The Law

Faith and works.  Law and grace.  This is the age-old battle between God and man-made religion that started not when Martin Luther nailed his Ninety-five Theses to the door of All Saints’ Church in Wittenberg, but long, long before—in the Garden of Eden, in the beginning, in fact.  This is a mega-post (so grab some coffee!), but please stick through to the end, because there is a blessing herein that the receptive heart will receive.  And please share with anyone you know, religious or otherwise, who is far from God.

Was there law in Eden?  No, there was grace, but there was a caveat, a single warning: “Do not eat the fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, for in the day you eat of it, you will die.”  The Garden, initially, was a place of grace where man and God had an intimate, trusting relationship like that between best friends or a father and his son.  It was familial and not based on do’s and don’ts, because in an intimate, trusting relationship of love, there is simply no need for do’s and don’ts.

People who love one another—in the biblical sense of agapé—will never harm the other.  The relationship with perfect love is a perfect relationship.  Does the elder son, mature and well-disciplined, need the rules and structure of the younger?  Does he need to be told to look both ways when he crosses the street and to eat his vegetables?  Does he need a strict curfew?  Does he need timeouts?  Does he need the rod?  Of course not.  The well-disciplined son is free and can be trusted because he has learned through discipline that his father is trustworthy.  This son has matured beyond the elementary rules (spiritual milk) and now walks in love for his father and so their relationship is no longer based on rules (for the child’s safety), but on love.

But what about the rebellious and undisciplined son?  Regardless of his age, he needs rules and lots of them.  The rules are meant to steer him back to repentance.  But the ultimate goal of repentance—and this is what so many simply misunderstand (besides misunderstanding what biblical repentance actually means; “to change one’s mind and heart, to convert”)—is not to cause the son to keep all the rules, but to cause the son to return to a loving, trusting relationship, because the loving, trusting son needs no rules.  The rules were never the goal or intent, because a rule-based relationship is an imperfect relationship.  It is fundamentally broken.  Rules imply a rule-breaker and someone willing to break trust.

The rebellious son must learn that he has the freedom to rebel, but not freedom from consequence.  Perhaps he remains rebellious into adulthood and goes out like the prodigal.  His rebellion will ultimately lead to death, whether from drugs, or from violence, or from recklessness.  And this is why his father gave him rules meant for a child, because he wanted his son to finally realize he had gone his own way, and the only way back was for his son to start trusting and loving again—to return to a relationship where rules are unnecessary.

The trusting son lives in Eden, but the untrusting son lives in Nod.

God warned Adam and Eve not to eat the fruit because the fruit was poison.  But they rebelled anyway and by eating the fruit their genome was fundamentally corrupted (and that corruption was passed down to all their descendants).  But God can heal physical corruption.  He can restore sight to the blind, make the deaf hear, and cleanse the leper, with just a word.

The bigger problem was in the heart.  Their decision to eat the fruit in disregard of God’s command was evidence of a faith problem.  It wasn’t merely the outward action of eating the fruit, but the greater, inward problem of unbelief.  When our first parents ate the fruit they became unbelievers and unbelievers die.  It is unbelievers (not lawbreakers) who are ultimately cut off (see Heb. 3–4).  Lawbreakers can be forgiven.  Lawbreakers can be restored.  Unbelievers cannot, unless, with breath still in their lungs, they start to believe.

Let’s take a look at God’s original command in Genesis 2:17:

But you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; for in the day that you eat of it, you will surely die.

Now I want you to make two careful observations, because a number of modern translations (though not all) twist this verse and satan is the craftiest twister of all.  A number of translations replace “in the day” with “when” or “if.”  That implies a direct connection between death and the fruit.  But that’s not what the text says.  The Hebrew for that first underlined section is yom (“day”), which is a period of time, usually referring to 24-hours, but not just a moment.  So here is what you need to note:

1. God warned Adam that the consequence would occur during that day, not necessarily at the very moment of eating the fruit.  Why?  Because, I would argue, the death occurred when they were deceived.  They died when they stopped believing God.  Unbelievers are cut off, but believers stand firm through faith.  That is the thorough, Genesis to Revelation testimony of Scripture.

