This blog will delve into a much debated subject in Evangelical theology. They call it Law VS. Grace. This blog is a follow-up to my last blog. Please note that what I’m about to say may well be considered heresy in Evangelical churchianity. But I think it’s a more accurate representation of the truth found in the Bible. When churchians see what I say, I think they will agree that it’s simple, although they may not like the truth of it. The way I’m going to approach this is to tell you my argument at the outset, and then go about showing you my rationale for it.
Essentially, I believe the NT teaches us that we must obey God’s law. The scope of God’s law is another discussion but first I’d like to establish the Christian’s obligation to obey God’s law. I get my ideas from Galatians 3, Romans 3 and the Covenants in the OT. I have already discussed Galatians 3, Romans 3 and the OT Covenants in previous blogs. So I’ll assume you know what I said in those blogs and just refer to those conclusions as facts for this one.
Here are my facts:
- Abraham obeyed God’s law (Genesis 26:2-5, God speaking to Isaac, Abraham’s son, see below)
- Abraham’s obedience to God’s law caused God to give him the Promise Covenant, aka, the Abrahamic Covenant (same verses)
- Israel and then Jesus (through Israel), came into existence based on that Promise Covenant (previous blogs)
- The Promise Covenant is the same as the ancient Royal Grant (previous blogs)
- The basis of a Royal Grant is faithful performance (previous blogs)
- Abraham did not have a mediator between himself and God when God gave him the Promise Covenant (Genesis 12-26)
- Israel did have a mediator (Moses and the Angel Michael) when God made them His Theocracy (Genesis-Deuteronomy, especially the Sinai event in Exodus, Daniel 12:1, etc.)
- Everybody who has wanted to become one of God’s people (Christian) since the time of Jesus’ resurrection needs Jesus to be their mediator (1 Timothy 2:5)
- The Abrahamic Covenant (Promise Covenant/Royal Grant) was an irrevocable free gift from God (previous blogs)
- The New Covenant that Jesus ratified is also an irrevocable free gift from God (previous blogs)
- The New Covenant in Jesus is a continuation of and fulfillment of the Abrahamic Covenant (previous blogs)
- Evangelical theology believes that Christians do not have to obey God’s law (see any Evangelical systematic theology primarily on the subject of Soteriology, but also Hamartiology and Anthropology).
Here’s my argument in the form of questions:
- How can God grant the Covenant to Abraham based on his performance (obeying God’s law) and NOT require the same performance from everybody else who enters into that same Covenant?
- If specific performance was the basis for God giving His Covenant gift to Abraham, then how can specific performance NOT be the basis for God accepting people (who want to become Christian) as parties to His Promise Covenant?
Remember: The New Covenant is new only with respect to the Mosaic Covenant. It is a continuation of the Abrahamic Covenant by virtue of it being the fulfillment of that Covenant. So technically, the new Covenant is the continuation of the Abrahamic Covenant (the Promise Covenant).
They key to the underlying thesis in this blog is found in God’s promise to Abraham, which He renewed with Isaac:
Sojourn in this land and I will be with you [Isaac] and bless you, for to you and to your descendants I will give all these lands, and I will establish the oath which I swore to your father Abraham. I will multiply your descendants as the stars of heaven, and will give your descendants all these lands; and by your descendants all the nations of the earth shall be blessed; because Abraham obeyed Me and kept My charge, My commandments, My statutes and My laws.” (Genesis 26:3-5)
Note the emphasized words in the above Scripture. “Because” is a causal word. It refers to the essential ingredient that brought about the end result. In the above scenario, Abraham’s obedience was the essential ingredient that caused God to want to bless him. In other words, Abraham’s obedience triggered God’s blessing on him. And notice what Abraham obeyed: God’s charge, commandments, statutes, and laws.
Although the Hebrew word for “heard” is translated into English as ”obeyed”, I’ll assume it means “accepted,” while I’ll also assume that everybody knows what “keep” means. So let’s focus on the meaning of the other 4 terms so we can get an idea of the details of Abraham’s obedience.
