{"id":3517,"date":"2024-07-16T16:32:46","date_gmt":"2024-07-16T16:32:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/67.223.117.105\/~gracetruthpress\/?p=3517"},"modified":"2024-07-16T16:32:46","modified_gmt":"2024-07-16T16:32:46","slug":"what-laws-are-we-supposed-to-obey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/graceandtruthpress.com\/index.php\/2024\/07\/16\/what-laws-are-we-supposed-to-obey\/","title":{"rendered":"What Laws Are We Supposed to Obey?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Stop me if you think you have heard this one before:\u00a0\u201cYou Christians are such\u00a0hypocrites<\/b>. You pick and choose which parts of the Bible you like. If you were a\u00a0serious<\/b>\u00a0Christian, you would make sure not to eat pork or shellfish, just like Leviticus says!\u201d<\/i>

Many who desire to dismantle or disprove Christianity try to attack God\u2019s Laws and the Christian\u2019s ability to keep those Laws. Even some Christians have been swayed by these \u201cgotcha!\u201d arguments so that they have no idea what they should think of God\u2019s Law anymore, either. After all, there\u00a0are<\/i><\/b>\u00a0commandments that the Christian today is no longer required to keep, but they do not have the foggiest idea why that would be. Others, because they are so rebellious and antagonistic against God\u2019s Word and Law, actively look for ways to be disobedient.

There are three basic groups of people, then, when it comes to God\u2019s Law. The legalists, the antinomians, and the obedient. The legalists\u00a0add<\/i><\/b>\u00a0to God\u2019s Law by elevating their own man-made traditions and commandments over and above God\u2019s Law, or by keeping commandments that the New Covenant no longer requires. The antinomians are opposed to God\u2019s Laws and insist that, because sinners are saved through faith according to God\u2019s Grace, no obedience is necessary. Then, we have the obedient. While not perfect by any stretch of the imagination, the obedient have been saved by Christ and now seek to faithfully keep His commandments.

My prayer for each person reading this is that you become\u00a0obedient<\/b><\/i>\u00a0to God, first by trusting in Jesus through faith and being saved by Grace. But in order to be obedient to God\u2019s Law, we need to understand the sinful hearts of men, the difference between traditions and laws, and which laws are still active under the New Covenant.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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The Depraved Heart of Rebellion<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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In the\u00a02022 State of Theology Survey<\/i>\u00a0put out by Ligonier Ministries, people were asked whether they agreed or disagreed with various statements. One statement was this:\u00a0\u201cEveryone sins a little, but most people are good by nature.\u201d<\/i>
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14 percent strongly disagreed, 14 percent somewhat disagreed, 6 percent said they were not sure, 39 percent somewhat agreed, and 27 percent strongly agreed.

What does this tell us? That most people, and even many evangelicals, believe that people are fundamentally good. They refrain from calling people depraved sinners and prefer to say\u00a0\u201cPeople sometimes sin, but they\u2019re all basically good.\u201d<\/i>\u00a0In fact, the common consensus seems to be summarized rather well by Luke Bryan in his song from a few years back,\u00a0I Believe Most People are Good<\/i>:

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I believe most people are good \/ And most mamas ought to qualify for sainthood \/ I believe most Friday nights look better under neon or stadium lights \/ I believe you love who you love \/ Ain’t nothing you should ever be ashamed of \/ I believe this world ain’t half as bad as it looks \/ I believe most people are good.<\/i><\/div>\n
Man has always been good, ever since the Fall, at elevating himself to great heights. But the Bible paints a different picture.\u00a0Jeremiah 17:9-10<\/a>\u00a0explains that\u00a0\u201cthe heart is more deceitful than all else And is desperately sick; Who can know it?\u201d<\/i>\u00a0Likewise,\u00a0Romans 3:10<\/a>\u00a0says,\u00a0\u201cas it is written: \u2018There is none righteous, not even one.\u2019\u201d<\/i>

Man is not fundamentally good, but fundamentally evil, wicked, and rebellious against God and His Word apart from Christ. This is the root issue when it comes to understanding God\u2019s Law: sinners do not have the desire to understand God\u2019s Law, nor do they have the capacity for such understanding. But the one who is saved by Jesus and indwelled by the Holy Spirit must come to understand the Law.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Traditions Are Not Laws<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Traditions are often very good. Who dislikes Christmas or Thanksgiving? But even good things can become bad things when they are elevated above the commandments of God. Consider the time the Pharisees tried to call out Jesus and His disciples for not having washed their hands before eating, while simultaneously breaking God\u2019s laws in favor of their traditions.