2. God indeed promised that they would die (in the Hebrew, literally “dying you die”).  And their death would happen that very day.  Yet there they were after eating the fruit, running through the Garden for cover.  It doesn’t seem like they actually died.  Was God’s warning untrue?

Absolutely not.  They indeed died.  Their spirits died that very day.  But their bodies remained on.  The result of unbelief was spiritual death.  But the physical result of eating the fruit, the evidence of their unbelief, was a permanently corrupted genome making them and all their descendants prone to sin.  Human depravity quickly set in.

Their spirits were dead, but their now diseased bodies and souls still lived (“soul” in the Bible can take on two meanings: 1. both the whole living person, complete with physical and spiritual aspects; and 2. the consciousness/sentience of a person–the mind, will, and emotions; thus a person is composed of a body, a soul, and a spirit; c.f. 1 Thess. 5:23; Heb. 4:12).

And this is where the age-old battle began.  God purposed in His heart to save, at ultimate cost to Himself, these stillborn children who had suffered spiritual death.  He would raise them from the dead, both physically and spiritually.  And the plan, though made before the foundation of the world (1 Pt. 1:18–20; Eph. 1:4), began to be revealed in Genesis 3:

And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed.  He will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.

In Genesis 3:15 God reveals that Eve will have seed—a male descendant—whom will destroy the serpent who deceived her, but this male descendant will be injured in the process (as an aside, this prophecy likely extends to the next verse, as well, which you can read more about here).

God promises a Redeemer.

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A Covering that Doesn’t Cover

What happened right before God’s initial promise of a Redeemer?  Adam and Eve’s eyes were opened to evil and they ran and hid to cover the shame of their nakedness:

Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves. (Genesis 3:7)

They sewed fig leaves to cover themselves.  This is where man-made religion began.  Through their own effort and toil they made something that they thought would make them sufficiently right with God again.  They thought their fig-leaf garments would cover their shame.  But this only demonstrated that their deadly unbelief remained.  They still didn’t trust God, for if they had repented they would have gone to God as they were—naked, ashamed, and all—and asked Him to fix what they had broken.

But God, who loves sinners, intervened despite their present unbelief.  He promised a Redeemer.  He unveiled a plan.  And He sealed the plan with what may have been the second Christophany (a pre-incarnate appearance of Christ; the first being God walking around in the Garden in Genesis 3:8).  God slaughtered an animal Himself:

The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them. (Genesis 3:21)

And

And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. (Revelation 13:8)

Now, to be absolutely clear, the atonement happened on the cross many thousands of years later and Christ was not yet incarnate, but God signified it beforehand at the very foundation of the world with the very first animal sacrifice.

A sacrifice is something offered for another and only a sacrifice on God’s part would be sufficient to really make right what Adam and Eve had done.  Their own works (the fig leaves) would simply not do.  It had to be God’s work and it had to be a sacrifice.  And when they allowed God to clothe them, we see what may have been the first moment of repentance (“change of mind and heart”) and belief.  They were now holding out hope for their coming Redeemer.

The story of faith and works continues in Genesis 4.  The serpent was told that the woman would have seed, but so would he.  All human descendants of Adam and Eve have either been believers (seed of the woman) or unbelievers (seed of the serpent).  And these descendants have been at enmity throughout the history of the world.

Adam’s firstborn, Cain, was an unbeliever.  He hated his younger brother Abel because Abel found God’s favor.  Cain offered the fruit of his own labor (Gen. 4:3), but Abel offered animal sacrifice (Gen. 4:4; perhaps a testimony of Abel’s remembrance of what God did years before to clothe his parents).  Abel recognized that God wasn’t interested in labor and vegetables, but in atonement and faith.  Abel believed God, and thus according to Christ, was the world’s very first prophet (Lk. 11:50–51).  Through his actions, he prophesied of the need for atonement.  He foretold us all that we need to stop going our own way, in our own labors, and return to the One who made us all.  He became a template for all future prophets who would proclaim God’s perfect standard of righteousness.  On some level he knew that the Redeemer would come.  He held fast through faith.

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Why Was the Law Given?

