans 4, was saved by faith, then he wasn't relying on the old covenant for salvation.
The covenant promises were the blessings of being His people, and were for a good purposeto bring Glory to God among the nations.
But the new covenant is also about being God's people, but the promises are better in that we are now shown the true means of salvation and obedience all along. Not external tablets, but an internal love for God that willingly obeys Him, and forgiveness that comes from the one true sacrifice of Christ.
2) Paul also makes clear that following the law of the Old is no longer necessary. Several are done away with specifically and others are directly contradicted.
In regards to the nation they already had modified some of their law, because they were under Roman rule. So I assume we are not talking about the law of the theocracy.
Likewise, we both agree that the sacrificial system, etc. was done away with, including the food laws, etc.
And in fact Acts 15 makes it clear that the gentiles were accepted without circumcision, as was demonstrated by the events in Acts 10 in relation to Cornelius, and as predicted through the prophets, that the gentiles would come in.
Moreover, the rest of the decision of Acts 15 was to rule that of the law of Moses the gentiles would keep only a few. But where did they get these few? As we examined earlier in the thread, they were not random, or a compromise. They were based on the laws given for foreigners living among the Israelites. And NONE of the 10 commandments was in them.
So we have a problem .Was it the message of Acts 15 that the gentiles were not to keep any of the 10 commandments? Obviously not. The commandments were not even on the table. They were simply showing what was required of the law of Moses...which they seemed to distinguish from the commands themselves.
So, let's review. The sacrificial system, the system of ritual uncleannes, the theocratic law, and those particular customs which were specifically for Judaism, but not for foreigners in Israel, were done away with.
Which basically leaves us with the commandments. No one really doubts the others. And the Sabbath is observed by Paul, and by most in the church for 400 years. And it doesn't fall under the distinctly Jewish part because it was instituted at creation. So what reason is there for removing it?
Clearly, the whole OldC is done away with and the New is just that - NEW and not the old merely reworked. The Old was *never* meant to be more than temporary and was always intended as a mere shadow of the New.
I certainly agree that the old was always a shadow of the new. In fact, you may want to go through Nazaroo's and I's posts to see our discussion of this previously, it might save some time in clarifying.
But there is still the issue that the problem was found in the promises with the people, not with any of God's requirements.
But beyond this, what you haven't demonstrated is how the Sabbath, which was made at creation, long before the old covenant, was ever part of that old covenant which was done away with?
Was there a command to keep it in the old covenant? Yes, but there were commands to keep lots of things that you still agree with. So that can't be the only answer.
Agreed. However, the law referred to here is not speaking of the Mosaic law. If it were, then we would also need to observe everything in the law, not just the 10 Cs. Instead, this is speaking of the the law which the Mosaic system is merely a shadow of. IOW, while the Mosaic law *includes* the law of God, it does not and cannot *be* the law of God.
I agree that it is not the sum of the law of God. But what you need to demonstrate is how you know what the law is if not from what God has revealed? And how can you do away with the Sabbath which was made before the covenant?
Keep which law? Not the Mosaic law, otherwise Paul would not explicitly deny the necessity of keeping of several key laws - ie. circumcision, dietary laws, observance of Sabbaths and holydays.
The mosaic law was clearly in mind here, since this follows right in from chapter 7 where he quotes the Sabbath command. He speaks of it pointing out sin. And he speaks of his own experience in the past. It can be nothing other than the law from the old covenant, at least the 10, if not the others.
It is this same law that he says is holy, righteous and good. And he says that sin used the law to put him to death but he agrees that the law is good. You are making a false assumption here that the old law was the problem. The old law, if we mean the 10 commandments, which he quotes from, is not the problem. Sin was the problem.
And moreover, while circumcision did not apply to the gentiles since the gentiles were brought in, fulfilling prophecy, and indicated by Acts 10, etc. and while dietary laws did not apply, being part of the tabernacle cleanness system, you have not actually demonstrated that the weekly Sabbath did not apply. The context of the verse in Col. suggests feast Sabbaths, because the weekly Sabbath never was a shadow of sacrifices. Sorry to repeat things a bit, but I am trying to reply to each point so that you don't think I am passing over them. But most of them boil down to this one factThe Sabbath preceded the covenant, preceded sin, preceded the sacrificial system, and was not a shadow of anything in the future. So there is no reason for the new covenant to leave it out.
And the example of Jesus, and Paul, and most of the early church in history seems to recognize this.
