Obedience is better than sacrifice

[Ozias]

Lets look at modern use of the language of Law, legalism, and Antinomianism. I see essentially the Law used in three ways, the Law first shows us our sin and points us to the Gospel. Then, for some, the Law can be used post-conversion to stress the need for obedience. That doesn't sound so bad right?

The problem is how to use the Law in two seemingly contradictory ways, one contrary to our nature and the other comes to us naturally. We should be seriously Lifting up the biblical command “You shall be holy, for I am holy” Peter 1:16? So why in today's modern Christianity is it just the opposite. One example is homosexual ministers leading Churches. It seems to have been overcome by evangelical antinomianism, and it’s high time for another Luther to take his stand and call the people of God to holy living.

So one of the last “dangers” to Christianity just may be Antinomianism as it involves a misunderstanding of the right connection between justification and sanctification. Since sanctimonious self-improvement involves a misunderstanding of the Holy Spirit’s role in sanctification. Unfortunately, it leaves out a vital part—the Spirit’s role—and as a result sanctification simply does not work. The reason being is we're allowing our flesh to make up the rules.

 

[Soyeong]

Lets look at modern use of the language of Law, legalism, and Antinomianism. I see essentially the Law used in three ways, the Law first shows us our sin and points us to the Gospel. Then, for some, the Law can be used post-conversion to stress the need for obedience. That doesn't sound so bad right?

In Matthew 4:15-23, Jesus began his ministry with the Gospel message to repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand, and God's law was how his audience knew what sin is, so the law does not point us to the Gospel, but rather repenting from our disobedience to it is a central part of the Gospel.

The problem is how to use the Law in two seemingly contradictory ways, one contrary to our nature and the other comes to us naturally. We should be seriously Lifting up the biblical command “You shall be holy, for I am holy” Peter 1:16? So why in today's modern Christianity is it just the opposite. One example is homosexual ministers leading Churches. It seems to have been overcome by evangelical antinomianism, and it’s high time for another Luther to take his stand and call the people of God to holy living.

In 1 Peter, 1:16, it is quoting from Leviticus where God was giving instructions for how to be holy as He is holy, which includes refraining from eating unclean animals (Leviticus 11:44-45).

So one of the last “dangers” to Christianity just may be Antinomianism as it involves a misunderstanding of the right connection between justification and sanctification. Since sanctimonious self-improvement involves a misunderstanding of the Holy Spirit’s role in sanctification. Unfortunately, it leaves out a vital part—the Spirit’s role—and as a result sanctification simply does not work. The reason being is we're allowing our flesh to make up the rules.

I see legalism as being a perversion of God's law that undermines both the intent of what God has commanded and why He commanded it, which therefore leads to death just as assuredly as refusing to submit to it. For example, in Leviticus 19:12, it instructs not to swear falsely by God's name. Someone is is following the spirit of this law would understand that its intent is for us to not swear falsely whereas someone who was following the letter of this law would understand that we are free to swear falsely just as long as we swear by something other than God's name, which incidentally was the issue that Jesus was addressing in Matthew 5:33-37. Likewise, in Matthew 23:23, Jesus said that tithing was something that they ought to be doing while not neglecting weightier matters of the law of justice, mercy, and faith, so they were missing that the intent of the law is to teach us how to testify about those and other aspects of God's nature.

 

[atpollard]

Antinomianism suggests that "Christians are no longer required to obey the Law" (typically, the OT Law, but oft abused and expanded into all moral law). While sort-of-true in one sense, and sort-of-false in another sense ... it misses the whole point of the bigger picture. Salvation did not render the LAW void, it rendered it superfluous.

Under the OLD COVENANT, God drew a LINE of Morality in the sand and people were instructed to not cross the line. It was a code of MINIMUM acceptable Holiness ... Thou Shall Not. Under the NEW COVENANT, we are transformed within [it is our core desires that are changed] and the goal is to strive TOWARDS Christ-likeness [emulating our perfect example, our Savior]. Thus the TWO LAWS (really one law) of LOVE ... Love God with the totality of our being [everything we feel and are and do] and - just like He does - Love other people with a self-sacrificial love ... overwhelm all other Laws and render them superfluous (painting lilies and gilding gold).

