Not under the law

[tsth]

No, our salvation has nothing to do with the Law anymore, we are still to obey what God says.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

It NEVER did! People often think that the OT believers were saved by the Law, they were not.

But obedience is still priority.

Romans 1:5 Through Him we have received grace and apostleship for obedience to the faith among all nations for His name,

Romans 15:18 18 For I will not dare to speak of any of those things which Christ has not accomplished through me, in word and deed, to make the Gentiles obedient--

Romans 16:19 For your obedience has become known to all. Therefore I am glad on your behalf; but I want you to be wise in what is good, and simple concerning evil.

16:23

Acts 21:24 Take them and be purified with them, and pay their expenses so that they may shave their heads, and that all may know that those things of which they were informed concerning you are nothing, but that you yourself also walk orderly and keep the law.

Romans 10:19-39

In His Love,

Suzanne

[Yahsway]

Thank You Suzanne. Shalom

[gypc]

Colossians2:20Since you died with Christ to the basic principles of this world, why, as though you still belonged to it, do you submit to its rules: 21"Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!"? 22These are all destined to perish with use, because they are based on human commands and teachings. 23Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence.

Colossians 3:1Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. 2Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. 3For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. 4When Christ, who is your[1] life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

5Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. 6Because of these, the wrath of God is coming.[2] 7You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. 8But now you must rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. 9Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices 10and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator.

Gal 2:19For through the law I died to the law so that I might live for God. 20I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. 21I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing!

[Guest Colossians]

Matthew 22:36-39 Master, which is the great commandment in the law? Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

Yes, all the law hangs on these two commandments. But these two commandments do not hang on the law.

Pause for a moment, and conceptualise each position:

1. Firstly conceptualise what it means for the law to hang on the two greatest commandments.

2. Secondly, think about the converse, the two hanging from the law. (How does this change the meaning?)

You will find that it is actually the second position you are thinking, not the first.

Therefore you have it the opposite way around from scripture.

Note also that the two greatest commandments are still part of the law which we are not under. This is why Jesus had to give a new commandment.

The new commandment differs from the 2 greatest in that it contains the power of personal example/precedent: "as I have loved you".

This is the new covenant: Christ works in us.

John 14:15 If ye love me, keep my commandments.

MY commandments, not THE commandments. These are found in 1Jn 3:23, and 1 Jn 5:3-5, as well as Jesus' 'New Commandment'.

Accordingly, when Jesus addressed the religious people, He said to them: "It saith in YOUR law....", and not "it saith in OUR law". That is, He distanced Himself from their system.

John 14:21 He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.

Again, and in different words, the New Covenant is not simply a new attempt to keep the old covenant. There were plenty of devout Jews who sought to keep the OT commandments. They had no part in the new covenant however.

Edited November 30, 2004 by Colossians

[Guest Colossians]

OneAccord,

Interesting thread!!!!!!!!! I understand what you are trying to say, sort of, but I don't get what is your point? Are you trying to make a case against 'legalism'?

A little more than that: I am making a case against legalism, yes, but I am also defining legalism in more accurate terms.

The general line of the main-line churches is that legalism is an over-attention to rules and regulations rather than love and Christ. In the back of their mind they are still under the OT law, but do not really acknowledge it. When someone asks them whether they should keep the 10 commandments, they generally answer: "we keep them automatically via love".

This works ok for them until they come across an MJ or SDA, who correctly points out to them: "hey! you keep the 9 commandments, but you do not keep the 4th! That is inconsistent!"

So I am defining legalism as "any attention to any OT commandments whatsoever", and dispensing with the law carte blanche, which is the NT position, and why Hebrews 7:18 says the law is disannulled.

The confusion in the mainline camp is that they don't understand the witnessing function of the law as per Rm 3:21, and Rm 13:9, that the law now merely witnesses our righteousness, and plays no part in achieving it. It is stand-apart, and stand-alone.

Also, when a person is no longer under the law, but above it as they walk in the Spirit of Jesus, how should they be living? What should a Christians walking above the law look like in their manner of living?

