What are we as followers of Christ to do with the Old Testament law?  Does it hold any purpose or value for us today?  Our text today gives us some helpful insight into this question, and into how we in America in 2008 are to live as members of Christ’s Kingdom.  We have been chewing on Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount.  In this epic sermon, He teaches us about Kingdom values.  He begins by telling us we are under the favor of God as we acknowledge the truth about who we are, desperately dependent and needy people, who come to Him for grace we need for everything.  As we come to Him, at His invitation, He brings us into His Kingdom.  We are blessed as He places a hunger in us for Himself, His righteousness, and we respond to that hunger.  This is called submission to the Lordship of Jesus Christ.  Then we are blessed as we live as members of His Kingdom, in His power, which is at work within us, so we act as peacemakers, even in the midst of persecution.  Then, last week, we looked at identity statements– declarations by our Lord about who He has made us to be– salt and light.  And as we believe– faith is the key here– these identity statements, we are transformed into Kingdom agents nop matter where we go or what we do.  This morning, Jesus moves to a related but new subject, which was probably spurred on by a question from the audience, about the law of God.  In His life, Jesus perfectly obeyed the law, and by His death, He made us perfectly righteous with regard to the law.

I. How does Jesus fulfill the law?

As I have read and re-read the gospels, I have noticed a couple of things about Jesus’ perspective on the law.  First, Jesus does not talk about the law much outside of this sermon.  Almost every time the law is mentioned, it is spoken of with regard to teachers of the law, who opposed Jesus and challenged Him at every turn, which gives us a negative view of the law.  Did Jesus know the Old Testament law?  Absolutely!  He knew it.  When Jesus was a young boy, He spent time questioning the teachers of the law about its meaning, so Jesus clearly read, studied and knew the law of God.  This would lead me to believe that it is a good thing to know and study the law and to clearly understand what it says and why.

I also noticed that Jesus was seen as and called a teacher of the law Himself.  Good teacher, or Rabbi were titles spoken to Jesus and He did not correct those who used these titles.  He was a teacher of the law, which is what people meant by the title.  So, clearly, it is not the law, nor being a teacher of the law which has negative sentiment attached to it by Jesus.
Jesus makes the most powerful statement about His view of the law here in this sermon.  Jesus clearly tells his hearers that He has not come to dissolve the law or make the law ineffective.  The word chosen refers to destroy, abolish or to tear apart something which should be held together.  BUT, just the opposite, Jesus tells them He has come to fulfill or to complete the law.  Ultimately, the phrase, “law and prophets” refers to the teachings of the Old Testament, the Scriptures.  Jesus declares this to them with a solemn declaration, translated “I tell you the truth...”  He repeatedly uses this phrase to say, “Pay attention to this truth!”  Until the very heaven and earth pass away– the things which you call stable and immovable– until that day, the smallest stroke of the pen– “jot and tittle” which referred to smallest vowel markings– will certainly come to pass.  In other words, the word of the Scripture will certainly take place, every detail of them will happen just as is stated!

Jesus had a very high view of the Scriptures.  I don’t know how you think about these things, but if Jesus, my Lord and my God saw the Scriptures in this way– every detail written will come to pass– if Jesus had this high a view of the truth of the Scriptures, how can we take any other view?  I have read scholars and commentators who do all kind of things with the Scriptures to make them say things they do not say.  Many pastors in main line denominations do not believe that the Scriptures are infallible or even true.  They point out errors in them and later editorial comments, which are conclusive from their point of view.  These viewpoints have affected the church in America dramatically.  Many pulpits today are filled with pastors who do not hold the same view of the Scriptures which Jesus clearly held.  I guess Jesus was mistaken!???  Jesus, the God-man, who knew the will and heart of His Father perfectly, tells us that the Scriptures are true and will come to pass.  How can any thinking Christian take a different point of view?  This is incredibly important, because the moment we think we know better than what the Scripture teaches, because of what scholars have said about the Scriptures, at that moment, we are left without ground upon which we can stand, because we, in essence, have rejected what our Lord and Savior called true.

What then does Jesus mean when He says He has come to fulfill or complete the law?  He means He has come to accomplish everything spoken by Moses and the prophets.  Jesus completed or fulfilled every part of the ceremonial law and every part of the moral law and moral duty designed by the Father.  He lived a sinless life, perfect under the standard of the law.  If the law were placed in judgement over Jesus, He would be declared perfectly righteous and moral.  The Pharisees in Jesus’ day maligned Him for breaking the law as they interpreted it.  The reason for this is because they did not understand the law or the purpose of the law.  When Jesus allowed His disciples to break grains of wheat off in the field because they were hungry, the Pharisees said they were working on the Sabbath and so breaking the law of God.  The real problem was how the Pharisees sought to apply the law.  They made laws on their own which surrounded the law of God so they would prevent people from even coming close to breaking the law.  But they missed the whole point of the law!  Jesus interpreted the law perfectly.  He told the Pharisees that man was not made to serve the Sabbath, but God had designed the Sabbath to serve the best needs of men.  Jesus was not legalistic in the way some Christians are today.  He completely obeyed the law and perfectly knew and obeyed the will of His Father.  Because of His life, Jesus was the only person to ever live who was perfectly righteous.  Jesus was even perfectly obedient in His death on the cross, which was the will of His Father.

