Christians and the Law

[jriccitelli]

The verse is from the RSV:
For we hold that a man is justified by faith apart from works of law... 31 Do we then overthrow the Law by this faith? By no means! On the contrary, we uphold the Law. (Romans 3:31 RSV)
The ‘Law’ has ‘now’ been put in our heart (What is in our heart? The Holy Spirit, God, His Word, and the Law which is His Word).

”But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days," declares the LORD, "I will put My law within them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.34 "They will not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother, (Jeremiah 31:33:34)

What Law was put in our heart?
‘The’ Law. That includes Jesus teaching on the Law, and the Holy Spirits daily conviction and comfort of the Words of God, if we walk in the Spirit and in the Truth, and His word is truth.
In Romans 7:6... But now we have been released from the Law, having died to that by which we were bound, so that we serve in newness of the Spirit and not in oldness of the letter. What shall we say then? Is the Law sin? May it never be! On the contrary, I would not have come to know sin except through the Law; for I would not have known about coveting if the Law had not said, "You shall not covet…12 So then, the Law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.14 For we know that the Law is spiritual, but I am of flesh…16 But if I do the very thing I do not want to do, I agree with the Law, confessing that the Law is good... 22 For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man,…25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other, with my flesh the law of sin.
Romans 8:2 …For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death….4 so that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.5 …but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit…. 7 the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so,8 and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.9 However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you.

I don’t think God uses the letter of the Law to chastise me, but none the less I believe God 'allows' life, and consequences, to teach us, and instill chastisement in order to bring correction and truth to our walk. Only 'now' the Law produces good fruit, rather than bad. The Law 'now' brings life rather than death. Therefore i can agree with Paul when he says;
We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not despairing;9 persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; 10 always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body... 16 Therefore we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day.17 For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison!

[JohnDB70X7]

There are two Laws. Two Torahs:



The Law of Moses ground breaking establishing what is good and what is evil and what is entailed to meet the minimum requirements for righteousness (which man cannot meet without the imputed righteousness of Christ btw). And the Law of Christ (God) which is the law God is interested (throughout scripture) that we keep which is to believe in Jesus Christ. Then the believer in Christ fulfills both Laws. And the Law of Moses remains to point the way to the Law of Christ or to condemn those who do not believe in the Lamb of God.

Galatians 3:24-25 (KJV)
24 Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith.
25 But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster.

Wherefore the law of Moses was our schoolmaster to bring us unto the Law of Christ, that we might be justified by faith.
But after that faith is come, we are no longer under that old schoolmaster.

[JohnDB70X7]

As far as how believers are to live...

Ephesians 2:8-10 (KJV)
8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.
10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

The old moral codes of do dis don' do dat does not apply.

BUT !

We are to keep our sights on the big picture that we are undeserving recipients of the greatest gift and treasure mankind will ever know! And that we have a (fallen) human nature to contend with and keep in check through discipline and constant watch... but that we are to serve our God and our fellow man with all our might with the mind set that all we are and all we have are not our own but Christ's and are subject to his demands... if he wants us to give it all away then we are to joyfully do so. If he wants us to lay down our very lives... then the same is true.

We are not our own we have been bought with a price.

This is the Law of Christ the Law of God the Law of Love.

The Law of Moses is the Law of sin and death.

We are to keep Christ's Law.

And one of the major reasons the Church is in such disarray and division is that its members do not keep the Law of Christ nor do most even know it exists... and another major reason it is in the state it is in is because the Church suffers from a severe identity crisis and the division especially comes from this as mere mortal men armed with human traditions try to reinvent the Church over and over again.

Ruth said it best...

Ruth 1:16 (KJV)
16 And Ruth said, Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God:

The Church has stripped away the Hebrew elements and taken the Hebrew God back to Moab to reinvent him and his followers according to pagan / gentile traditions...