Firstly, Abraham kept God’s charge. The Hebrew word is msihmereth. What is a charge? Today’s world would probably consider it equivalent to a court order in civil society. Today’s military world would probably consider it a command from a superior officer. In the corporate world they would probably see it as equivalent to their corporate policy and managerial determinations. By now you hopefully get the point. A charge is a determination made by some authority, and issued as a command to someone for its fulfillment. In religious language, let’s call it God’s Will. With regard to Abraham, God’s charge is probably a reference to his act of offering his son Isaac on the altar as a sacrifice, the ultimate proof of Abraham’s ‘faith’ in God with respect to God’s covenant promises. In other words, like Hebrews 11:19 says, “He [Abraham] considered that God is able to raise men even from the dead.”
The second term we want to look at is commandments. The Hebrew word is mitzvah. When I say “God’s Commandments”, what’s the first thing that pops into a Christian’s mind? For Catholics I’m betting it’s the Ten Commandments. For Protestants I’m betting it’s the Mosaic law (which includes the 10). For Jews I’m betting it depends on their particular rabbi’s teachings, but for the most part they’re probably thinking mitzvot, which essentially is all the rules you follow daily and all the good deeds you always try to do during the course of your life. For non-religious people I’m not sure what they would think, because commandment is primarily a religious word referring to the 10. In any case, that’s not what we need to know in order to arrive at an accurate meaning for this word relative to its Biblical context.
What do the experts say this word commandment means? Well, it is fairly involved. For starters, its occurrence in Genesis above is the only occurrence in Genesis, so there’s no lexical field to use as a basis for determining what the word could have meant during Abraham’s time. Next, it occurs mostly in Numbers and the rest of the Pentateuch. It does occur in the Prophets, but not that much. So we don’t have a lot to work with for pinpointing its meaning in Genesis. Next, it has multiple meanings in its various uses, so that further complicates the process. Add to that the scholarly speculations about the word’s etymology.
So, for the sake of brevity, let me state what I think it means. Commandment = The 10 Commandments. I also believe that the founding fathers in the OT knew the 10 (or at least ‘primitive’ equivalents), including Noah and Adam. I have no real proof of that. But that’s my opinion. The reason I believe that to be true is because God’s law is unchanging. Why? Because it is based on His design of human will, actions, relationships, social structure, and the rest of His Creation. Since none of that changes because God built all that design/function into the Cosmos, then neither does God’s ‘law’ change for governing His Cosmos. And so I believe that God informed the founding fathers from the beginning about His “law”.
In other words, the 10 Commandments is God’s summary statement to humanity on how life works. If you follow them, things will go well for you and everybody else. But if you violate them, things won’t be so good. We can see that today all around the world. When we consider all the corruption, violence, destruction, pain suffering, etc., we merely have to ask ourselves ‘which of the 10 is this particular sin violating?’ We can also ask ourselves, ‘which of the 10 should the people obey to fix this evil?’ That’s pretty much what I think commandment means in the above text. I think all the founding fathers of God’s Kingdom knew the 10 – or at least ‘primitive’ equivalents – especially Adam and Eve, because they were closest to God.
The third term we want to look at is statutes. The Hebrew word is hukkah. What do the experts say the word statutes means? Same thing with this word. It’s involved. For starters, its occurrence in Genesis is the only occurrence in Genesis, so there’s no lexical field to use as a basis for determining what the word could have meant during Abraham’s time. Next, it occurs mostly in Leviticus and Psalms. It also occurs in the rest of the OT, but not as much. So we don’t have a lot to work with for pinpointing its meaning in Genesis. Next (and sadly), this word is translated as ordinance and due. In other words, the same Hebrew word is translated into different English words. Talk about introducing unnecessary and unwanted confusion into the translation! Plus, the word has different meanings. Add to that the scholarly speculations about the word’s etymology.