None of us is able to keep the law perfectly, or anywhere near perfectly!  Every day, I and you break some aspect of God’s law, especially as we understand the law as Jesus explains it.  We will look at this more closely next week.  Jesus fulfilled the law by living according to the law, and then He chose to die on the cross as the perfect sacrifice.  We are made whole, made righteous under the law as we place our faith in Jesus Christ and what He has done on the cross for us.  When God our Father looks at each of us who have placed our faith in Jesus Christ, what He sees is the blood of His Son Jesus covering all of our sin.  We are given grace to be right in God’s sight and to love the Lord with all our heart, soul, mind and strength and our neighbor as ourselves.  It is only in Jesus that this is possible.

Now, as we spoke about last week, our response is important.  We are to believe the gospel, using the faith God has given to us, and we are to live according to who we are, by His grace at work within us!

II. What is the place of the law in the New Testament?

Jesus knew the law God gave to His people, Jesus lived under the law perfectly, Jesus was called a teacher of the law, and Jesus completed or fulfilled the law of God.  From these statements, does it sound like the law is good or bad?  The law is good!  It was given to God’s people by God Himself, so they would understand His character.  It was never given so that His people could be righteous by keeping the law.  God knew before He gave the law that this would never happen.  And herein lies the mistake of many Jews.  Those who sought to establish their own righteousness by keeping the law were condemned, because this was never the purpose of the law.  The law was given to show us what God required of us, and to show us that we cannot keep the law and be righteous.  God has not changed His mind about either His character of holiness, nor about His standard of righteousness He demands from us.  His standard is still holiness!  The law shows us both what God requires and how far short we fall.  The law points us to the cross!

So what does the New Testament do and what do we do with all of this?  The New Testament calls us to be holy as our Father in heaven is holy!  We know that we don’t do this by keeping the law, because no one ever has been able to do this, and no one ever will.  We ask Jesus to forgive our sin, to make us righteous in God’s sight, and also... also to empower us to live righteous lives which line up with who we are in Christ.  The Christian life cannot be lived in our own power.  This is where most Christians fail miserably.  They ask Jesus to forgive their sin, and receive Him, believing that they are now saved, and they are.  Then they go out and live the rest of their life as they had before, not quite as ungodly in terms of outward behavior, but basically the same in terms of their mentality.  This is not the whole gospel.  The good news is that Jesus has fulfilled the law for us.  The written code was also nailed to the cross so it can no longer condemn us.  Paul tells us this in Colossians 2:13‑14, “He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross.”  When Christ was nailed to the cross, our obligation to fulfill every written ordinance, every law was done away. 

III. How are we to view the law as members of Christ’s Kingdom?

How are we to respond to the law then?  We have agreed that the law is good– Paul tells us this clearly in Romans 7:12, “So then, the law is holy, and the commandment is holy, righteous and good.”  Jesus fulfilled the ceremonial law.  What I mean by that is we no longer need to sacrifice the blood of animals as God commanded His people to do in the Old Testament.  The final sacrifice has already been made.  Hebrews 10 tells us that it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sin.  The blood of these animals was required to cover sin until the ultimate sacrifice was made by Christ to take away our sin.  When Jesus made the final blood sacrifice in the heavenly temple, there was no longer any purpose for the sacrifice of animals.  Jesus completed the ceremonial law with His own blood.  So, we no longer need to worry about the ceremonial law.

Did Jesus do away with the moral law given by God to His people?  No.  In the introduction to 1 Corinthians, listen to this greeting written by Paul,  1:2 “To the church of God in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus and called to be holy, together with all those everywhere who call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ‑ their Lord and ours...”  We are holy, which means pure in God’s sight, and we are called to be holy, which refers to our lifestyle actions.  The purpose of the law in our day is the same as it was when it was given.  The law tells us what God requires.  We know we cannot live like this on our own, so the law points us to Christ.  We need to know the law for ourselves– what God requires and why.

When speaking to non-Christians, I sometimes use the law as it was intended.  I read portions of the law to them.  When they hear it, they know they have not lived like this, especially as I begin to explain to them what is meant by each command.  These are heart commands, not outward commands.  Obedience is a matter of the heart.  When there is disobedience of any kind in our lives, it is a heart problem.  When you see rebellion in your kids, or in yourself, the issue is your heart is rebellious and God needs to work there.  So, do we discipline and train our kids in what God asks?  Absolutely!  We also pray truth into their hearts, because if one of our youth is obeying the law outwardly, but their heart is far from Christ, this does not help them.  This is why I am not legalistic.  I am free.  But I use my freedom to share Christ with others.  Those I spend time with– I do ask them how their hearts are doing, and areas they need accountability for holy living. 

Use the law as it was intended by God to be used– to point to His purity and to our need!  We need the mercy of God.  We need the grace of God to enable us to live for Him a holy life.  I want to follow Christ and to live a holy life, but only because of what He has done for me!  His love has been poured out over me!  As I embrace and receive this love, then I respond to Him, asking for His holy life to be lived through me!  That is the call to holiness.