The fulfillment and end of the Old Covenant leads us to Jesus. And Jesus gives us a New Covenant, a better covenant, which calls for sacrificial love instead of sacrificing animals...over and over and over again, ad nauseam. Even God the Father Himself said so through the prophet Isaiah...law keepers going through the motions repeatedly and so often that it became annoying and tiresome to God Himself...!
The Old Covenant was God’s word to Israel. In it we can see examples and illustrations, and a rich history of God’s relationship with Israel. Jesus’ apostles used the Old Covenant when speaking to a Jewish audience. But Jesus’ New Covenant is for ‘all’ people in ‘all’ of the world. God clearly relates to people differently in the Old Covenant...which was between Him and Israel...than He does in the New Covenant. Something clearly ‘new’ happens with Jesus that changes the course of history, and the way we relate to God.
The Old Covenant certainly doesn’t inform our moral conduct as followers of Jesus. If it did, my parents would have stoned me to death when I was 14 years old for being disobedient and disrespectful. Are we still stoning adulterers to death...? Are we still cutting a woman’s hand off because she accidentally touches a man’s private parts while trying to break up a fight between two men...? Why not...? Because the Old Covenant ‘has’ been fulfilled and ‘has’ ended, and now a new and better way of relating to God has been made available to us through Jesus Himself.
The Old Covenant ceremonial laws are fulfilled in the death of Jesus...no more animal sacrifices. Old Covenant civil laws are clearly no longer enforced, as they were given for Israel at Mt. Sinai. Old Covenant moral laws have been reset upon a new and better foundation...Jesus Himself...they have been transformed. Now that Jesus has come, the Old Covenant itself, that entire system of laws that ‘used to’ define the relationship with God and His people, is no longer in effect for followers of Jesus. To say that any of the Mosaic Law continues to be authoritative blunts the truth that the entire Mosaic covenant is no longer in force for followers of Jesus.
If that makes me an “illegitimate protestant” then so be it.
Matthew 5:18 is very often, ad nauseam, taken completely out of context...and twisted...to conform to the beliefs of the Hebrew roots movement. They clearly despise Apostle Paul because he points out that the Old Covenant Law itself, is no longer in effect for followers of Jesus.
I do believe that God's grace...and acceptance of it...leads to repentance, and repentance inspires action in the form of righteous living. In ‘that’ order. Others believe that they ‘earn’ salvation “through true repentance which in turn leads to forgiveness through grace.”
Question, Do you think a person reading the 4 gospels, Peter, James, John, and the Revelation could come away with enough information to receive the salvation offered by Jesus? Without reading the writings attributed to Paul?