So, for the sake of brevity, let me state what I think it means. Statutes = Statutes. Note: Statutes are converted to Code law in America. This is as good an analogy as I can come up with from our modern day vocabulary. This kind of law is basically prescriptive law for establishing (and ‘enforcing’) proper procedure in government systems and social process. So for Abraham, the animal sacrifices he offered were done according to God’s statutes. Same with his family’s marriages. Same with foods. Same with ritual purity. Also of note about the sacrifices, some Biblical scholars consider Abraham a priest, or at least he acted in the role of a priest because he offered animal sacrifices. But that’s another subject off topic here. And just to throw this out there, we have a contrast from Moses on this:
You shall not do what is done in the land of Egypt where you lived, nor are you to do what is done in the land of Canaan where I am bringing you; you shall not walk in their statutes. (Leviticus 18:3)
Note the statutes of Egypt and Canaan. If you want to know what they are, just go look at some of the extant ancient primary source documents on the subject. That would give you an idea of what ancient Egypt and Canaan considered to be statutes. And since YHWH compares them with His statutes, you’ll probably get a good idea of what they are, that is, at least for Israel and later. As far as Abraham is concerned, we can only speculate based on the little extant information we have available to us from non-Biblical sources, such as from Sumer, Akkad, etc. Anyway, you probably get the point by now.
The fourth term we want to look at is laws. The Hebrew word is Torah. What do the experts say the word laws means? Again, it’s involved for pretty much the same reasons as above. Add to that the confusion that’s inherent in the way the Jews look at it, which I won’t get into here.
So for the sake of brevity, let me state what I think it means. Laws = teachings of the authorities (those who came before, such as Abraham’s great ancestor Noah). Why do I say that? Because Torah basically means teaching and the ancients’ laws had to originate somewhere. Presumably God taught them (in one form or another) to Adam, who taught them to his children, and so forth and so on down to Abraham. And Abraham taught them to his descendants all the way down to Moses, who learned them from his parents. Then came Sinai, where God wrote them on stone as permanent evidence of Israel’s Covenant Obligations (the stone tablets are typical evidence of a covenant agreement). James talks about Torah in chapter 3 of his letter when he says, “Let not many of you become teachers, my brethren, knowing that as such we will incur a stricter judgment.” He’s talking to diaspora Israel’s judges during 2nd Temple times. One of the duties of judges was to Teach the Law (Torah) to those who erred and who stood before them for correction.
Now let me take that one step further. I’m no Hebrew expert, so maybe this is ‘out to lunch’. But when you look at the previous phrase, “My charge, My commandments, My statutes and My laws,” you see Hebrew synonymous parallelism in it. You see charge being in the same category as laws, and you see commandments being in the same category as statutes. Charge is God’s determination whereas Torah is the ancients’ determinations. Also, commandment is God’s Categorical law, whereas statutes are the fixed applications of God’s Categorical Law. And since Abraham was not a nation at that point, the development of the national statutes called “the Mosaic law” didn’t exist yet, especially regarding the government system of the Priests and Levites. Same with the United Monarchy. It wasn’t until Israel became a monarchy that they needed a ‘procedure of the king’ (1 Samuel 8:9, 11). That is, they then received a very involved law code and administrative system of law enforcement. So that’s how I see those words. And when considering them in that vein, you can hopefully see how I would conclude that Abraham obeyed God’s law, which at the very least included the 10 Commandments (or equivalents).
Now, when you consider how large an army Abraham had, you have to also consider that he had quite a resource base that supplied such an army. So in reality, as a patriarch Abraham had a mini-nation of sorts. And what law do you suppose he followed to govern his family’s mini-nation? Do I really have to answer that question? Don’t you think he had procedures that he followed on a daily basis for running his various businesses and managing all the personnel, including all the inevitable conflicts and such? What about dealing with his slaves, and paying contractors or taking care of employees? See what I’m getting at? Abraham wasn’t just some isolated yahoo camping out in the wilderness and going to the nearby quick-stop market for groceries when he needed to eat. On the contrary, he built and managed a full-fledged family empire that produced and supplied ALL their basic material needs. And I’m betting he had a hierarchy to run the thing, along with laws and policies and cops (of sorts). So is it that far-fetched to suppose that Abraham knew, obeyed and enforced the 10 Commandments (or something similar) in his own personal mini-nation? If not, then what laws do you think he did follow?
