The old testament is loaded with rules…..laws. I think that we pretty much accept that the law of the old testament has been superceded, at least in part, by the law of the new testament.
Love God
Love your neighbor
I believe that much of the old testament law still holds……for example, the ten commandments. Other parts of the old testament law…….not so much.
Don’t boil a baby goat in its mother’s milk.
Today I want to focus on the old testament law……. prior to the birth of Jesus.
Specifically, how did God feel about all of those rules……. before Jesus…….before the new covenant?
Before love God…..love your neighbor.
Needless to say……. I’m on thin ice here. So you should take what follows with a grain of salt.
I believe that the old testament law was important because God spends a lot of ink telling the Jewish people what they can and cannot do. This includes a very long list of crimes that call for a singularly brutal form of capital punishment…….stoning…….and that list is much longer than our modern list of capital crimes.
So, how serious was God about this list of laws…… especially the death penalty laws?
I believe that God intended for there to be some flexibility in the enforcement of the old testament law. I believe that he intended for there to be some room for mercy. This is clearly true after the arrival of Jesus……in the episode of the adulteress, whom he saved from stoning. Jesus was the epitome of mercy..
But what about before Jesus?
God clearly required flexibility…..mercy in the enforcement of the law BEFORE Jesus.
If the people of Nazareth had rigidly followed the bible………had rigidly enforced the law regarding adultery, they would have hauled Mary out to the local dump and stoned her.
God’s long range plan…….his plan to save us…..clearly required the local authorities of Nazareth to set aside the old testament law regarding adultery. Jesus often railed against legalism. He placed the law of love above all other laws. I think that this reflects God’s heart prior to Jesus as well.
So…….how do we apply this?
I think that we need to be careful when we take someone to task over a rule violation. Don’t get me wrong……the ten commandments stand. But we must be sure that we deal with people who break these rules from a posture of love. After all, God deals with me from a posture of love.
If we get angry with someone because they have an abortion, or have extramarital sex, or steal, or lie, or murder………or even invade the Ukraine……..we may very well be guilty of a greater sin than theirs. We may be guilty of violating rule number two……..love your neighbor.
In the end………..we cannot control them. We can only control how we respond to them.
We are not going to win someone over by beating them up over a broken rule.
And after all……..after loving God and each other…….isn’t that what we’re here for?
Now for the hardest part…………
Perhaps we need to pray for Putin……….
The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him.
But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.
At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. Jesus straightened up and asked her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?”
“No one, sir,” she said.
“Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin.”
Jesus, (breaking the law in an act of mercy), NIV