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Then some Pharisees and scribes came to Jesus from Jerusalem and said, \u201cWhy do Your disciples break the tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands when they eat bread.\u201d And He answered and said to them, \u201cWhy do you yourselves transgress the commandment of God for the sake of your tradition? For God said, \u2018Honor your father and mother,\u2019 and, \u2018He who speaks evil of father or mother is to be put to death.\u2019 But you say, \u2018Whoever says to his father or mother, \u201cWhatever you might benefit from me is given to God,\u201d he need not honor his father.\u2019 And by this you invalidated the word of God for the sake of your tradition<\/i>\u00a0(Matt. 15:1-6<\/a>).<\/div>\n
Here, then, is the difference between being legalistic and obedient to God. Many people think that caring about keeping and obeying God\u2019s Law makes you a legalist. However, that is not the case. A legalist is one who, like the Pharisees that Jesus is rebuking here, elevates their own traditions and commandments over and above the Law of God. This, in turn, is the equivalent of idolatry.

Is it bad to wash our hands before eating? Of course not! By all means, wash your hands. Feel free to use soap while you are at it. But recognize that, as much as you wash your hands physically, you simply cannot wash yourself spiritually. No amount of hand washing will save your soul. No tradition-keeping will ever save you.

The only way to be saved is through obedience to the Law of God. The problem is, of course, that we cannot keep God\u2019s Law in and of ourselves. What we need is a Savior to come and fulfill the Law on our behalf. We need a Savior to earn our salvation and righteousness before God.

Thankfully, that is exactly what we have in Jesus. The question becomes, then, once we have been saved, do we need to keep any laws?<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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The Three-Fold Division of the Law<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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One of the keys to understanding the Law of God as a whole, and why we keep some laws and not others, is to understand how the Law is to be divided. Typically, theologians use a three-fold division and framework, wherein the Law is divided into the Ceremonial Law, the Civil Law, and the Moral Law.

The Ceremonial Law consists of those laws relating to dietary restrictions and those ceremonies that separated the Old Covenant Jews from other nations. Jesus fulfilled these laws in such a way that we no longer need to keep these laws. The prime example of this being spelled out in Scripture is\u00a0Acts 10:9-16<\/a>:

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And on the next day, as they were on their way and approaching the city, Peter went up on the housetop about the sixth hour to pray. But he became hungry and was desiring to eat. And while they were making preparations, he fell into a trance and saw heaven opened up, and an object like a great sheet coming down, lowered by four corners to the ground, and there were in it all kinds of four-footed animals and crawling creatures of the earth and birds of the sky. And a voice came to him, \u201cRise up, Peter, slaughter and eat!\u201d But Peter said, \u201cBy no means, Lord, for I have never eaten anything defiled and unclean.\u201d Again a voice came to him a second time, \u201cWhat God has cleansed, no longer consider defiled.\u201d And this happened three times and immediately the object was taken up into heaven.<\/i><\/div>\n
This is an example of the fulfillment of the Ceremonial Law. Likewise, in\u00a0Hebrews 7:27<\/a>, we learn that Jesus,\u00a0\u201cdoes not need daily, like those high priests, to offer up sacrifices, first for His own sins and then for the sins of the people, because this He did once for all when He offered up Himself.\u201d<\/i>\u00a0This is why we no longer need to offer daily ceremonial sacrifices, either.