But where’s my evidence for all this? Good question! I have already alluded to some of it that I got from the Biblical text. But there’s other evidence. While reading Rabinowitz I came across a little gem that may shed some light on this subject. While discussing the form of the Talmudic purchase agreements, he referred back to the form used by Abraham when he purchased the land in Canaan for his burial plot from the sons of Heth. According to Rabinowitz (Jewish Law, p 94; Genesis 23:15-18), the wording that Abraham used had the same elements in it that ‘Jewish law’ used in their purchase agreements “throughout the Talmudic period. And in their “ketubah (marriage document), it is used by Jews to this day.” Moreover, Rabinowitz says that the form and process of today’s Talmudic bond agreements hasn’t changed since the 3rd century BC, based on extant ancient documentary evidence. So one has to wonder how connected and truly close we are to those ancients. How much has changed since then, and how much has remained the same? Based on that evidence, I have to conclude that Abraham wasn’t much different from us today in his way of living and also in his way of interacting with outsiders. And that involved how he managed his business affairs and how he dealt with persistent enemies. And the way he did that was by following standards. We call those standards laws, and apparently, so does God.
Okay, now for the curve ball. Let’s suppose my lengthy speculation above is wrong. So what? The text still says My charge, My commandments, My statutes, My laws. Who is the ‘My’ referring to? YHWH (God), of course! That ‘My’ means that the ‘laws’ Abraham obeyed came from God. In other words, it is God’s demands and laws that Abraham obeyed, not some man-made stuff that everybody fears and obeys without question.
Now let’s consider a Christian theological idea that church leaders teach to their parishioners: STEWARDSHIP. Regarding God’s laws, let’s ask ourselves this question: Is it good stewardship to not obey God, but to obey men instead? Think about how this plays out in practical terms. If you were told by good authority that such and such was God’s will, would you obey it? And what if you were told God’s law is the same thing as God’s will? Would you obey it then? If so, then consider this: If you are willing to obey a not-so-developed version of God’s law like Abraham may have obeyed, then would you not want to obey a more developed version of God’s law, such as the one we read about in Exodus 20 (the 10 Commandments), which was designed specifically for a nation? In that light, does it really matter how we define God’s law, so long as we are obeying the best version of it? Wouldn’t that be considered ‘good stewardship’ by today’s religious standards?
With that in mind, let’s ask another question that’s built on some principles we established in previous blogs. If the New Covenant is a fulfillment of the Abrahamic Covenant and thus, a continuation of it, and if Abraham did not need a mediator to receive that Covenant, then why does every human being need Jesus to be their mediator in order to enter into the New Covenant to become a Christian? Why do we need a mediator to participate in that same Promise Covenant, which is a Royal Grant from God?
Think about the role a mediator plays in this transaction. I referred to the mediator in a previous blog, and will discuss it more in depth in a future blog. In the meantime, let me tell you what a mediator does: he brings together distant parties. In relation to God, he bridges the gap between humans and God. Now, think about why a mediator is needed in the first place when God is involved. Every good Christian knows it’s because of SIN. So here we have our simple answer. Because of humanity’s sin, humans need a mediator. It may be true that Abraham and Moses kept God’s law consistently as a lifestyle, but we who want to become Christian do not. We are to some degree, lawless. So there you have your difference between Abraham and us. Abraham kept God’s law so he received that Divine Promise. But when we want to be part of that Promise we can’t, because of our state of sin. So naturally, we need a mediator to bridge the gap between us and God. And the mediator takes care of that sin problem for us. So thank God for Jesus Christ who did this for us!
Now we have to ask this question: Since the mediator takes care of the sin problem for us, does that mean we don’t need to worry about our sins anymore? In other words, can we keep ignoring God’s standard for identifying sin once the mediator gets us back in God’s favor? Isn’t that the same exact question that the Apostle Paul asked in his Romans letter, “Shall we continue to sin?” (Romans 6:1) What about the Hebrews letter? “If we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth” (Hebrews 10:26). What about Peter? He talks about the ‘spiritual’ developmental process in the first chapter of his second letter. Part of that process is self-control and godliness. Does godliness involve sinning? Do you see what I’m saying?
