Opening:
In this writing I used the name of
Yeshua instead of the name Jesus. I am not one that thinks the
pronunciation of the name is a magic word, The Hebrew word for name
doesn't just mean what you are called, but refers more to the essence
of the person. That being said, I think it's kind of cool to use the
name that His friends and family called Him, so that is why I am
calling Him Yeshua. Secondly, I have replaced the untranslated word
“Christ” into the English equivalent “Anointed one”. So Jesus
Christ becomes Yeshua the anointed one. Now on with the study...
The sacrificial laws have been
satisfied by Yeshua, they are no longer in effect because His
sacrifice was the ultimate sacrifice.
The moral laws are still in effect, and
they are really pretty easy to follow...Don't murder, that is easy,
right? They are all pretty basic and easy to follow on a surface
level....
Then there are what I call the
separation laws. These were laws created for the reason of making the
children of Israel Holy. When we hear the word “Holy” we often
think of an old painting of some saint with a halo over his head but
this word simply means to be “set apart” to be different from the
other people or nations around you. These laws were temporal laws,
clearly they didn't exist from the beginning because God tells us in
Gen 9:3 “Everything
that lives and moves about will be food for you. Just as I gave you
the green plants, I now give you everything.” but
then later in
Deut 14:8 we see God telling the people of Israel “The pig is also
unclean; although it has a divided hoof, it does not chew the cud.
You are not to eat their meat or touch their carcasses.” It also
goes on to say other things that they shouldn't eat or touch. So,
where the moral laws existed from the beginning, (it's always been
wrong to murder) the separation laws did not exist from the
beginning.
So
what did Yeshua do in regards to the law? First,
in regard to the moral laws, He did not by any means end the moral
laws, instead, He elevated them beyond the capacity of anyone under
the original creation to fully follow. For example... Do not murder
turned into “whoever
will provoke his brother to anger without cause, he will be
pronounced guilty and be subject to judgment. And anyone who says to
his brother, ‘I spit on you,’ will be condemned by the assembly.
And whoever will call his brother an ‘Unbeliever,’ he will be
condemned to the fire-stove of the Vally of Hinom.”Matthew 5:22.
It's easy not to murder someone, but who among us in even a brief
moment of anger can help
but
provoke someone to anger, or call someone a name? Again, We have Do
not commit adultery which Yeshua turns into
“whoever
looks at a woman with sexual desire has already committed adultery
with her in his heart.” Who among us can fully control even the
slightest or briefest thought that might pop into our mind? And you
could go on and apply this elevation to the rest of the commandments
and with every one it would become more and more impossible to live
by these commandments under the original creation. So
in the death and resurrection of Yeshua He made a new
creation
2 Cor 5:17 “From now on if any man is in the anointed one, he is a
new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things have
become new.” In believing into Yeshua we are
a
new creation, a human that can be in complete unity with God John
17:23 “I am in them and you are in me. May they experience such
perfect unity that the world will know that you sent me and that you
love them as much as you love me.” Yeshua already proved that He
could follow the moral laws, even the elevated moral laws that are
impossible for humans to follow fully, so now that we are a new
creation and He is in us and we are in Him and He is in the Father
our nature is changed to His nature and
we“are
being transformed into his image” 2 Cor 3:18 and
so as He followed the moral laws, we too can follow these laws and
these laws will actually be second nature to us IF we totally and
completely subject ourselves to His control.
Now,
we have talked about the moral laws, how they were elevated by Yeshua
and how as a new creation in Him we can, by His nature in us, follow
even these elevated laws. But how did Yeshua effect the the
separation laws? Okay,
the first time that I am aware that this was directly discussed in
the new testament was in Acts 10:10-15 where it states that Peter
“fell into a trance; and he saw the sky 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 air. A
voice came to him, “Get up, Peter, kill and eat!” But Peter said,
“By no means, Lord, for I have never eaten anything unholy and
unclean.” Again a voice came
to him a second time, 'What God has cleansed, no longer
consider
unholy'.” So, we have a vision of a sheet being lowered from heaven
with all of the animals that God had called “Unclean” in the old
testament and Yeshua
himself
saying “Kill and eat, what God has cleansed do not call unclean
anymore” Now, many will say this actually has nothing to do with
animals at all and that God was using the example of the unclean
animals as a metaphor for the non-Jewish people. While it is true
that this was indeed a metaphor for the gentiles, we really have to
examine how metaphors were used by Yeshua to understand this vision
fully.
Yeshua
used truths of nature and truths of human nature and truths of
situations as metaphors to demonstrate spiritual truths. In
other words he never used untruths or half truths to demonstrate
spiritual truths. So, knowing this we can state with absolute
certainty that when He said “what
God has cleansed no longer consider unclean” that
not
only was He stating that He has cleansed the non-Jewish people, but
that He has also cleansed the animals formerly forbidden. Paul
also confirms this when he states “do not let anyone judge you by
what you eat
or drink,
or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a
Sabbath day. These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the
reality, however, is found in the anointed one.” You see the
separation laws were the shadow, an earthly example of the spiritual
separation from the world that we would encounter through Yeshua.
So,
in summing this up,
1
Yeshua the anointed one fully completed sacrificial law through His
sacrifice.
2
He elevated moral law so that when we, through Him as a new creation,
are able to live by that elevated moral law which is not humanly
possible, He will be glorified.
3
He has made the shadow, or physical example of the separation law, a
spiritual reality, meaning that our separation from the world is no
longer “Do not eat, do not touch, do this, do not
do
that” but rather is a transformation into a new being that is
spiritually separated from the world.
One
last closing thought. Many will point to scriptures that say that
these
laws will never end. This is true. But you have to look at it as two
different systems. The first system will last as long as the earth
lasts and the people who are in that system will be under that
system. But the second system doesn't change the first system, it
changes the people into a new creation and therefore they are under a
new system. A system that doesn't ignore the first system, but one
that takes the first system and
elevates it to a new level that could never happen under the first
system. Fallen mankind are forever under the first system, but if
they accept Yeshua the anointed one and follow Him they will become a
new creation and be transformed into a new system, a more perfect
system.
“Yeshua
the anointed one has a more excellent ministry, because he is
mediator of a better covenant, which is established on the footing of
better promises.” Hebrews 8:6
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