Man-made religion and any mixing of works into the salvation equation is to rebuild what Christ tore down through the shedding of His own blood.  So let’s cut to the chase: why was the Law of Moses given?  God’s word tells us:

Therefore no one will be justified in His sight by works of the Law.  For the Law merely brings awareness of sin. (Romans 3:20)

Now the law came in to increase the trespass, but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more. (Romans 5:20)

Why then was the Law given?  It was added because of transgressions, until the arrival of the seed to whom the promise referred.  It was administered through angels by a mediator. (Galatians 3:19)

So the law was our guardian until Christ came that we might be justified by faith.  Now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian. (Galatians 3:24–25)

Many people caught up in the Roman Catholic, Hebrew-Roots, and Christian-cult systems fundamentally misunderstand these simple precepts.  Oh, that they would be given eyes to see!  Please LORD, let them see!  Why was the Law given?  It all boils down to this: 1. To condemn us, and 2. To point us to Christ.  The Law was never given to bring us life, make us holy, or restore us to God.  The Law is holy and its commandments holy, righteous, and good (Rom. 7:12) and we, like Paul, uphold its unchanging and holy standard (Rom. 3:31), but we are no longer under it (Rom. 6:14; 7:4–6; 8:2; Gal. 5:18), because we are under grace.  We believe, as Abel did, that our own produce is unacceptable.  What is acceptable is the sacrifice.  And the sacrifice we’ve been given is Christ—the redeeming seed promised to both Eve (Gen. 3:15) and Abraham (Gen. 12:7; 13:15; 24:7).

Why would God want to condemn us by exposing our exceeding sinfulness?  Because we stood condemned already through unbelief.  And He used the Law to show us our need.  Those who think they are justified in any sense by the Law misunderstand the Law and how stringent it actually is.  It isn’t something to be kept partially, but fully.  It condemns you and everyone under it.  If you think you keep it then you have deceived yourself and are a liar.

Through faith we know that any imperfection in us, any sin, any iniquity, is atoned for in His blood.  And through faith in Him we are restored to God.  Though the Law is holy, righteous, and good, we no longer have need of it because a greater law has come, which is the law of Christ.

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A Warning

Hear me, all of you who give lip service to Christ and the forgiveness of sins, but your self-righteous works (and many open declarations attacking grace) testify to the world that you don’t believe in either.  You are indeed under the Law and will be condemned by it unless you repent.  It’s to you that this was written:

If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God.  Anyone who rejected the law of Moses died without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses.  How much more severely do you think someone deserves to be punished who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, who has treated as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that sanctified them, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace?  For we know Him who said, ‘It is Mine to avenge; I will repay,’ and again, ‘The Lord will judge His people.’  It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. (Hebrews 10:26–31)

Outside of James 2, no passage of Scripture is more severely twisted by our common adversary.  The deliberate sin spoken of in Hebrews 10 is shrinking back from God in unbelief, which is to reject the only available sacrifice for sins, and to embrace or mix in the Law thinking that the Law makes you right with God.  Only Christ can make you right with God.  He is the One greater than Moses (Heb. 3:3), the One greater than the Law (Mk. 2:27–28), the One whose covenant is far superior to the covenant made on Sinai (Heb. 8:6; Gal. 4:21–31).

Now I want you to read everything else in Hebrews 10 and you’ll never see those above six verses the same way again.

The law is only a shadow of the good things that are coming—not the realities themselves. For this reason it can never, by the same sacrifices repeated endlessly year after year, make perfect those who draw near to worship.  Otherwise, would they not have stopped being offered?  For the worshipers would have been cleansed once for all, and would no longer have felt guilty for their sins.  But those sacrifices are an annual reminder of sins.  It is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.

Therefore, when Christ came into the world, He said:

‘Sacrifice and offering You did not desire,
   but a body You prepared for Me;
with burnt offerings and sin offerings
   You were not pleased.’
Then I said, ‘Here I am—it is written about Me in the scroll—
   I have come to do Your will, My God.’

