The Two-Hundred-Fifty-Eighth (What Path? Part 1)

This week’s study is somewhat of a continuation from last week.  It has to do with the journey we are on as believers, both spiritually and physically, and taking a look at whether or not we’re on the right path in terms of a particular aspect of being a follower of Yeshua.  While sometimes our studies consist of topics that would be generally accepted by the majority of Christians, this particular topic does not fall into that category.

For full disclosure, I definitely have a strong belief on this topic, and as we get into it you may already know what that belief is, based on previous studies.  However, the goal is not to try and convince you that my belief is correct.  It is simply to present different aspects of the topic such that you can search your heart and seek the Holy Spirit’s guidance in this area of your walk with Yeshua.  

Also, it must be made clear that I am not coming from a position of feeling superior or somehow more righteous, in any way, than any believers that disagree with me or really anyone in general.  This is, admittedly, a topic that can stir up some strong feelings related to that, which is interesting in its own way when you think about it, but I will be the first to volunteer that I am still working through living this belief out in my life.  However, part of our job as believers is not to disregard something we know the Holy Spirit has led us to just because we haven’t figured out exactly how to live it out yet.  We are to strive towards whatever it is, denying ourselves and the world’s views in order to be obedient to Him (Matthew 16:24, Mark 8:34, Luke 9:23, John 15:19).

That leads into what this week’s title is alluding to.  We all know Yeshua’s teaching of the narrow path (Matthew 7:13-14, Luke 13:22-30), and we all like to tout our Christianity, or more generally our faith, as “counting us in” on that narrow path.  Are we really, though?  Or have we allowed convenience, excuse, and worse, rebellion, deceive us into thinking we are on it while we unknowingly lumber down the wide path to destruction?

Whereas in previous studies we’ve made allusions or hinted at things, we going to be very specific on the topic this week.  So, if you haven’t figured it out already, we’re talking about YHWH’s Law, given to Moses, and how it relates to us as believers.  I hope I haven’t lost you already at that sentence, but I did warn you this topic can stir up strong feelings!  All I ask is that you keep an open heart and open mind as we go through this, and strive to determine what the Holy Spirit is leading you to rather than what anyone else has told you.

The first thing to do is to understand what the Law actually is.  Many only see it as a list of restrictions that the people of Israel were required to follow, however when you look at the whole of scripture you find that its definition is not that narrow.  It isn’t just a list of dos and don’ts that YHWH imposed upon the Israelites, it has a bigger purpose that extends beyond the people of Israel.

One of the misnomers that has spread around in Christianity is that before Yeshua’s death and resurrection it was following the Law that made people righteous.  In fact, that’s one of the justifications put forth to “prove” that we no longer have to follow the Law.  Namely, that because He is risen, the ability to be made righteous transitioned from the Law to belief in Him.  What you actually find in scripture is that adhering to the Law never actually made anyone righteous.  

Whenever you see the requirements of the Law that included sacrifices made as a result of someone’s sin, the word used is typically translated to “atonement.”  This typically is talked about as being a cleansing of the individual’s sin, but the Hebrew word actually means covering (Leviticus 1:4).  In fact, that same Hebrew word that’s translated to atonement first occurs in scripture when YHWH is giving instruction to Noah about covering the ark in pitch! (Genesis 6:14)  

It's probably obvious to you, but just to be perfectly clear about it, when you cover something, the thing that you’re covering doesn’t actually go away.  It doesn’t get cleansed, purged, or disappear.  You just can’t see it because there’s something in the way, covering it up.  If you step in some mud with your bare feet and then go put shoes on, your feet are still muddy.  You just can’t see the mud anymore.  When Noah covered the ark in pitch, the ark didn’t somehow disappear or go away.  

So, what was the point?  Why make the Israelites sacrifice innocent animals in order to cover transgressions?  The sinful actions that the person did were still there, so it’s almost as if the animals sacrificed were being killed for no reason.  YHWH even stated that in the time of Yeshua is when He will no longer remember sins (Hebrews 8:12, Jeremiah 31:34), not as a result of the sacrifices in the tabernacle/temple.

Aside from the obvious fact that these sacrifices were pointing to the future sacrifice of our Savior, Yeshua, Paul actually helps us understand what the Law, and its associated sacrifices, was for.  His teachings are still manipulated and twisted today as Peter said they were when Paul was first giving them (2 Peter 3:16).  And take note, Peter says the people distorting them were doing so to their own destruction!

