Dietary laws, do you keep them?

[Soyeong]

Righteous works of the Law (such as dietary restrictions, circumcision, or worship on particular days) at first glance seem to have wisdom and an aura of pleasing God by performing them.

And these things are addictive while subtlety convincing you of your own self righteousness.

However....they are actually taking you further from your goal of fellowship with Jesus. Because that's the ultimate goal we wish to obtain.

Fellowship with Jesus can only be obtained with humility by exercises of agape love and faith towards God and your neighbor. (Which is what the law focused on in another time in history)

So....eat a bacon cheeseburger without guilt....wash it down with a beer and smile....be ready to give an answer for that sort of faith. One that has extreme confidence in what God has said He will do to those who love him and your neighbor.

In Romans 3:27, Paul contrasted a law of works with a law of faith, so "works of the law" are of works while he said in Romans 3:31 that our faith upholds the Law of God, so it is of faith. Likewise, Paul said that our faith upholds the Law of God in contrast with saying in Galatians 3:10-12 that works of the law are not faith. God is trustworthy, therefore His law is also trustworthy (Psalms 19:7), so the way to trust God is by obediently trusting in His instructions, it is contradictory for someone to think that we should trust God, but not His instructions, and to think that God's instructions are not of faith/untrustworthy is to deny the faithfulness/trustworthiness of God. If trusting in God's instructions leads us father away from our goal, then you are saying that God is misleading us and is untrustworthy.

Something that we do on our own does not involve trusting in anyone else, so it is contradictory to think that we can become self-righteous by obediently trusting in God's instructions. If God's law were His instructions for how to become self-righteous and God does not want us to become self-righteous, then it would follow that God therefore wants to be disobeyed, which is absurd, especially consider that all throughout the Bible, God called for His children to repent and to return to obedience to His law. Therefore, God's law is not His instructions for how to become self-righteous, but rather it is His instructions for how to testify about His righteousness. Likewise, our good works in obedience to God's law were not commanded for the purpose of establishing our own goodness, but to teach us how to testify about God's goodness, which is why our good works bring glory to Him (Matthew 5:16), and by testifying about God's goodness, we are also expressing the belief that God is good, or in other words, we are believing in Him, and the same is true of God's other character traits.

God's word is His instructions for how to have fellowship with God's word made flesh and it is contradictory for someone to have faith in God's word made flesh, but not in God's word. the Bible repeatedly states in both the OT and the NT that the way to love God is by obeying His commandments, so it is contradictory to love God instead of obeying His commandments.

Sin is the transgression of God's law (1 John 3:4) and God's law prohibits eating unclean animals, so it is therefore a sin to do that. Moreover, in Deuteronomy 4:2, it is a sin to add to or subtract from God's law, so it is also a sin to claim that it is not a sin to eat unclean animals.

 

[JohnDB]

In Romans 3:27, Paul contrasted a law of works with a law of faith, so "works of the law" are of works while he said in Romans 3:31 that our faith upholds the Law of God, so it is of faith. Likewise, Paul said that our faith upholds the Law of God in contrast with saying in Galatians 3:10-12 that works of the law are not faith. God is trustworthy, therefore His law is also trustworthy (Psalms 19:7), so the way to trust God is by obediently trusting in His instructions, it is contradictory for someone to think that we should trust God, but not His instructions, and to think that God's instructions are not of faith/untrustworthy is to deny the faithfulness/trustworthiness of God. If trusting in God's instructions leads us father away from our goal, then you are saying that God is misleading us and is untrustworthy.

Something that we do on our own does not involve trusting in anyone else, so it is contradictory to think that we can become self-righteous by obediently trusting in God's instructions. If God's law were His instructions for how to become self-righteous and God does not want us to become self-righteous, then it would follow that God therefore wants to be disobeyed, which is absurd, especially consider that all throughout the Bible, God called for His children to repent and to return to obedience to His law. Therefore, God's law is not His instructions for how to become self-righteous, but rather it is His instructions for how to testify about His righteousness. Likewise, our good works in obedience to God's law were not commanded for the purpose of establishing our own goodness, but to teach us how to testify about God's goodness, which is why our good works bring glory to Him (Matthew 5:16), and by testifying about God's goodness, we are also expressing the belief that God is good, or in other words, we are believing in Him, and the same is true of God's other character traits.