First He said, ‘Sacrifices and offerings, burnt offerings and sin offerings You did not desire, nor were You pleased with them’—though they were offered in accordance with the law.  Then He said, ‘Here I am, I have come to do Your will.’  He sets aside the first to establish the second.  And by that will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties; again and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins.  But when this Priest had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, He sat down at the right hand of God, and since that time He waits for His enemies to be made His footstool.  For by one sacrifice He has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.

The Holy Spirit also testifies to us about this. First He says:

‘This is the covenant I will make with them
   after that time, says the Lord.
I will put My laws in their hearts,
   and I will write them on their minds.’

Then He adds:

‘Their sins and lawless acts
   I will remember no more.’

And where these have been forgiven, sacrifice for sin is no longer necessary.

Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, His body, and since we have a Great Priest over the house of God, let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water.  Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for He who promised is faithful.  And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

[VV. 26–31: Don’t continue the sin of shrinking back in unbelief like your ancestors.  Don’t choose something other than Christ’s sacrifice.  His is the only sacrifice for sins.]

Remember those earlier days after you had received the light, when you endured in a great conflict full of suffering.  Sometimes you were publicly exposed to insult and persecution; at other times you stood side by side with those who were so treated.  You suffered along with those in prison and joyfully accepted the confiscation of your property, because you knew that you yourselves had better and lasting possessions.  So do not throw away your confidence; it will be richly rewarded.

You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what He has promised.  For,

‘In just a little while, He who is coming will come and will not delay.’

And,

‘But my righteous one will live by faith.  And I take no pleasure in the one who shrinks back.’

But we do not belong to those who shrink back and are destroyed, but to those who have faith and are saved.

Am I telling you to break the Law?  By no means.  Again, we uphold the holy standard of the Law.  But we are not made righteous by it.  Our righteousness comes from Christ through faith.  We are not under the Law (Torah).  The law we are under is the law of love, because we are sons and daughters who have returned to the Father’s house.  We acknowledge our need for Him and freely choose to love Him and to be loved by Him.  And so our works are not for salvation, but as free will offerings to the One who died for us while we were yet sinners.  We love because He first loved us, and all the commandments are summed up in this:

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength; and love your neighbor as yourself.

We do not love to be saved, we love because we are saved.  Just as Adam and Eve had one commandment in the Garden—not to eat the forbidden fruit—and their disobedience of unbelief brought death, so now all men and women everywhere have one necessary commandment, as well:

Then they asked Him, ‘What must we do to do the works God requires?’

Jesus answered, ‘The work of God is this: to believe in the One He has sent.’ (John 6:28–29)

Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the Name of God’s one and only Son. (John 3:18)

You can either believe in Him who died for your sins, or you can believe in yourself and the fruits you offer to God, but you cannot believe in both.  Walking the fence of faith and works is what makes you lukewarm (Rev. 3:14–22), fallen from grace (Gal. 5:4; Rom. 11:6), and in need of being washed in the Lamb’s blood during the Tribulation (Rev. 7:13–14).  Don’t make the simple mistake of rejecting God’s gift.

Because of Christ’s atoning sacrifice we are now free, having been liberated from the Law and its many requirements, and now are faced with just one choice, just as Adam and Eve once were.  The choice is Christ and Him crucified or something else.

Will you make the right choice?  Will you be restored to God, returning to Him as a son into the arms of a loving father, or will you shrink back in unbelief, believing falsely that He is a hard master who owes you your due?

He doesn’t owe you anything, yet has offered you everything.  Take the gift.  Return to the Father.  You can be like Abel and Jacob, or you can be like Cain and Esau.  But you must decide.

But He was pierced for our transgressions,
   He was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was on Him,
   and by His wounds we are healed.
We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
   each of us has turned to our own way;
and the Lord has laid on Him
   the iniquity of us all. (Isaiah 53:5–6)

I have blotted out your transgressions like a cloud, and your sins like a mist.  Return to Me, for I have redeemed you. (Isaiah 44:22)

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Dividing Faith, Law, and Works

By making it through all of this, my hope and desperate prayer is that God is illuminating your spirit.  Thank you for taking the time to read through this lengthy discourse and I pray you will now see it through to the end.  This section was prepared by a brother in our community and the credit goes to him for the diligent time spent to make it.  This is a detailed summary of what the New Testament says about the Law (with some Old Testament background):


Leviticus:

• All the commandments must be kept [Lev. 26:14–15; see also Numbers 15:39–40, Deut. 5:29–30].