The Civil Law consists of those laws that were peculiar to the nation of Israel. It is typically understood that these laws are no longer enforceable since Jerusalem fell to the Romans in 70 A.D. There are, however, principles of general equity wherein these laws do have some bearing on Christians today. For example,\u00a0Exodus 21:28<\/a>\u00a0commands,\u00a0\u201cIf an ox gores a man or a woman to death, the ox shall surely be stoned and its flesh shall not be eaten; but the owner of the ox shall go unpunished.\u201d<\/i>\u00a0The general equity principle would say,\u00a0\u201cWell, if we have a vicious animal today, we ought to either put it down or get rid of it to protect others, according to God\u2019s Law.\u201d<\/i>

The Moral Law, on the other hand, is best summarized within the Ten Commandments. These laws are still active and binding upon the Christian today and are repeated throughout the New Testament as still being binding.

Both the Westminster Confession and the Second London Baptist Confession recognize this three-fold division, as well as the general equity principle:
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III.<\/b>\u00a0Beside this law, commonly called moral, God was pleased to give to the people of Israel, as a church under age, ceremonial laws, containing several typical ordinances, partly of worship, prefiguring Christ, his graces, actions, sufferings, and benefits; and partly, holding forth divers instructions of moral duties. All which ceremonial laws are now abrogated, under the new testament.<\/i><\/div>\n
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IV.\u00a0<\/b>To them also, as a body politic, he gave sundry judicial laws, which expired together with the State of that people; not obliging any other now, further than the general equity thereof may require.<\/i><\/div>\n
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V.<\/b>\u00a0The moral law doth forever bind all, as well justified persons as others, to the obedience thereof; and that, not only in regard of the matter contained in it, but also in respect of the authority of God the Creator, who gave it. Neither doth Christ, in the gospel, any way dissolve, but much strengthen this obligation<\/i>\u00a0(Westminster Confession of Faith, 19.3-5).<\/div>\n
So, the Ceremonial Law has been fulfilled, the Civil Law has general equity principles we may apply today, and the Moral Law binds us forever. With that in mind, we are able to answer the scoffer at the start of this article and say,\u00a0\u201cWe eat pork and shellfish now because Jesus fulfilled the Ceremonial Law on our behalf. Furthermore, I am now clothed in His righteousness since He satisfied the entirety of the Law for me. Repent of your sins, trust in Jesus, and you, too, can be saved in this way!\u201d<\/i>

As\u00a02 Corinthians 5:21<\/a>\u00a0says,\u00a0\u201cHe made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.\u201d<\/i>\u00a0The Puritan Thomas Brooks once put it like\u00a0this<\/a>:
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Through Christ we are as righteous as if we had satisfied the Law in our own persons. The end of the Law is to justify and save those which fulfill it. Christ subjected Himself thereto: He perfectly fulfilled it for us, and His perfect righteousness is imputed to us. Christ fulfilled the moral Law, not for Himself, but for us. Therefore Christ doing it for believers, they fulfill the Law in Christ. And so Christ by doing, and they believing in Him that doth it, do fulfill the Law.

Or Christ may be said to be the end of the Law because the end of the Law is perfect righteousness, that a man may be justified thereby, which end we cannot attain of ourselves through the frailty of our flesh. But by Christ we attain it, Who hath fulfilled the Law for us.<\/i><\/div>\n
Yes, Jesus satisfied the Law on our behalf. It is right and good to be obedient to God\u2019s Law, but hypocritical to elevate our own man-made laws and traditions over and above God\u2019s Law. Our rebellious and depraved hearts will always rebel. But through the power of Christ within us, we are made able and willing to obey the Law.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Stop me if you think you have heard this one before:\u00a0\u201cYou Christians are such\u00a0hypocrites. You pick and choose which parts of the Bible you like. If you were a\u00a0serious\u00a0Christian, you would make sure not to eat pork or shellfish, just like Leviticus says!\u201d Many who desire to dismantle or disprove Christianity try to attack God\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3518,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[203,148,232],"tags":[147,140,149],"class_list":["post-3517","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-humility","category-justice","category-reforming-femininity","tag-civil-law","tag-law","tag-moral-law"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/graceandtruthpress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3517","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/graceandtruthpress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/graceandtruthpress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graceandtruthpress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graceandtruthpress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3517"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/graceandtruthpress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3517\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graceandtruthpress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/graceandtruthpress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3517"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graceandtruthpress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3517"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graceandtruthpress.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3517"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}