God's word is His instructions for how to have fellowship with God's word made flesh and it is contradictory for someone to have faith in God's word made flesh, but not in God's word. the Bible repeatedly states in both the OT and the NT that the way to love God is by obeying His commandments, so it is contradictory to love God instead of obeying His commandments.

Sin is the transgression of God's law (1 John 3:4) and God's law prohibits eating unclean animals, so it is therefore a sin to do that. Moreover, in Deuteronomy 4:2, it is a sin to add to or subtract from God's law, so it is also a sin to claim that it is not a sin to eat unclean animals.

You should join the Olympics with that sort of mental and scripture gymnastics you just performed.

 

[Soyeong]

You should join the Olympics with that sort of mental and scripture gymnastics you just performed.

Please explain why you consider what I said to be mental gymnastics.

 

[Soyeong]

Hello Soyeong.

Here is a passage from the book of Acts that you must explain.

Acts 15:8-10
And God, who knows the heart, testified to them giving them the Holy Spirit,
just as He also did to us; and He made no distinction between us and them,
cleansing their hearts by faith. Since this is the case, why are you putting God
to the test by placing upon the neck of the disciples a yoke which neither our
forefathers nor we have been able to bear?

What is the yoke that was being placed on the shoulders of the Gentile disciples?

What is the yoke that the apostles and the forefathers had been unable to bear?

In Acts 15:1, men from Judea were wanting to require Gentiles to become circumcised in order to become saved, however, this was never the purpose for which God commanded circumcision, so the Jerusalem Council upheld God's law by correctly ruling against requiring circumcision for an incorrect reason. In Acts 15:10-11, it makes it clear that the heave burden that no one could bear was not God's law, but a means of salvation that is an an alternative to salvation by grace, namely salvation by circumcision that was proposed in Acts 15:1.

In Romans 10:5-8, it references Deuteronomy 30 as the word of faith that we proclaim in regard to proclaiming that God's law is not too difficult for us to obey and that obedience to it brings life and a blessing while disobedience brings death and a curse, so choose life! So according to these verses, do you think that we should choose life and a blessing or death and a curse? Interpreting Acts 15:10 as referring to God's law as being a heavy burden that no one could bear is denying the word of faith that we proclaim, it is calling God a liar, and it is interpreting Acts 15 as saying that Gentiles should choose death and a curse instead of life and a blessing.

In Acts 15:5, Pharisees from among the believers agreed with the men from Judea that Gentiles should obey God's law, so that is not what they were debating, rather they were debating whether Gentiles needed to become circumcised in order to become saved or whether salvation is by grace. In Matthew 4:15-23, Jesus began his ministry with the Gospel message to repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand, which was a light to the Gentiles, and God's law was how his audience knew what sin is, so repenting from our disobedience to it is a central part of the Gospel message, which is the Gospel that Peter argued in Acts 15:6-7, that Gentiles heard and believed, so he was in agreeing with the Pharisees from among the believers in Acts 15:5. In Acts 15:8-9, Peter argued that Gentiles had received the Spirit quoted many verses in my previous post that those that the Spirit has the role of leading us to obey God's law, so again, he was agreeing that Gentiles should obey God's law, but that salvation is by grace rather than by circumcision (Acts 15:10-11).

Did a Gentile need to become a Jew like Jesus was and under the law?

Christ spent his ministry teaching his followers to obey God's law by word and by example, so while Gentiles do not need to become Jews in order to become followers of Christ, Gentles can't follow Christ by refusing to follow what he taught.

No interpretation needed.

