Law Vs Grace, or Law AND Grace?

[WolfBitn]

Lek you make complete sense and it is all there in the Word.

Not that it will make any difference. They can't even make a definition of their own terms. Apparently the law = any rules, suggestions, commandments, attributed to God.

But I know you mean the Mosaic law.

This would have been a two page thread if there were some definitions laid down.

"In that He says, A new covenant, He has made the first one old. Now that which decays and becomes old is ready to vanish away." (Heb 8:13)

This thread kinda reminds me of "Hath God indeed said...."

But I'm not surprised. This is going on in all churches, in all Christian Forums, and is leading the church away from the one and only true gospel.

"The Law and Grace" is nothing other than another "gospel" which is no gospel at all.

Indeed

I have seen two churches split over this in the last two years, and the side which picked to live in the joy of their salvation are on fire and adding members weekly.

Those who prefer judgment and condemnation, are bitter and lifeless. I also know another church that has come under law doctrine and it is nothing like it was. Very sad indeed.

Of course I am also sure there are imbalances towards grace as well, but personally I haven't seen it hurt anyone's walk.

I wouldnt neccessarily regard institutional growth as something Godly in a day when its been prophesied that the church would depart from the faith. We have seen wholesale departure form long help traditional doctrine... 1800 years or more, in these last 50... This isnt a judgement on you or any church, just an observation on prophecy, doctrine, and an admonishment to be very careful in this day and age

precepts

How do you define sin if not for the law?

Exactly my friend... Adam was under the law not to eat of the tree. Sin was at the very least defined as the eating from the tree. Then we see that sacrifice and grace were instituted.

For millenia, we have known that hatred, theft, bearing false witness, coveting possessions, lust etc, were all sin, and we know this because of the 10 laws or statutes of God Himself. 10 simple lik=ttle laws that define what to watch for in out own hearts. We were to obey these form our hearts... of course the Jews agreed to obey the law to gain life, but thy themselves broke the covenant because they couldnt keep the law perfectly... when we as ciotizens break the covenant of civil law, this in no way voids the law... we simply receive our due punishments. So it is with these 10 laws of God

These laws define sin for us, and we are charged as guilty. This is where sacrifice and faith come into effect. Christ died for ALL breaking of the law... some of us will accept His receiving of our punishment... some wont.

Edited July 27, 2009 by WolfBitn

[Ovedya]

And again, youre addressing me and not the points

Actually I was addressing you about the points.

[BlindSeeker]

lekh l'kha,

I am in the process of responding to one of your last post to me. I did not want you to feel I was ignoring you.

I did want to add however a brief and perhaps side note right now.

I have taught for years that there are two separate things that God requires of us that necessitate all our heart if we are to do it acceptably.

De 6:5 And thou shalt

love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might

.

6 And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart:

7 And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.

De 10:12 And now, Israel, what doth the LORD thy God require of thee, but to

fear the LORD thy God

, to walk in all His ways, and to love Him, and to serve the LORD thy God

with all thy heart and with all thy soul

,

13 To keep the commandments of the LORD, and His statutes, which I command thee this day for thy good?

We are to both love and fear God with all our hearts, even though many would even debate this.

We also know from God

[Guest shiloh357]

"

Behold, the days come, says Jehovah, that I will cut a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah, not according to the covenant that I cut with their fathers in the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which covenant of Mine they broke, although I was a husband to them, says Jehovah;" (Jer.31: 31-32)

It is NOT a "renewed" covenant - it is a totally NEW covenant. The covenant based on obedience to the Law God gave to Moses when He "took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt" was God's marriage-contract with Israel which they broke .

The New Covenant is a completely NEW marriage contract.

Actually it is a renewed covenant. The term "New Covenant" which Jeremiah uses in chapter 31 is "Brit Hadashah." Dashah in Hebrew meas to renew, with a view to improving upon the former. Jesus used the same term in reference the New Covenant cut in His blood.

So God renewed and "improved upon" the covenant that was broken by the Israelites. So we have nothing more than a broken covenant.

Well then we are of all people the most pitiable, because A BROKEN COVENANT IS NO COVENANT AT ALL.

"In that He says, A new covenant, He has made the first one old. Now that which decays and becomes old is ready to vanish away." (Heb 8:13)

No, if God has renewed it, it is not broken. I am sorry, but you simply mistaken. Brit Hadashah is the phrase chosen by the prophet Jeremiah under the guidance and inspiration of the Holy Spirit and it means "renewed coveant. You can kick agasint the goads all you want, but that is what it says. The fact that God renews His covenant should be a source of encouragement.

Again, In Hebrews 8, the same theme of a covenant renewal is play so you still do not have case against it.

I think it bears pointing out since you chose to conveniently ignore the points I made earlier that the New Covenant is an improved version of the covenant already in existance. It is improved in that it is unbreakable and it is based on the sacrifice, blood and High Priesthood of Christ.

Renewing the Covenant does not mean a return to the Old Testament economy of animal sacrifices and such.