What we find in Paul’s writings is that the Law was a teacher (Galatians 3:18-25).  But a teacher of what?  We can kind of get the answer to this question in the passage, but it’s even clearer in one of Paul’s other letters.  The Law was a teacher of sin (Romans 5:20-21).  

Now, this is where things start to get twisted.  In the letter to the churches of Galatia, people focus on the phrase “until the arrival of the seed” (Galatians 3:19) and say that clearly it means the Law is no longer applicable.  To that, I have two questions for you to consider: 1) When you are instructed by a teacher in whatever subject, and then you move on to the next grade or the next level in that subject, do you turn around and say that whatever that teacher taught you is no longer applicable and you forget it or disregard it?  And 2) If that were the correct interpretation of that verse in Galatians, why does it contradict Paul’s other statements in Romans?

Paul specifically asks the question as to whether or not we should continue sinning and answers by saying “certainly not” (Romans 6:1-2).  What did he just say sin was, literally one sentence before?  Transgression of the Law.  The same Law that was given to Moses, not some “new” law that Yeshua gave (we’ll get to that in a moment).  And mind you, both of these letters were written to believers coming from the Gentiles, not Jews who always knew about the Law and having to keep it.  In other words, he is stating that yes, even the Law given to Moses defines sin for Gentiles.  It defines sin for all mankind.

It's also very important to point out that these letters were written well after Yeshua’s resurrection.  One of the common beliefs is that the Law was “nailed to the cross” (Colossians 2:14) and that because Yeshua fulfilled the Law (Matthew 5:17) it’s no longer applicable.  We’ll get more into the specifics of these verses next, but first ask yourself, when have you ever filled something up and it went away?

The Greek word translated to fulfill is pleroo, and its definition is to complete, fill up, or accomplish.  I know when I go get gas for my car, I complete, or accomplish, the task once my gas tank is full, but that doesn’t mean I never have to get gas again.  My gas tank still exists, and my car still requires gas in it in order for it to run.  Those basic, fundamental requirements still exist in terms of how the car operates.  My filling the gas tank doesn’t change that.

You may say, “yes, Rob, I get that, but Yeshua is perfect and us and this world is flawed because of sin, so when He fulfills something it’s a perfect fulfillment.”  I agree with that, but it misses the mark in terms of why Yeshua was accomplishing the Law in the first place.  It wasn’t to get rid of it.  As we just proved, the Law defines sin.  We also know that the result of sin is death (Romans 6:23), meaning if we sin we must die, and as we learned in a previous study this is referring ultimately to a permanent, spiritual death.    

The whole reason Yeshua accomplished the Law was because He had to in order for His death to count for ours.  If He had sinned, then not only would His death have been the payment for His own sin, He also would not have been able to rise from death in resurrection.  If He could have risen from death despite sinning, then the same would have been true for all others who had died.  Yet, upon death, they went to Sheol and stayed there, eventually being preached to by Yeshua and being resurrected with Him (1 Peter 3:19, Matthew 27:52-53).

If that’s not clear enough, let’s start to get into the details of the two verses mentioned earlier.  As regarding fulfillment of the Law, Yeshua Himself said He did not abolish the Law (Matthew 5:17).  But wait a minute.  Here’s Paul again talking about abolishing the law, and even using that same idea of abolishing, or annulling?! (Ephesians 2:15)  

Look closer at the Greek of that verse.  Paul states that the “law of commandments in ordinances” was abolished.  In fact, the Greek word he uses that’s translated to ordinances is where we get the word “dogma” from.  In other words, what was abolished was the addition of rules and requirements created and imposed by man (the Jewish religious leaders) to tell the people how to follow YHWH’s Law.  The rest of that verse makes this even more clear as Paul states in doing so, Yeshua made the two (meaning YHWH’s Law and man’s ordinances) into one and therefore making peace.  You see, the ordinances created by man actually contradicted YHWH’s Law in some cases, so there was not peace between the two.  Yeshua even pointed this out in His ministry (Matthew 15:3-9).

So, if Yeshua didn’t abolish the Law, what about it being “nailed to the cross?”  This is a common belief as well, but what does the actual verse say?  This is very important to recognize, because this is how many false doctrines get created.  A portion of a verse is taken and melded with some other belief and used as a basis of doctrine.  In this case, it even gets used as a sort of catch phrase of rebuttal against those who proclaim that the Law is still valid.

It turns out that the full phrase written by Paul is not referring to YHWH’s Law at all.  The Greek word there is actually the same one we talked about earlier, that was translated to ordinances in that case.  So, Paul again is saying that Yeshua “blotted out” or cancelled the man-made ordinances, not YHWH’s Law given to Moses.  