Every form of communication requires interpretation, which is why multiple people can have different understandings of the same verse.

Paul defined sin as anything that is not of faith in Jesus Christ.

Everything that is in transgression of God's law is sin (1 John 3:4), everything that is in transgression of God's law is not of faith (Matthew 23:23) and everything that is not of faith is sin (Romans 14:23), so that is not a different definition of sin.

 

[Inquisitor]

I did not admit that and you don't have grounds to accuse me of not accepting what the Bible says at face value when you cannot accept what all of the verses that I quoted that contradict your interpretation say at face value. If you hold to the truth of all of the Bible and there are verses that you read verses that appear to you to be contradicting each other, then the correct response is to think that you must have misunderstood one or more of those verses, not to pick one and reject all of the other verses that don't agree with your understanding of that verse.


Indeed, but what you are making an incorrect assumption about what the "the letter of the law" refers to and are ignoring major problems with your assumption. If the "letter of the law" refers to "correctly obeying God's instructions" and that leads to death, then that would mean that God would be misleading us and shouldn't be trusted.


God is sovereign, so the whole world is under His law and is accountable to refrain from sin, otherwise God would have no means by which to judge the world. While I agree that Christians are not under the law, Paul spoke about multiple different categories of law other than the Law of God, such as the law of sin and works of the law, so it should be worth discerning which law Paul was referring to as us not being under out of all of the categories of law that he spoke about rather than blindly assuming that he was referring to the Law of God as if it makes perfect sense to interpret a servant of God as speaking against obeying him and then to think that we should obey him instead of God. In Deuteronomy 13, the way that God instructed His children to determine that someone is a false prophet who is not speaking for Him was if they taught against obeying His law, so you are interpreting Paul in a way that makes him out to be a false prophet, but you lack the self-awareness to consider whether you have misinterpreted him.

The verse I quoted below.

2 Corinthians 3:3
Who also made us adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit;
for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.

I read the, "the letter", as the Mosaic law.

How do I know that, "the letter", means the Mosaic Law?

Well, the verse above says, "for the letter kills".

Romans 7:9-10
I was once alive apart from the Law; but when the commandment came, sin came to life,
and I died; and this commandment, which was to result in life, proved to result in death for me.

The scripture tells us directly that, "the letter kills", and, "the letter", is the law.

How do you interpret the phrase, "the letter kills", in 2 Corinthians 3:3?

 

[JohnDB]

Please explain why you consider what I said to be mental gymnastics.

Because it flat out defies the doctrines clearly laid out by Paul in Galatians, Colossians, Corinthians, Romans, John's Gospel, Matthew and the writer of Hebrews.

 

[Soyeong]

Because it flat out defies the doctrines clearly laid out by Paul in Galatians, Colossians, Corinthians, Romans, John's Gospel, Matthew and the writer of Hebrews.

I did not defy or deny any of the doctrines laid out by Paul, but rather I am in complete agreement with him.

 

[Soyeong]

The verse I quoted below.

2 Corinthians 3:3
Who also made us adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit;
for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.

I read the, "the letter", as the Mosaic law.

How do I know that, "the letter", means the Mosaic Law?

Well, the verse above says, "for the letter kills".

Romans 7:9-10
I was once alive apart from the Law; but when the commandment came, sin came to life,
and I died; and this commandment, which was to result in life, proved to result in death for me.

The scripture tells us directly that, "the letter kills", and, "the letter", is the law.[/quote]

In post #239, I quoted many verses that show that the New Covenant involves following the Mosaic Law, that showed that the Spirit has the role of leading us to obey it, and that showed that obedience to it is the way to inherit eternal life, so if you believe in the truth of all of Scripture, then you should make the case for how your interpretation of 2 Corinthians 3:6 and Romans 7:9-10 is in harmony with the verses that I quoted, but you have ignored those verses. Moreover, you are ignoring the major problem of thinking that correctly obeying God's instructions leads to death.