We do not need Laws to make us Holy, we are already HOLY in Christ.
We do not need Laws to make us Righteous, we are already RIGHTEOUS in Christ.
We do not need Laws to make us Loved , we are already LOVED in Christ.

What we need is to live lives that bring honor to our FAMILY NAME, to LIVE as the CHILDREN of THE FATHER that we are.
... just like Jesus did and taught us to follow His example.

 

[Soyeong]

Antinomianism suggests that "Christians are no longer required to obey the Law" (typically, the OT Law, but oft abused and expanded into all moral law). While sort-of-true in one sense, and sort-of-false in another sense ... it misses the whole point of the bigger picture.

Morality is in regard to what we ought to do and we ought to obey God, so all of His laws are inherently make up the moral law. Legislators give laws in regard to what they think ought to be done, but no one knows what ought to be done better than God. For someone to claim that some of God's laws are not moral laws is to claim that God made a moral error about what ought to be done when he gave those laws, and for them to claim that they have greater moral knowledge than God.

Salvation did not render the LAW void, it rendered it superfluous.

Our salvation is from sin (Matthew 1:21) and sin is the transgression of God's law (1 John 3:4), so living in obedience to it is intrinsically part of the concept of salvation from living in transgression of it.

Under the OLD COVENANT, God drew a LINE of Morality in the sand and people were instructed to not cross the line. It was a code of MINIMUM acceptable Holiness ... Thou Shall Not. Under the NEW COVENANT, we are transformed within [it is our core desires that are changed] and the goal is to strive TOWARDS Christ-likeness [emulating our perfect example, our Savior]. Thus the TWO LAWS (really one law) of LOVE ... Love God with the totality of our being [everything we feel and are and do] and - just like He does - Love other people with a self-sacrificial love ... overwhelm all other Laws and render them superfluous (painting lilies and gilding gold).

While the Torah contains 365 negative commandments to refrain from doing something, it also contains 248 positive commandments to do something, though the negative commandments should also be understood as being commandments to do the reverse, such as understanding the commandment against theft as being a commandment to be generous.

In Exodus 33:13, Moses wanted God to be gracious to him by teaching him His way that he might know Him and Israel too, and in Matthew 7:23, Jesus said that he would tell those who are workers of lawlessness to depart from him because he never knew them, so knowing God and Jesus through emulating his example has always been the goal of the law, which is eternal life (John 17:3).

In Deuteronomy 4:2, it prohibits adding to or subtracting from the Torah, so the NT authors did not do that. Even if the NT authorings could have raised the bar without sinning, then at minimum we should obey the Torah plus whatever else the bar was raised to. In Exodus 20:6, God wanted His people to love Him and obey His commandments, and the greatest two commandments are part of the Mosaic Covenant, so it has always been about love. If the other laws were superfluous, then God would not have bothered to command them. In Matthew 24:12-14, Jesus said that because of lawlessness the love of many will grow cold, so that does not leave room for considering the other laws to be superfluous.

We do not need Laws to make us Holy, we are already HOLY in Christ.
We do not need Laws to make us Righteous, we are already RIGHTEOUS in Christ.
We do not need Laws to make us Loved , we are already LOVED in Christ.

What we need is to live lives that bring honor to our FAMILY NAME, to LIVE as the CHILDREN of THE FATHER that we are.
... just like Jesus did and taught us to follow His example.

To become a character trait means to become someone who practices that trait and the way to become a character trait is only through faith that we ought to become it, not on the basis of having followed laws. So to become courageous means to become someone who practices courageousness and the way to become courageous is through faith, not through having first practiced courageousness. The same is true of righteousness and holiness, so God's law is is not His instructions to make us righteous or holy, but for how to practice righteousness and holiness, and Jesus set a sinless example for us to follow of how to walk in obedience to it.

 

[atpollard]

Morality is in regard to what we ought to do and we ought to obey God, so all of His laws are inherently make up the moral law.

No, this is simply not factually correct.

All 613 laws are not concerned with Morality. There is nothing innately "immoral" about a cotton-wool blend cloth. Many laws are ceremonial for distinguishing the Hebrews from their neighbors.

Some laws are actually IMMORAL but were created to place limits on human immorality (unless you approve of slavery)!

• [Exodus 21:7 KJV] 7 And if a man sell his daughter to be a maidservant, she shall not go out as the menservants do.
• How much does your daughter cost?
• How much would you pay for a "maidservant"?

