“But, scripture says not to follow the law, right?”
Does it?
Does it really say that?
John 3:16
For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
Ephesians 2:8-9
For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, 9 not of works, lest anyone should boast. 10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.
Mark 16:16
He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned.
Romans 10:13
For “whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”
Ephesians 2:13
But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.
Ok, that settles it, right?
Well, no, not exactly. Nowhere in these verses (and many more like them) does it say to not follow the law, God’s instructions given in Torah. (Before you start quoting Paul, please read 2 Peter 3:14-18)
But, the church has taught for many centuries and many generations that we are saved by faith, that Jesus fulfilled the law, and we no longer have to do it.
Yes, you are correct. The church has taught us that.
But is it correct?
Show me anywhere in those verses, or any other, that we are not supposed to follow the law.
I agree that salvation comes by faith, and that it is a gift so that no man should boast. End of story, right?
No, end of that statement, but the story goes on. There is more.
This concept highlights the difference between how the mainstream approaches scripture, and how I approach scripture.
Yes, I believe Ephesians 2:8-9 is true.
Does that mean we can take Ephesians 2:8-9 and John 3:16 and other verses like them, and create a doctrine based on them, while ignoring scripture like Revelation 14:12, Matthew 7, etc?
No, we cannot.
I propose this:
Every bit of scripture is true. But every bit of scripture is just a small piece of a large puzzle. When you take all the pieces and fit them together, you get ONE WHOLE BIBLICAL TRUTH.
Some people like to take bits of scripture and create a doctrine with them. But to do so, they have to remove other bits of scripture, because they don’t fit in the puzzle that they are creating.
We don’t get to take the pieces we like and build our own mini-puzzle.
We have to take all of the pieces and build the whole puzzle, otherwise, we just create false doctrine. Or partially true doctrine. Call it what you like, but it is not the whole truth of the whole bible.
Yeshua (Jesus) tells us more than once in Revelation who the saints (disciples, Christians, followers, believers, etc) are:
1. Those who keep the commandments of God
2. Those who have faith in Jesus.
There are verses that support #1, and there are other verses that support #2.
We need all of it, not just the pieces that support #2, if those are our favorites.
John 3:16 says this:
“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. “
Matthew 7 gives us this:
“Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. 22 Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ 23 And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’
Can we say Jesus’ words in Matthew 7 are invalid or must mean something other than what it actually says, because of John 3:16 or because of Ephesians 2:8-9?
No. Independently, they seem to be saying different things. Together, they create a whole truth; the whole truth that is represented in the words of Jesus in Revelation 14:12.
“Here is the patience of the saints; here are those who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus.”
John 3:16 and Ephesians 2:8-9 (and many other scriptures) support the ‘faith in Jesus’ half of Revelation 14:12.
Matthew 7 (and many other scriptures) support the “keep the commandments of God” half of Revelation 14:12.
Both are truth, and both support a whole biblical truth.
We can read ALL scripture and obey it, or we can build doctrine on the parts we like and ignore the rest. Or we can decide that the parts we don’t like must mean something else. Or we can decide the parts we don’t like were for another time, another place, another people.
Except there are those pesky verses that tell us God never changes, that the Word never changes, that the law never changes.
Yes, this is a difficult thing to wrap our head around, because we have been taught a partial truth for so many centuries and so many generations.
Here is the solution: we are not supposed to wrap our heads around it. We are supposed to wrap our hearts around it.
Just submit to God’s sovereign authority.
Just say yes.
Let’s stop trying to academically fit the pieces into preconceived ideas.
Yesterday I shared my testimony with a teen who is struggling (read here, if you wish: http://the2000yearfix.com/index.php/2016/11/30/my-testimony/).
There was a time in my life when a horrible crisis brought me to my knees. A horrible crisis forced me to strip away all doctrine, all thoughts and ideas, all religiosity, and just submit to YHVH (God).
I found myself in a place where God is everything, the Creator and Caretaker of all that there is, and I am nothing, just the dirt of the earth. At that point of total submission I began to learn truth.
We are not meant to shoe horn scripture into ideas we’ve been taught all of our lives. I know, because it won’t fit. I tried for decades…
Submit your heart to God, and your mind will follow — not the other way around.
Learn the WHOLE truth, not just fabricated pieces of it.
James 2:26
For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.
Use all of the pieces of the puzzle, not just the ones you like the best.