Think of it like this: For generations in the US, people who grew cotton had to deseed cotton by hand. It was a long laborious, time consuming process. Along comes Eli Whitney and his cotton gin. It revolutionized the deseeding process. The time in which it took to deseed cotton was cut at least in half and the manufacture of cotton was signficantly improved.

Eli Whitney's cotton gin did not abolish the need the deseed cotton; they STILL needed to deseed cotton. Rather made it faster and more efficient. It was an improvement on the prior method.

In a similar way, in the New Covenant, we STILL need blood atonement, STILL need a High Priest, STILL need a Sacrifice, etc. All of those things are met in Christ. What the writer of Hebrews is saying is that the old economy is vanishing. He is not saying our need for atonement is vanishing away, but rather the old economy where atonement was found in the blood of animals and a merely human High Priest is vanishing away and now we have a new economy that has the same essential elements as before, but now they are perfect, Divine, eternal and permanent in nature.

[canuckamuck]

Yes the Covenant with man is renewed, it is a new contract written on our hearts and the letter of the law is no longer appropriate. We live by the Spirit now.

Or at least we are supposed to.

[WolfBitn]

Yes the Covenant with man is renewed, it is a new contract written on our hearts and the letter of the law is no longer appropriate. We live by the Spirit now.

Or at least we are supposed to.

And how do we know what is wrong... scripture tells us not to trust our hearts because they are so deceiving... so what is our standard for knowing sin? Not a general answer like "Jesus"... though He is our example, He doesnt define sin by His example, He defines righteousness... How do you know what sin is?

[canuckamuck]

How do you define sin if not for the law?

We define sin by the Holy Spirit who lives in us, and the law which is written on our hearts. (not Mosaic law) We know what is sin, and some things that are sin are not even covered by the law, it is about our relationship with God and neighbor. Sometimes a simple comment can be sin, even though it breaks no Mosaic law.

Simply asking this question is very telling of what people can't understand of the new covenant.

Mosaic law was (sin for dummies) Now we have the programmer of righteousness working right along with us. It is better.

[canuckamuck]

I have seen two churches split over this in the last two years, and the side which picked to live in the joy of their salvation are on fire and adding members weekly.

Those who prefer judgment and condemnation, are bitter and lifeless. I also know another church that has come under law doctrine and it is nothing like it was. Very sad indeed.

Of course I am also sure there are imbalances towards grace as well, but personally I haven't seen it hurt anyone's walk.

I wouldnt neccessarily regard institutional growth as something Godly in a day when its been prophesied that the church would depart from the faith. We have seen wholesale departure form long help traditional doctrine... 1800 years or more, in these last 50... This isnt a judgement on you or any church, just an observation on prophecy, doctrine, and an admonishment to be very careful in this day and age

Yes of course you would have to come and see and determine for yourself. But in one church in particular, I have seen more fruit of the Spirit represented there in a year, then I have seen from the others on decades. That is bad way to describe it but how can one quantify such things. I am sure you yourself could recognize the difference between live and dead churches. There is no way I can prove this here however and it is merely anecdotal besides.

[Guest shiloh357]

Yes the Covenant with man is renewed, it is a new contract written on our hearts and the letter of the law is no longer appropriate. We live by the Spirit now.

Or at least we are supposed to.

Actually you do live by the law. There is not one thing commanded to the Christian in the NT that is not based on the law. The NT never rescinds or abrogates God's laws. Spirit and Law are not mutually exclusive and the NT never treats them as such.

Let me ask you this. The commandment against a man sleeping with his daughter-in-law is not repeated in the NT. Would you argue that such activity is now permitted? Of course not.

The law of God cannot be done away with because it is the standard by which we measure sin. It is the standard by which we measure things like love, holiness, and so forth. Even the fruit of the Spirit are contained in the law. The law is reflection of God's character and nature, it teaches us about who He is. It is the textbook by which the Holy Spirit instructs us. EVERY teaching in the NT pertaining the matters of Christian faith and practice are in the Law and indeed the entire OT.

The Bible is a system of progressive revelation. That means that the Bible builds on itself as it progresses from the Genesis to Revelation. The NT is built on top of was revealed in the OT. The entire NT is written in the terminology of the of the Law of Moses. If you abrogate the Law of Moses, the NT no longer makes sense because without the Law, there would be no frame of reference with which to understand the sacrifices, festivals and other parts of the law and how they point to Christ.

[Guest shiloh357]

How do you define sin if not for the law?

We define sin by the Holy Spirit who lives in us, and the law which is written on our hearts. (not Mosaic law) We know what is sin, and some things that are sin are not even covered by the law, it is about our relationship with God and neighbor. Sometimes a simple comment can be sin, even though it breaks no Mosaic law.

Simply asking this question is very telling of what people can't understand of the new covenant.

Mosaic law was (sin for dummies) Now we have the programmer of righteousness working right along with us. It is better.

The problem is that what you call "the Mosaic law" is the only law there is measuring rod by which the Holy Spirit teaches you what sin is. There is no way around it. The law of God is the Mosaic law and is what the NT uses to define sin.