Now let’s delve into a theological subject. This is quite a controversy between theological sects but let me bring to bear upon the subject, the above ideas. The subject I’m talking about is known as ETERNAL SECURITY. Essentially, eternal security says, “once saved, always saved.” I consider it a religious fire insurance policy, because the adherents who receive it merely have to mouth a specific word formula (kind of like a MAGIC SPELL!), and then ‘they’re in’! So let’s take a look at eternal security from the perspective of the Promise Covenant.
The relevant aspect of the Promise Covenant is that it is irrevocable. But, it’s irrevocable only because those to whom it was given obeyed God’s law as a long-standing lifestyle. Remember, this covenant comes as a result of past performance. So technically speaking, the eternal security aspect of this Covenant is its irrevocability. In other words, the thing that is eternally secure is the covenant itself (because God promised). Now that surely raises a lot of questions with respect to the theological ideology of eternal security, because that theology’s eternal security is based on the person’s MEMBERSHIP, not on the COVENANT in which one possesses that membership. Considering the facts presented above, does Evangelical theology’s teaching on Eternal Security sound right to you?
Maybe something else is going on here that nobody has taken the time to think about. So let’s just briefly consider one point for the sake of the pragmatic implications. If the Promise Covenant came into existence based on past performance, then why would it be any different for future participants? In other words, although future participants enter the Promise Covenant via a mediator due to their shortcomings (sins), doesn’t it seem reasonable that God wants them to eventually be like Abraham was, in that they should rise to the same level of performance?
If so, then the way I see it is if you want to become a Christian, then you are basically signing up to become a CITIZEN of God’s Kingdom (a party to the Promise Covenant). And that involves all the citizenship obligations. As a Covenant member, you may never lose your citizenship. But if you are slack about the laws of your new citizenship, then you won’t be in good standing with the King of the Covenant (God). And since Christians are citizens of God’s Kingdom, they have a burden to know what the laws are of that Kingdom and to obey them. Just like LEGAL immigrants today who want to become US citizens have to swear an allegiance to this country and promise to obey its laws. You can call the laws of God’s Kingdom the Mosaic law, or you can call them the law of love, or the law of Christ, or whatever you want. But in the final analysis, the best ‘edition’ of God’s law available to us is the 10 Commandments and all the other laws in the OT and NT. So for the sake of good stewardship, it seems right that we learn the best edition of God’s law and incorporate it into our lives, so we can rise to the level of performance that Abraham had when he received the Promise Covenant. Finally, let’s be clear that I’m NOT saying God’s law includes any ‘Judaism’ or Jewish/rabbinic law’.
The way I see it is when you come into the Promise Covenant without a history of obeying God’s law the way Abraham did, then you obviously have some work to do (some of us more than others!). If you like, we can call that ‘works’. But it is not the work of Salvation, because Jesus did that to get you ‘in’ and keep you ‘in’ God’s Kingdom. Instead, we can call it the work of Sanctification, which is YOUR job to accomplish with the help of God’s indwelling Holy Spirit and your fellow covenant members (2 Corinthians 6:1; 2 Corinthians 7:1). And you have God’s law to guide you, that is, to remind you of the standard for sin and righteousness. That’s my understanding of what it means to be like Jesus. That’s my understanding of what it means to “follow in the steps of the faith of our father Abraham” (Romans 4:12). That’s my understanding of what it means to be justified by faith and works (James 2:14-26).
Let me add this final word of contrast: Although Jesus relieves you of your obligation to submit to governments that enforce God’s law (2nd Temple Israel in this case), he does NOT relieve you of your obligation to know God’s law and obey it. Note well the difference.
Okay, enough said. See you in the next blog!
(A big thanks goes out to my good friend Jim for editing this blog for grammar and content!)
Reality Bible 