So far, we’ve taken a look at the major scriptural references used to develop the belief that the Law is no longer applicable.  The last one, and I would say by far the most prevalent one, is that we are no longer under the Law but under grace (Romans 6:14).  And to that, I say, thank YHWH!

I am as thankful as you are that we are under grace, but what does Paul say immediately after making this statement?  He again asks the rhetorical question of whether or not we should sin just because we’re no longer under the Law.  And what was his answer?  Another “certainly not!”  Again, what is he using as a definition of what sin is?  The Law as written in the scriptures that he had access to at the time.  The Law given to Moses, not some other law that supposedly Yeshua gave.  And who was he talking to when he was using this definition of sin?  Believers that came from the Gentiles, not from the Jews.

Believers today like to say they’re under the law of Christ (1 Corinthians 9:21, Galatians 6:2) instead of the Law of Moses, but what does this actually mean?  I’ve searched the scriptures and have yet to find a passage that specifically says what the commandments are that are in this law.  In fact, in that verse in Paul’s first letter to the church in Corinth, he actually points out that being under the law of Christ is not being outside the Law of YHWH.  In other words, to be under the law of Christ is to also be inside the Law of YHWH, which means that if you follow the law of Christ you will not transgress the Law of YHWH.    

It seems there’s two options in order for us to define the law of Christ.  The first is that it consists of one commandment, which is the one that He gave specifically to the disciples during the last supper after Judas left to betray Him (John 13:34).  He calls it a new commandment, but really it’s a reiteration of one of the two greatest commandments He had listed previously (Matthew 22:37-40), specifically the one stating, “love your neighbor as yourself.”  The reason this one commandment could be all that’s in His law is because it’s the only one He stated without first pointing to an Old Testament commandment, and also it follows Paul’s reference to the law of Christ in Galatians.

The other option to define the law of Christ is that it includes all the commandments He reiterated during His ministry.  These include those two greatest commandments (which, as a reminder, He stated encompasses all the Law), and others like not murdering (Matthew 5:21-22) or committing adultery (Matthew 5:27-28).  When you look at all the commandments He stated though, they are actually more stringent versions of the Law of YHWH.  For instance, hating someone is actually considered murder, not just physically killing someone (Matthew 5:22).  

Furthermore, the commandments Yeshua states that seem to be more loosely related to YHWH’s Law (meaning they weren’t specifically commanded by YHWH to Moses) but were stated by Him nonetheless, you would be hard pressed to find a “law of Christ-follower” that actually follows them.  How many believers do you know give someone more than they ask for in a situation where the individual sued the believer or asked for something beyond what was agreed to?  One of Yeshua’s commands was to also give your cloak (coat) when someone sues you for your tunic (shirt) (Matthew 5:40).  

The point is, the same argument that is made to say we don’t have to follow YHWH’s Law because it’s impossible to follow (Acts 15:10), suggests that because the law of Christ is so much more stringent, and therefore harder to follow, we shouldn’t have to follow that one either.  Let that sink in for a moment.  We, as believers, have gotten to the point that the arguments made against the Law contradict the justification we make to not follow it.  We say that it’s too hard to follow it so we follow something else, when in reality that something else is even harder to follow.  And all the while we live in sin because we end up not following either one.  Only, we have deceived ourselves into thinking we are not sinning when we do so.  Or worse, we know we’re sinning, but believe not only that it doesn’t matter, but that YHWH and Yeshua approve of it, in fact, that it was Their whole plan all along!  

I really wanted to get this whole topic covered in one week, but it looks like we will have to continue next week.  This week we covered all the reasoning used to justify the doctrine that believers no longer have to follow the Law.  We saw that many times verses that suggest it’s cancelled or abolished are actually referring to man-made ordinances and also that other statements by Paul, or even Yeshua Himself, don’t talk about nullifying the Law and sometimes they even emphasize that we should be following it.  

Please, I encourage you, implore you even, to take a look at each and every one of the verses mentioned.  Look at their context, read paragraphs, even chapters, before and after.  Pray about them.  Ask the Holy Spirit to lead you into understanding from Him, not from the teaching of men.  I promise you, it’s not hard to understand, and there’s not some hidden secret to understanding that you need to go through years of schooling to get.  YHWH wrote the scripture to us.  Each of us, individually.  He didn’t write it such that you need a doctorate in order to understand it and apply it to your life to have a relationship with Him.

Next week, we’ll get into the other side of the coin: what does scripture actually say about the Law and how it relates to believers, rather than what arguments has man created against it.  Shabbat shalom and YHWH bless you!

-Rob and Sara Gene