 

[civic]

No, this is simply not factually correct.

All 613 laws are not concerned with Morality. There is nothing innately "immoral" about a cotton-wool blend cloth. Many laws are ceremonial for distinguishing the Hebrews from their neighbors.

Some laws are actually IMMORAL but were created to place limits on human immorality (unless you approve of slavery)!

• [Exodus 21:7 KJV] 7 And if a man sell his daughter to be a maidservant, she shall not go out as the menservants do.
• How much does your daughter cost?
• How much would you pay for a "maidservant"?

Yes there are both moral and ceremonial laws. They are not the same.

 

[atpollard]

Yes there are both moral and ceremonial laws. They are not the same.

Some laws are not even for EVERYBODY!

Even if I WAS COMMANDED to obey all 613 laws ...

• NONE of the laws about WOMEN apply to me (as a man)
• NONE of the laws about being a Priest apply to me (as a non-Aaron descendant),
• NONE of the laws about being a Levite apply to me (as a non-Levite)
• NONE of the laws about owing land in Israel apply to me (as someone whose kin came from Wales and has no inheritance in Israel to sell or redeem).
• NONE of the laws about farming apply to me (as a non-farmer)
• NONE of the laws about temple offerings are possible for me (there is no Temple)

The NEW COVENANT, with its COMMAND TO LOVE, is a far better fit to the new and greatly expanded "Body of Christ" People of God. It both makes sense and is 100% applicable.

 

[Soyeong]

No, this is simply not factually correct.

All 613 laws are not concerned with Morality. There is nothing innately "immoral" about a cotton-wool blend cloth. Many laws are ceremonial for distinguishing the Hebrews from their neighbors.

Some laws are actually IMMORAL but were created to place limits on human immorality (unless you approve of slavery)!

• [Exodus 21:7 KJV] 7 And if a man sell his daughter to be a maidservant, she shall not go out as the menservants do.
• How much does your daughter cost?
• How much would you pay for a "maidservant"?

Morality is in regard to what ought to be done and everything that God commanded is in regard to what He thought ought to be done, otherwise God would not have commanded it. Do you think that God made a mistake about what ought to be done when He commanded against wearing clothing mixed with wool and linen or in Exodus 21:7? You say that there is nothing innately immoral about doing that, but you have given no objective standard stated by the Bible that we can use to distinguish which of God's laws are moral and which are moral to disobey, and I see no justification for thinking that it can ever be moral to disobey anything that God has commanded. The Bible never lists which are the moral or ceremonial laws and never even refers to those as being subcategories of law.

Some laws are not even for EVERYBODY!

Even if I WAS COMMANDED to obey all 613 laws ...

• NONE of the laws about WOMEN apply to me (as a man)
• NONE of the laws about being a Priest apply to me (as a non-Aaron descendant),
• NONE of the laws about being a Levite apply to me (as a non-Levite)
• NONE of the laws about owing land in Israel apply to me (as someone whose kin came from Wales and has no inheritance in Israel to sell or redeem).
• NONE of the laws about farming apply to me (as a non-farmer)
• NONE of the laws about temple offerings are possible for me (there is no Temple)

The NEW COVENANT, with its COMMAND TO LOVE, is a far better fit to the new and greatly expanded "Body of Christ" People of God. It both makes sense and is 100% applicable.

The fact that some of God's laws are not for everybody does not mean that they are not moral laws. The commandments to love God and our neighbor are the greatest two commandments of the Mosaic Covenant, so that is not different under the New Covenant. If we love God and our neighbor, then we won't commit adultery, theft, murder, idolatry, rape, kidnapping, favoritism, and so forth for everything else commanded in the Torah because everything it it was given for the purpose of teaching us how to love God and our neighbor, which is why Jesus said in Matthew 22:36-40 that those are the greatest two commandments and that all of the other commandments hang on them. We can't obey God's command to love by disregarding all of His instructions for how He wants us to love.

The Torah is God's instructions for how to testify about His nature, so by obeying His commands for how to practice His righteousness, we are expressing our love for His righteousness, and the same is true for other aspects His nature, which is by 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 commanded in the Torah was commanded for the purpose of teaching us how to love a different aspect of His nature. 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, so the way to love God's holiness is by following those instructions, and the way to not love God's holiness is by refusing to follow those instructions. We can live in a way that testifies that God is holy, but if God were not holy and had given no instructions for how to be holy as He is holy, then that would make no different to the way that some people live, so those people live in a way that testifies that the God that they follow is not holy and holiness is simply not an aspect of God's nature that they love.