[Jason]

Bruxy Cavey, in his book "The End of Religion," speaks of the difference between the religion of rules and the teaching of Christ. He uses the example of a cup of cold water that's given to someone who is thirsty... the religious person licks the outside of the cup, mistaking the form for its substance. Likewise, the law given to Israel is like the cup, which is a form, and Christ is the water inside, and thus the substance contained inside the form. We all know people (and have been people) who mistake form for substance. Drinking the water gives nourishment, but licking the cup does nothing to quench our thirst. Is the cup useless then? Well, it makes drinking the water a lot easier.

[jeremiah]

hello john,

The Church has stripped away the Hebrew elements and taken the Hebrew God back to Moab to reinvent him and his followers according to pagan / gentile traditions...

which particular hebrew elements do you have in mind?
grace and peace...

[JohnDB70X7]

Well let's see...

Passover Seder which points straight to Jesus.

[jeremiah]

yes, but so did the day of atonement and the feast of tabernacles. these were a shadow of the substance which is christ, who is in us. what important thing can we learn from observing any of those outward things, that the spirit of jesus cannot make known to or on our hearts? don't get me wrong, i recognize a disciple has liberty to celebrate the seder if they like. but when you say the church has stripped that away, it seems to imply it to be necessary.

grace and peace...

[Paidion]

Imputed righteousness doesn't cut it. We need actual righteousness. God is satisfied with nothing less. This actual rightousness is available to us by the enabling grace of God which TRAINS us "to renounce impiety and worldly passions, and to live sensible, righteous, and devout lives in the present age, expecting the blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of the great God and of our Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people of his own who are zealous for good works". This sounds like an actual practical righteouness to me ... and it has all been made available to us by the supreme sacrifice of Christ. Notice the reasons Paul and Peter and the writer of Hebrews give for the death of Christ:

I Peter 2:24 He himself endured our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed.

II Corinthians 5:15 And he died for all, that those who live might live no longer for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised.

Romans 14:9 For to this end Christ died and lived again, that he might be Lord both of the dead and of the living.

Titus 2:14 who gave himself for us to redeem us from all iniquity and to purify for himself a people of his own who are zealous for good deeds.

Heb 9:26 ...he has appeared once for all at the end of the age to do away with sin by the sacrifice of himself.


How do we appropriate this enabling grace?

Again the writer of Hebrews says:

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. (Hebrews 4:15,16)

Do we simply pray and ask for this mercy and grace to help us when we do wrong or fail to do right? Yes, but we must ask in faith expecting to be delivered by Christ from wrong doing and enabled to do right.

For in [the gospel] the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.” (Rom 1:17 )

As for the "law of Christ" which Paul was under — was it not the "sermon on the mount" and other teachings of Christ to which Paul referred? And did not Christ's instructions to us contain a lot of "do's and don'ts". It's not the do's and don'ts which are the problem. It is our unwillingness to do or to refrain, or if we agree that we are not doing what Christ asked us, we are failing to appropriate the enabling grace of God in order to carry out Christ's instructions. When Christ completed His instructions as recorded in Matthew 5,6, and 7, he said:

“Everyone then who hears these words of mine and DOES them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and DOES NOT DO them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.” (Matthew 7:24-27)

[jriccitelli]

There are not two Laws, there is the Law fulfilled, and there 'was' the Law unfulfilled.
The Law of Christ is the Law fulfilled. There is no longer any other Law because it is the same Law. Only now we have a choice of either becoming one with the Law keeper or rejecting Him.

A Law is not a law without a penalty, so is there a penalty to the Law of Christ?
The penalty of the Law was paid by Christ, so if there is no penalty to the Law of Christ is it a Law?
Yes it is a Law, there was a penalty, only He 'could' pay it and only 'in' Him is it paid.

The Law of Christ therefore is Christ, there is no other 'way' to keep the Law because without the penalty there is no law, so the decision to keep the Law can only be made in Him, and with Him.
So 'we' keep the perfect Law of liberty by 'accepting' that only He can keep the Law, and only He has paid the penalty, anything else is to not keep the Law of Christ. The only penalty that remains is to not accept the Law of liberty.

Again this freedom is not a license to sin, it is freedom to do good, of which the Law of God (Moses) is our guide handbook and prosperity for it was all good, and the 'principles' of keeping from evil, please God and prolong life.