In Romans 7, Paul said that the Law of God is good, that he wanted to do good, that he delighted in obeying it, and that he served it with his mind, but contrasted that with the law of sin, which stirs up sinful passions in order to bear fruit unto death, which was causing him not to do the good that he wanted to, which was holding him captive, which was waging war against the law of his mind, and which he serve with his flesh, so the Law of God and the law of sin lead us in opposite directions. You are interpreting Paul as speaking against what he delighted in obeying and as if he delighted in stirring up sinful passions in order to bear fruit unto death. In Romans 7:12-13, Paul said that the Law of God is good and that it was not that which is good that brought death to him but that is what you are trying say brought death to him.

How do you interpret the phrase, "the letter kills", in 2 Corinthians 3:3?

Again, if obeying the letter of the law referred to correctly obeying what God has instructed, then that would mean that He is leading us to death, so you should have a major problem with how you are interpreting it.

The difference between the letter of the law and the spirit of the law is not in regard to following different sets of laws, but in regard to the manner in which someone follows it in regard to its intent. For example, in Leviticus 19:12, it prohibits swearing falsely by God's name, so someone who was following the spirit of the law would understand that its intent is for us to not swear falsely whereas someone who was following the letter of the law without regard to its intent would understand that we are free to swear falsely just as long as we swear by something other than God's name, which is incidentally what Jesus was criticizing the Pharisees for doing in Matthew 5:33-37.

 

[posthuman]

righteousness doesn't change, and the law is not for the righteous but for the disobedient and godless, the wicked and the sinner.

 

[SavedByBlood]

Do believers who follow Messiah even know the difference between law, statutes and ordinances? The 10 commandments are the moral law written down for our benefit. I'm not bound to statutes and ordinances that have nothing to do with the moral law of God. It does not mean I can't benefit from them time to time.

If I'm driving on a winding country road, the posted speed limit is 35MPH. I'm sure salvation will not be lost if I do 40MPH, but if I start doing 65MPH, I'm sure there will be consequences. A speeding ticket or worse yet, loss of life. I should have just taken the council of the posted speed limit, but the cartel man knew better.

When Covid was in full swing, I did not need to be told by government entities to not go to large gatherings. I considered Gods word to be a higher authority on how not to get make myself prone to getting an infectious disease and practiced reducing my contact with potentially infected people.

1 Timothy 1:8But we know that the law is good if one uses it lawfully, 9knowing this: that the law is not made for a righteous person, but for the lawless and insubordinate, for the ungodly and for sinners, for the unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers, 10for fornicators, for sodomites, for kidnappers, for liars, for perjurers, and if there is any other thing that is [c]contrary to sound doctrine, 11according to the glorious gospel of the blessed God which was committed to my trust.

I'm not under the law but I can still learn from it.
5A wise man will hear and increase learning,
And a man of understanding will attain wise counsel,

What are the scriptures if not an instruction manual from God himself?

 

[posthuman]

Do believers who follow Messiah even know the difference between law, statutes and ordinances? The 10 commandments are the moral law written down for our benefit. I'm not bound to statutes and ordinances that have nothing to do with the moral law of God. It does not mean I can't benefit from them time to time.

If I'm driving on a winding country road, the posted speed limit is 35MPH. I'm sure salvation will not be lost if I do 40MPH, but if I start doing 65MPH, I'm sure there will be consequences. A speeding ticket or worse yet, loss of life. I should have just taken the council of the posted speed limit, but the cartel man knew better.

When Covid was in full swing, I did not need to be told by government entities to not go to large gatherings. I considered Gods word to be a higher authority on how not to get make myself prone to getting an infectious disease and practiced reducing my contact with potentially infected people.

1 Timothy 1:8But we know that the law is good if one uses it lawfully, 9knowing this: that the law is not made for a righteous person, but for the lawless and insubordinate, for the ungodly and for sinners, for the unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers, 10for fornicators, for sodomites, for kidnappers, for liars, for perjurers, and if there is any other thing that is [c]contrary to sound doctrine, 11according to the glorious gospel of the blessed God which was committed to my trust.