Without realising it, this question actually reveals the problem I have alluded to above, and hopefully now you have begun to see this.

If we walk by the Spirit, we will not be thinking about how we should appear - our eyes will not be on our performance, but on Him and Him only.

The term "the law" means not only "the decalogue" or "the torah", but "the flesh", "my efforts" and generally, "absence of Christ".

It we take one second to 'check' whether we are living 'correctly', then we have spent one second in the law which should have been spent in Christ.

It is true that the New Man in us recognises what the Old man does, and disagrees with such actions. But it is therefore all the more important to understand just what the 'fuel'/power/energiser is that invokes such old man.

Do we ue the law to stop the old man? No! We do the opposite. Why? Because "the strenght of sin is THE LAW"! 1 Cor 15:56, and "the motions of sin are [(invoked)] by the law" Rm 7:5.

How then does the old man cease to hold sway?

The New Man and the Old Man are not concurrent, but exist alternatively: they are philosophically disjunctive by virtue of "new" and "old".

The New man is that which looks at Christ. The old man cannot look at Christ, but derives his power from the law.

The New Man 'comes into being' more and more via understanding just how much God does not see our old man.

In short, we might think of grace not so much as being forgiven, but as begin crucified in Christ by the proxy of faith. That is, we are saved because the we that is saved is the New Man risen in Christ, who has left behind the old man at Calvary.

Praise God.

Edited November 30, 2004 by Colossians

[Guest Colossians]

(Trinity)No, our salvation has nothing to do with the Law anymore, we are still to obey what God says.

It NEVER did! People often think that the OT believers were saved by the Law, they were not.

Implied false dichotomy: Nomism.

There are no things which please God but which are also separate from justification.

All things which please God are things which also justify us in Christ, and all things which justify us in Christ are those things which please God.

Seeing then that Christ's work has justified us, we see that anything we can do is precluded - chiefly, the law.

Accordingly, "ye have become dead to the law that ye might be married to another", and again: "I through the law am dead to the law".

The obedience now in us is not our own, but Christ's finished work at Golgotha.

And such obedience entailed not an obedience to the law (which is why He did not keep the Sabbath), but an obedience of trust in His Father: "go here, go there, say this, don't say this, say that later.....etc"

And if it was all finished at Calvary, then we must rest in that, and not look to resurrecting the law as though we are to 'have another shot at it'.

Accordingly: "There therefore remains a rest for the people of God, for he that is entered into His rest, has ceased from his own works, as God did from His."

It's all about Jesus, and nothing about us.

[Ovedya]

The New Testament does not advocate a complete rejection of the Old; not in any sense. You err if you believe such.

[nebula]

Anybody else wondering if this is going to turn into a justification for living as he pleases - since we are already justified and sanctified and not under law and all that?

[Guest Colossians]

The New Testament does not advocate a complete rejection of the Old;

"New" and "old" are necessarily disjunctive.

If you have a problem with the doctrine, refute what has been said on the basis of the pragmatics of it, not on some theoretical issue. All theory must be validated by the outworking of it.

Start by looking at my reply to OneAccord, which deals primarily with pragmatics, and point out an error which would lead to a shaming of God.

In the absence of such pointing out, sitting back on your haunches making unsubstantiated (redundant) assertions, is not productive. Nor does it help your cause, whatever that may be.

[Ovedya]

The New Testament does not advocate a complete rejection of the Old;

"New" and "old" are necessarily disjunctive.

If you have a problem with the doctrine, refute what has been said on the basis of the pragmatics of it, not on some theoretical issue. All theory must be validated by the outworking of it.

Start by looking at my reply to OneAccord, which deals primarily with pragmatics, and point out an error which would lead to a shaming of God.

In the absence of such pointing out, sitting back on your haunches making unsubstantiated (redundant) assertions, is not productive. Nor does it help your cause, whatever that may be.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

That's just a fancypants way of saying "Prove me wrong." I'll get back to you later.