Deuteronomy:

• The Law cannot be added to or broken up (Deut. 4:2; 12:32) [meaning there is no “moral law, civil law, and ceremonial law,” there is only “the Law,” which is made up of 613 Commandments].
• 42 verses in Deuteronomy indicate that Israel’s blessing depended on them keeping all the commandments perfectly.

Matthew:

• Under the Law, hatred or reviling is murder and lust is adultery (Mt. 5:21–28).
• “You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind” is part of the Law (Mt. 22:36–37, Lk. 10:26–27, Deut. 6:5).

Acts:

• The Jews did not keep the Law (Acts 7:51–53).
• The Law is a yoke that the Jews couldn’t carry (Acts 15:10).

Romans:

• The Law brings knowledge of sin but cannot justify (Rom. 3:20).
• The promise to Abraham was by faith, not the Law (Rom. 4:13–14).
• The Law brings wrath (Rom. 4:15).
• Sin is not counted when there is no Law (Rom. 5:13).
• The Law increases sin (Rom. 5:20).
• Faith places one under grace, not under the Law (Rom. 6:14).
• Christians have become dead to the Law by the body of Christ (Rom. 7:1–4).
• When the Jews were seeking to be justified by the law, the sin aroused by it produced death (Rom. 7:5).
• We have been delivered from the Law (Rom. 7:6).
• The Law is holy but cannot make you holy (Rom. 7:7–12).
• The Law is not sin; but it shows us what sin is and arouses it in us (Rom. 7:7).
• Apart from the Law sin was dead; but under the Law, sinful desire is produced (Rom. 7:8).
• When there is no Law, there is life; when there is Law, sin revives and results in death [i.e., misery, “lack of real life…the power of doing right, of confidence in God and the hope of future blessedness” according to Thayer’s Greek Lexicon] (Rom. 7:9).
• The Law is appointed for life but only brings death due to our sin (Rom. 7:10).
• The Law produces death, making one exceedingly sinful (Rom. 7:13).
• Attempting to be righteous by Law is equated with the flesh and the carnal mind; and is contrasted with the Spirit which is of faith in Christ’s imputed righteousness, which is received by that faith (Rom. 8:1–13).
• The Law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made us free from the law of sin and death (Rom. 8:2).
• The Law is weak through the flesh (Rom. 8:3).
• The Law is not fulfilled through the flesh; but through the Spirit (Rom. 8:4).
• Those in the flesh [unbelievers] focus on the flesh [and by implication, attempt to be righteous by their own efforts] those in the Spirit [believers] focus on the Spirit [and are righteous through faith] (Rom. 8:5).
• The flesh [and by implication, the attempt to be made righteous by the Law] is carnally minded, and results in death [i.e. misery]; but life and peace comes through faith [i.e. trusting in Christ] (Rom. 8:6).
• The carnal mind is opposed to God, and cannot meet the high standards of the Law (Rom. 8:7).
• Christians are not indebted to live according to the flesh [i.e. by the works of the Law] (Rom. 8:12).
• Living according to the flesh’s work results in death (Rom. 8:13).
• The concept illustrated in verses 1–13 is that an attempt to be righteous by the Law is an attempt to be made righteous by one’s own performance, and is motivated by a mind centered on the flesh (first birth, born from Adam) and it’s works in this world, doomed to fail, and only by the Spirit, given at the moment of faith in Christ’s finished work (second birth, born of the Spirit), is one righteous; having joy and peace.
• Israel attempted to establish their own righteousness through the Law; faith in Christ is the end of the Law for righteousness (Rom. 10:1–4).

1 Corinthians:

• The strength of sin is the Law (1 Cor. 15:56).

2 Corinthians:

• The Law written on stones (10 Commandments, i.e. “the moral law”) is a ministry of death (2 Cor. 3:7).
• Those commandments are a ministry of condemnation (2 Cor. 3:9).
• The Law has no glory at all in comparison to the New Covenant (2 Cor. 3:10).
• The Law is passing away (2 Cor. 3:11).
• Attempting to be righteous by the Law produced a veil over the hearts of the Jews that is taken away in Christ (2 Cor. 3:13–15).