I'm not under the law but I can still learn from it.
5A wise man will hear and increase learning,
And a man of understanding will attain wise counsel,

What are the scriptures if not an instruction manual from God himself?

The scripture does not describe the Torah as bits and pieces you can obey some of and disregard other parts of.

Both Christ and His disciples say if you are under the Law you are under all of it, and that if you break any part of it you are guilty of all of it.

This idea of breaking the Torah into 'moral law' to subject believers to and 'other laws that don't matter' is a purely human invention, albeit and old one.

 

[posthuman]

The 10 commandments are the moral law

sabbath observence is a ceremonial command, not a moral principle.

((for example))

 

[Soyeong]

righteousness doesn't change, and the law is not for the righteous but for the disobedient and godless, the wicked and the sinner.

God's righteousness is eternal (Psalms 119:142), therefore all of His laws for how to testify about His righteousness are also eternal (Psalms 119:142), so indeed the way to be a doer of righteous works does not change. While the only way for someone to become righteous is having faith that they ought to be a doer of righteous works apart from being required to have first done a certain amount of righteous works in order to earn it as the result, someone becoming righteous means that they are becoming a doer of righteous works in obedience to God's law and it would be contradictory for someone to become righteous apart from that. This is why there are verses like Isaiah 51:7 that say that the righteous are those on whose heart is God's law and 1 John 3:7, where everyone who is a doer of righteous works is righteous even as they are righteous. Those who try to abuse 1 Timothy 1:8 to say that being a doer of righteous works is not for the righteous in order to justify their freedom to be a doer of unrighteous works thereby become someone that God's law is for.

 

[Soyeong]

Do believers who follow Messiah even know the difference between law, statutes and ordinances? The 10 commandments are the moral law written down for our benefit. I'm not bound to statutes and ordinances that have nothing to do with the moral law of God. It does not mean I can't benefit from them time to time.

The existence of the moral law would imply that we can be acting morally while disobeying the laws that aren't in that category, however, therefore a no examples in the Bible where disobedience to God is described as being moral and I see no justification for thinking that it can ever be moral to disobey God. For example, do you think that someone can be acting morally while committing rape just because the command against doing that isn't listed as one of the Ten Commandments? Morality is in regard to what we ought to do and we ought to be a doer of God's character traits in obedience to Him, so all of God's laws are inherently moral laws. Legislators give laws according to what they think ought to be done in accordance with their understanding of morality, so for someone to claim that some of God's laws are not moral laws is to claim that God made a moral error about what ought to be done when He gave those laws and therefore to claim to have greater moral knowledge than God.

I'm not under the law but I can still learn from it.
5A wise man will hear and increase learning,
And a man of understanding will attain wise counsel,

What are the scriptures if not an instruction manual from God himself?

God is sovereign, so we are all under His law are are obligated to refrain from doing what He has revealed to be sin through it, otherwise God would have no grounds by which to judge the world. In Romans 6:14, it describes the law that we are not under as being a law where sin had dominion over us, which does not describe the Law of God, which is a law where holiness, righteousness, and goodness have dominion over us (Romans 7:12), but rather it is the law of sin where sin had dominion over us. In Romans 6:15, being under grace doesn't mean that we are permitted to sin, and in 1 John 3:4, sin is the transgression the Law of God, so we are still under it and are obligated to refrain from doing what it reveals to be sin. Moreover, everything else in Romans 6 speaks in favor of obedience to the Law of God and against sin.

 

[posthuman]

there are verses like Isaiah 51:7 that say that the righteous are those on whose heart is God's law

i don't think that's what this verse says..

Isaiah 51:7​

Listen to Me, you who know righteousness, You people in whose heart [is] My law: Do not fear the reproach of men, Nor be afraid of their insults.​

​

it indicates the Law is able to teach of righteousness: it does not define righteousness as internalizing the external Law.

in another place scripture speaks of those who neither have nor know the Law being righteous, that it shows the work of the Law is in their heart.