 

[Soyeong]

Yes there are both moral and ceremonial laws. They are not the same.

Please quote where the Bible lists which of God's laws are moral or ceremonial or even where the Bible refers to those as being subcategories of law.

 

[praise_yeshua]

Please quote where the Bible lists which of God's laws are moral or ceremonial or even where the Bible refers to those as being subcategories of law.

Where did Christ fulfill the requirements of the laws concerning the Levitical priesthood?

You don't understand what the writer of Hebrews is saying when he wrote....

Heb 7:15 And it is yet far more evident: for that after the similitude of Melchisedec there ariseth another priest,

When Jesus died God destroyed the sanctuary where in the Priestly order or Aaron operated.

 

[Theophilus]

Please quote where the Bible lists which of God's laws are moral or ceremonial or even where the Bible refers to those as being subcategories of law.

In the Bible, there are three types of precepts: moral, ceremonial, and judicial. Moral precepts are dictated by the natural law, ceremonial precepts are determined by divine worship, and judicial precepts are determined by the justice to be maintained among men.

But wait there's more.

What is the distinction between the Moral, Ceremonial and Civil laws of the Old Testament?​

What is the distinction between the Moral, Ceremonial and Civil laws of the Old Testament?

I will say up front that I am a Biblical literalist. That means I believe the entire Bible – all 39 books of the Old Testament and all 27 books of the New Testament are the very Word of God. I bel…

biblicalgenderroles.com

 

[Soyeong]

In the Bible, there are three types of precepts: moral, ceremonial, and judicial. Moral precepts are dictated by the natural law, ceremonial precepts are determined by divine worship, and judicial precepts are determined by the justice to be maintained among men.

But wait there's more.

What is the distinction between the Moral, Ceremonial and Civil laws of the Old Testament?​

What is the distinction between the Moral, Ceremonial and Civil laws of the Old Testament?

I will say up front that I am a Biblical literalist. That means I believe the entire Bible – all 39 books of the Old Testament and all 27 books of the New Testament are the very Word of God. I bel…

biblicalgenderroles.com

“We must attend to the well-known division which distributes the whole law of God, as promulgated by Moses, into the moral, the Ceremonial, and the judicial law.”

The Institutes of the Christian Religion, John Calvin (1509-1564)

“We must therefore distinguish three kinds of precept in the Old Law; viz. ‘moral’ precepts, which are dictated by the natural law; ‘Ceremonial’ precepts, which are determinations of the Divine worship; and ‘judicial’ precepts, which are determinations of the justice to be maintained among men.”

Summa Theologica, Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274)
----

It is one thing for people to come to the conclusion we must make those divisions and another thing to show where the Bible lists which of God's laws are part of those categories or even where the Bible refers to those as being categories of law. People are free to categorize God's laws however we want, such as I could categorize God's laws based on which part of the body is most commonly uses to obey/disobey them, such as with the law against theft being a hand law, but just because I can categorize God's laws in that manner does not mean that any of the authors of the Bible categorized God's laws in the same manner. If I were to interpret the authors of the Bible as referring to a category of law that I created, such as by saying that hand laws have been done away with, but without establish that the authors of the Bible used the same categories or agreed with me about which laws I thought best fit into those categories, then I would making the same sort of error as someone who interprets the Bible as saying that ceremonial laws have been done away with. If a group of people were to create lists of which of God's laws they thought were moral, civil, and ceremonial, then they would come up with a wide variety of lists and none of those people should interpret the authors of the Bible as referring to something that they just created.

Furthermore, the existence of the category of moral law implies that we can be acting morally while disobeying the laws that are not in that category, however, there is not a single example in the Bible where disobedience to God is considered to be moral, nor do I see any reason to think that it can ever be moral to disobey God. Morality is in regard to what we ought to do and we ought to obey God, so all of God's laws are inherently moral laws. Legislators give laws according to what they think ought to be done and no one knows better than God what ought to be done, so for someone to claim that some of God's laws are not moral laws is to claim that God made a moral error about what ought to be done when He gave those laws and to therefore claim to have greater moral knowledge than God.