Galatians:

• Placing the burden of the Law onto people turns you away from God, and perverts the genuine Gospel into a false one; and Paul wishes that those who preach a perversion of the Gospel be accursed [disliked, scorned, spurned] (Gal. 1:6–9).
• The Law does not justify (make one innocent) (Gal. 2:16).
• Christians are dead to the Law (Gal. 2:19).
• If righteousness came through the Law Christ died for no reason (Gal. 2:21).
• Going back to the Law is not believing the truth (Gal. 3:1).
• Living according to the Law is attempting to be perfected through the flesh (Gal. 3:2–3).
• The Law curses all who practice it and fail to do it perfectly (Gal. 3:10).
• The Law is not of faith (Gal. 3:12) [see also Romans 14:23, “that which is not of faith is sin”; these verses imply that attempting to be righteous by works of the Law is sin].
• Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law (Gal. 3:13).
• The Law had nothing to do with the promise of God to Abraham to be a father of the Seed of many people, i.e. Christ (Gal. 3:18) [see Gen. 15:5].
• The Law functioned in God’s purpose as an Instructor from Moses to John the Baptist in order to preserve the Jews until Christ (Gal. 3:16–23).
• The Law is not against the promise of the Savior; because if a law could give [eternal] life—which it can’t—then the Law could make someone righteous before God [and Christ would be unnecessary] (Gal. 3:21).
• The Law was an instructor, to bring us to Christ, but after Christ, there is no longer an instructor (Gal. 3:24–25).
• The Law (first covenant) gave birth to bondage (Gal. 4:24).
• We are not children of the Law (Gal. 4:31).
• Do not be yoked by the bondage that is the Law (Gal. 5:1).
• Following one part of the Law puts you in debt to follow the entire Law (Gal. 5:3).
• Christ is of no effect to those who try to be saved by the Law (Gal. 5:4).
• In 5:9, “A little leaven leavens the entire lump”–leaven represents the sin of pride, which infects the entire lump of dough when introduced—the implication of this analogy in this context is that inserting a requirement the Law to be justified is an act of pride which taints the Gospel.

Ephesians:

• Christ has abolished the Law, making peace with God for us (Eph. 2:15).

Philippians:

• Paul associates the law to the flesh and considers what it gained him as “skybalon” which is a vulgar Greek word equivalent to “crap” (Phil. 3:4–8).

Colossians:

• The Law was against us, and was erased at the cross (Col. 2:14).

1 Timothy:

• The Law is good if used correctly–but it’s correct use is not for the righteous [believers] but for the unrighteous [nonbelievers] (1 Tim. 1:8–9) [see also Matthew 5:21–28].

Hebrews:

• The Law and Commandments were “fleshy” (Heb. 7:16).
• The Law was weak and made nothing perfect (Heb. 7:18–19).
• The Law was faulty and needed a better Covenant (Heb. 8:7–8).
• The Law is obsolete, old, and ready to vanish (Heb. 8:13).
• The rituals by the OT priests were done because the way into the holy place [i.e. Christ] wasn’t opened yet (Heb. 9:8).
• The OT sacrifices could not help the conscience of the worshiper (Heb. 9:9).
• The OT sacrifices were only imposed “until the time of reformation” [i.e., the cross] (Heb. 9:10).
• The Law is only a shadow of Christ and could never make someone perfect (Heb. 10:1).

James:

• If you try to be righteous by the Law, and fail at one part, you are guilty of breaking all of it (Jas. 2:10) [see also Ezekiel 33:13].

1 John:

• Sin is transgression of the Law (1 Jn. 3:4) [Note: it thus stands to reason from this verse that the phrase “turn from sin” used in a Gospel presentation as a prerequisite for salvation and as a necessary result of salvation is mistaken (see here).  “Turn from sin” is a phrase that carries the implication that living according to the Law must be done for salvation–note also that this phrase is not the literal definition of the Greek word for “repent,” which is “metanoia,” and literally means “change of opinion.”  God “repents” (metanoia) several times in older translations of the English Old Testament and in the Greek translation that Christ and His disciples used (Ex. 32:12, Deut. 32:36, Ps. 90:13; 110:4; 135:14; Jer 4:28; 18:8; 26:3, 26:13; 42:10; and Eze 24:14), thus the English meaning of “repent” has likely changed, as well].

