CHRISTIANS AND THE LAW

The Fulfillment of the Law

1. He came to fulfill all Old Testament prophecies. 2. He came to obey the Law perfectly. 3. He came to pay the penalty that the Law requires. 4. He came to fulfill the Old Testament types and shadows. 5. He came to fulfill the Law in us.

The Accomplishment of the Law

An iota is the smallest letter of the Greek alphabet. To Jesus’ Jewish hearers it would have represented the yodh, the smallest letter of the Hebrew alphabet, which looks something like an apostrophe. A dot (keraia) literally means “little horn” and refers to the small marks that help distinguish one Hebrew letter from another. It was a small extension of a letter similar to a serif in modern typefaces.

Galatians 3:19 “Why then the law? It was added because of transgressions, until the offspring should come to whom the promise had been made, and it was put in place through angels by an intermediary.”

We are no longer under the sacrificial system of the Law.

See Hebrews 10:1-14...

We are no longer under the Levitical priesthood.

Hebrews 7:11-19...

The legal punishments of the Law are no longer binding on us.

Hebrews 9:15 “Therefore he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant.”

The civil and ceremonial aspects of the Law are no longer binding on us.

See Hebrews 8:1-13...

See Hebrews 9:8–10...

Colossians 2:16–17 “Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ.”

Mark 7:19 “since it enters not his heart but his stomach, and is expelled?” (Thus he declared all foods clean.)”

Acts 15:5 “But some believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees rose up and said, “It is necessary to circumcise them and to order them to keep the law of Moses.””

Acts 15:10-11 “Now, therefore, why are you putting God to the test by placing a yoke on the neck of the disciples that neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear? But we believe that we will be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they will.””

Acts 15:19-20 “Therefore my judgment is that we should not trouble those of the Gentiles who turn to God, but should write to them to abstain from the things polluted by idols, and from sexual immorality, and from what has been strangled, and from blood.”

Galatians 4:9-11 “But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world, whose slaves you want to be once more? You observe days and months and seasons and years! I am afraid I may have labored over you in vain.”

See Romans 14:1-7...

There are moral requirements under the New Covenant.

Romans 6:14–15 “For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace. What then? Are we to sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means!”

Romans 6:1–2 “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it?”

Titus 1:13–15 “This testimony is true. Therefore rebuke them sharply, that they may be sound in the faith, not devoting themselves to Jewish myths and the commands of people who turn away from the truth. To the pure, all things are pure, but to the defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure; but both their minds and their consciences are defiled.”

See 1 Timothy 1:5-11...