 

[SavedByBlood]

The existence of the moral law would imply that we can be acting morally while disobeying the laws that aren't in that category, however, therefore a no examples in the Bible where disobedience to God is described as being moral and I see no justification for thinking that it can ever be moral to disobey God. For example, do you think that someone can be acting morally while committing rape just because the command against doing that isn't listed as one of the Ten Commandments? Morality is in regard to what we ought to do and we ought to be a doer of God's character traits in obedience to Him, so all of God's laws are inherently moral laws. Legislators give laws according to what they think ought to be done in accordance with their understanding of morality, so for someone to claim that some of God's laws are not moral laws is to claim that God made a moral error about what ought to be done when He gave those laws and therefore to claim to have greater moral knowledge than God.


God is sovereign, so we are all under His law are are obligated to refrain from doing what He has revealed to be sin through it, otherwise God would have no grounds by which to judge the world. In Romans 6:14, it describes the law that we are not under as being a law where sin had dominion over us, which does not describe the Law of God, which is a law where holiness, righteousness, and goodness have dominion over us (Romans 7:12), but rather it is the law of sin where sin had dominion over us. In Romans 6:15, being under grace doesn't mean that we are permitted to sin, and in 1 John 3:4, sin is the transgression the Law of God, so we are still under it and are obligated to refrain from doing what it reveals to be sin. Moreover, everything else in Romans 6 speaks in favor of obedience to the Law of God and against sin.

When I speak of moral law vs ceremonial law. The Pharisees had built walls around the law of God that no permission or instruction had been given to do so. The talmud is traditions of the rabbi's, these are over reaching add ons not authorized by God. Broadening the corners of tallit, lengthening the of the tzitizit (fringes) on the corners of tallit. In other words the outside of the cup was clean but the inside was as filthy rags.

I'm in no wise a legalist, But I'm not a believer unbound by Scriptural commands of morality. I believe in Scriptural law because of Messiah not in spite of Him. Let each believer be led by what the Holy Spirit lays upon them. My past was not the best so remembering what to do and not to do is helpful to me.

I work out my salvation daily with fear and trembling.

 

[posthuman]

Those who try to abuse 1 Timothy 1:8 to say that being a doer of righteous works is not for the righteous in order to justify their freedom to be a doer of unrighteous works thereby become someone that God's law is for.

it is inevitable that those who know their salvation, and affirm their freedom, are accused of trying to justify sin.

 

[Dino246]

God is sovereign, so we are all under His law are are obligated to refrain from doing what He has revealed to be sin through it

So not stoning your adulterous neighbours is sin. Not attending the temple thrice yearly is sin. Failing to go to the priest to have that rash examined (and following his direction to the letter) is sin. Bringing a blemished lamb instead of a perfect one for the sacrifice is sin... and yes, failing to bring a lamb at all is sin.

You still are treating the Law like your personal smorgasbord instead of accepting the harsh reality that the Law is a unit, not a collection. You break a single "minor" ordinance, you have become a lawbreaker no different than if you stole your neighbour's car after attacking him without provocation.

Your only hope is Jesus Christ. Attempting to obey the Law did nothing to get you saved, and it does nothing to keep you saved.

 

[Dino246]

it is inevitable that those who know their salvation, and affirm their freedom, are accused of trying to justify sin.

Perhaps we just need to accept that our counterparts are the modern Pharisees, and stop trying to convince them how wrong they are. Their only hope is the revelation of the Father and conviction of the Holy Spirit.

 

[JohnDB]

I did not defy or deny any of the doctrines laid out by Paul, but rather I am in complete agreement with him.

Yes you do....

Even going against the words of Jesus himself.

Eating pork was not considered any different from eating lamb or vegetables with unwashed hands.

Jesus declared all foods clean.

Adherence to the law is relying upon your righteousness instead of Christ's. Pure and simple.