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Conclusion

In the beginning there was grace, paradise, trust and intimacy with God, and a rule-less life governed by love.  There was just one thing to maintain and that was faith in God evidenced by obeying His single commandment.  And there was the Tree of Life and God walking among us.

And then our first parents broke faith.  Their spirits were cut off through unbelief and their bodies became permanently corrupted by the forbidden fruit.  And God had to put a plan of salvation in place that would come at ultimate cost to Himself—the death of His own Son signified from the foundation of the world by prophecy (Gen. 3:15) and the sacrifice of an animal to clothe our first parents’ shame (Gen. 3:21; Rev. 13:8).

The plan progressed further when God promised to Abraham the same Seed that was promised in Genesis 3:15.  Abraham’s faith in God’s promise was counted as righteousness without works of the Law, and outside of the Law’s demands.

And then several centuries later, God established the holy, but inferior covenant of Law, with the Israelites and all of those who would be joined to them.  This covenant of death was given for the express purpose of condemning all under sin.  It was established to show that 1. No one is righteous, not even one, and 2. All have wandered and must return to God.  It foreshadowed the greater reality yet to come in Christ (Heb. 10:1).

The Law remains holy and righteous and just, but it has served its purpose.  Christ did not abolish it, but He fulfilled all of its demands on our behalf so that we, who could never fulfill its demands (either before faith or after), could be saved and be free—returning to the familial relationship of father and son, and so that we could obtain the perfect righteousness that is not our own.  This is imputed righteousness (Gen. 15:6; Rom. 4:5–6; 10:4; 2 Cor. 5:21; Phil. 3:9).  We who are being sanctified have already been made perfect forever (Heb. 10:14).

The reason Scripture so sternly warns against trusting in anything other than Christ for salvation (Heb. 10) or mixing law and grace (Rom. 11:6; Gal. 5:4), is not because God hates works and doing good, but because trusting in the Law (or anything other than Christ) is plain evidence that a person is an unbeliever.  And unbelievers are cut off, because spiritual life comes through faith alone.  Christ Himself is the source of life for all men and women.  To believe in anything other than Him is to reject the Life—whether that be believing in pagan gods or no gods, or, believing in oneself and one’s works.  Without faith it is impossible to please Him (Heb. 11:6), and everything not from faith is sin (Rom. 14:23).  Many of those who claim allegiance to the Name of Christ have rebuilt what He has already torn down through their works-based systems.  They are unbelievers and many are deceived and are not part of the family of God.

Grace is not permission to sin or encouragement to sin, it is forgiveness of all sin, and restoration to God.  Sin is always wrong and that’s why the cross was necessary.  The antinomians who reject the Law or even the very concept of sin are also unbelievers because they necessarily reject the need for atonement and thus reject the cross (whether or not they pay homage to it with their words).  It’s vitally important to recognize that liberal theology (universalism, pseudo-universalism, antinomianism, and demythologization) can be just as deadly as legalism, because both sides are ultimately rejecting Christ and the gospel.  See more about this here.

We have now come full circle.  When you trust on Christ for salvation you have returned to your Father and you are free.  Your life is no longer governed by do’s and don’ts, but by love and the Spirit.  You have returned to a relationship with God like what Adam and Eve had before the Fall.  And you are promised the things given to them, but only much more so: eternal life, paradise, intimacy with God, freedom, inheritance, spiritual blessing, and access to the Tree of Life.

Living under the Law or mixing law and grace is to remain under the elementary principles of the world.  It is to live in the middle of the Bible, before the cross, rather than at the end in paradise.  It is to disbelieve God’s promises and to rely on the inferior covenant in lieu of the greater and final covenant that has come—the New Covenant made in God’s own blood.

Today is the day to choose the Life that is freely offered to you, because the door to the Ark is quickly closing.

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