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NASB | Exodus 1:1 Now these are the names of the sons of Israel who came to Egypt with Jacob; they came each one with his household: |
AMPLIFIED 2015 | Exodus 1:1 Now these are the names of the sons of Israel who came to Egypt with Jacob; each came with his household: |
Bible Question:
Is the Christian under Law? Dear Joe and Christiankl, God's design for our lives as Christians is to let Christ live His life thorugh us, not to keep the law. Please look at the Scriptures, brothers: Consider the church in Galatia. Paul had preached Christ crucified and risen again in their midst. This was a church of, as far as we can tell, believers in Christ who the Judaizers were trying to put back under the law and all it's requirements. Notice Paul's admonitions: Galatians 2:19 - Paul died to the Law so that he could live to God 3:10 - If you're under law, you're under it's curse - if you sin, you die 3:13 - Christ redeemed us from this curse 3:19 - The Law was added UNTIL the seed (Christ) would come 3:23 - Before faith in Christ came, we were under law's custody 3:24 - Law leads us to Christ so we can be justified by faith 3:25 - Now that faith in Christ is reality, we are no longer under the tutor (the Law) Romans 6:14 - we are not under the law but under grace 6:15 - again, we are under grace 7:4 - we were made to die to the Law so that we can be joined to Christ 7:6 - We have been released from the Law so that we can serve in the newness of the Spirit NOT according to the letter (law) Brothers, are these Scriptures not clear? If you were married to a woman you loved (see Paul's analogy in Roman's 7) and she died, as horrible as that would be, what relationship would you have with her? She would be dead and all the duties you had to her would be null and void. Would that mean you were against her or hated her? No. You would still, in fact, love her. But, you would no longer be in a relationship with her. The relationship is over. She would be dead. Now, Paul says that we were made to die to the Law through Christ's death (Rom 7:4) so that we could be joined to Christ. The first relationship has to end before the next can be binding. But the Law didn't die. We did. We are free of ANY relationship to it, not because there is something wrong with it, but because it has fulfilled it's purpose. It showed us exceedingly sinful so that we could come to Christ. And our relationship with Him will lead us to go places that the Law could never touch. The Law buried us under sin, as Christ did in the gospels (...the Law says...but I tell you...) so we would see our need to be justified by His death and saved by His life. So, obviously, I have a contention with your 3 conclusions: 1. The Holy Spirit now convicts the believer of sin and points us to Christ as sufficient - not the Law. 2. God doesn't want a moral people. The Pharisees were very moral. God wants a people who have Christ living through them. This goes beyond morality to miraculous. We don't need to eat from the morality Tree (of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, right and wrong), we need to eat from the Tree of Life, Jesus Christ. 3. We live out our sanctification. We do nothing to obtain it. Our spirits are 100 percent sanctified at conversion and we have the privelege of seeing that 'worked out' through our souls and bodies as we trust in Christ as our sufficiency and grow in His love. See Titus 2:11 - God's GRACE, not the Law, teaches us to live righteously and godly lives. As you said, God, through Christ, has met all His own moral demands. We, on our own, never could. We have been made holy not by our actions, but by His. We have HIS righteousness, not our own. And we have the joyful experience of living it out. We don't live holy, godly lives to gain sanctification. We live holy, godly lives because 'by this will (New Covenant) we have been sanctified through the body of Jesus Christ ONCE FOR ALL. For by one offering He has perfected for ALL TIME those who are sanctified.' - Hebrews 10:10,14 What do you think? In Christ, Bill Mc In Christ |
Bible Answer: Bill: Okay...guess this has to be a two-parter! First of all, you didn't address my complete quotation from Matthew 5, the very words of Christ Himself. We have to understand Paul's teaching on law by reconciling it to Christ's claim that he did not come to abolish the Law, but to fulfill it. The Law still exists in a moral sense. It is the sacrificial and ceremonial aspects of the law which were fulfilled in Christ's life, death, and resurrection. God's morality still exists as a standard for believers to attain to. The fact is not that the law has disappeared, but that Christ fulfilled all the requirements of God's moral law in himself. Those who are not in Christ are still under the requirements of God's morality (and still fall short -- Romans 3:23). I never argued that we are saved (i.e. justified) by law. No one ever was (Romans 3:20,28-30). What I am arguing is that the holiness exemplified by the moral aspects of the Law is definitely is the goal of our progressive sanctification. Let me address each of the points you made (and by the way, the three contentions are not mine, but those of John Calvin): You wrote: "The Holy Spirit now convicts the believer of sin and points us to Christ as sufficient - not the Law." Yes, the Holy Spirit convicts the believer of sin, but the Holy Spirit acts in concert with His revealed word. Therefore, the Holy Spirit employs Scripture (i.e. law) that He inspired to convict people of sin, just as he did at our coversion (Romans 3:20). Note that I am not saying that the ceremonial aspects of the Law are needed today, but God's moral commandments are still in effect and reveal the holy character of God and what righteousness is. (Romans 7:12). The fact that we cannot keep them without the empowerment of the Holy Spirit does not mean that God doesn't care whether we are moral or not. More in the next episode... --Joe! |