The Old Gospel is New
Notes
Transcript
I. The Gospel According to Moses
I. The Gospel According to Moses
For Moses writes about the righteousness which is of the law, “The man who does those things shall live by them.”
A. The Righteousness of the Law
A. The Righteousness of the Law
This righteousness cannot be about gaining eternal life by doing good works - otherwise salvation would be different in the OT, something Paul rejects.
The contrast that Moses has in mind is with the laws of other nations, laws that are not good and do not promote a good life (Lev 18:1-5; Ezek 20:14-26)
B. The Righteousness by Faith
B. The Righteousness by Faith
What it does not say - it does not pretend ignorance.
But the righteousness of faith speaks in this way, “Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’ ” (that is, to bring Christ down from above) or, “ ‘Who will descend into the abyss?’ ” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead).
The quotation is taken from Deut 30:11-14. The context is specifically about obeying God, the most important command being to love Him. It is about denying excuses that they did not know, but rather the word was already something they were saying.
In the Hebrew it talks about going across the sea rather than to the abyss, but in the Israelite mind, that was much the same thing. Paul substituted a similar idea because it will help his application.
Crossing the sea and ascending to heaven were proverbial for impossible tasks
Where can I go from Your Spirit? Or where can I flee from Your presence? If I ascend into heaven, You are there; If I make my bed in hell, behold, You are there.
If I take the wings of the morning, And dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, Even there Your hand shall lead me, And Your right hand shall hold me.
2. What it does say - The Word of Faith is in your heart and mouth
But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith which we preach):
The Israelites had to believe in God’s power to punish or bless; he had to really love God and to truly profess God’s Word in faith. Not doing that is what the prophets condemned as “lip-service”.
Therefore the Lord said: “Inasmuch as these people draw near with their mouths And honor Me with their lips, But have removed their hearts far from Me, And their fear toward Me is taught by the commandment of men,
3. Then what do we make of bringing down/raising up Christ?
Paul is not saying that Moses was predicting the Messiah here - Moses did predict the Messiah (Deut 18:15), just not here, since Paul goes on to equate the Word of Faith with the Gospel. Rather, he is applying the principle to the present world when Christ has come. What has changed since Moses wrote those words is that God has spoken
God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds;
Because God has now spoken through his Son, the Word we are to believe has changed. We no longer come to God through the theocracy by believing what he has spoken through the law alone, we believe in Jesus Christ and what he has said. Since the entire quotation is about the Word of God, we cannot apply it without considering that Jesus is the Word of God incarnate. So if we today were to try to make the same ridiculous excuse, we would have to argue that The Messiah either has not come, or that he is still dead. Something people do try to argue, though it is irrational.
II. The Gospel According to Paul
II. The Gospel According to Paul
A. Its Content
A. Its Content
But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith which we preach): that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.
To confess is to solemnly declare. v.9 gives the content of Paul’s word of faith. First, that Jesus is Lord; second, that he has truly risen from the dead. Just like the Israelites had to believe God’s Word in the Law as they repeated it, so we are to believe God’s Word in Jesus Christ as we declare it. The key in either case was the faith.
B. Its Mechanism
B. Its Mechanism
For the Scripture says, “Whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame.”
This is a requotation of Isaiah 28:16, after it was already quoted in Romans 9:33. The point was that the Assyrian Army was going to come through, and that they functioned as God’s judgment on sinful Israel and Judea. But those who believed in God would be protected from God’s Judgment. We now await the judgment of God on a wicked world. Soon the world will know just how intensely God hates sin. But those who trust him will escape the wrath of God.
The application to Paul’s Word of Faith further establishes that faith is necessary to escape God’s Judgment.
C. Its Scope
C. Its Scope
For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, for the same Lord over all is rich to all who call upon Him.
Since Moses obviously wrote to Israel only, Paul needs to make the case that this promise of safety applies to everyone. He brings up this issue, and points out that God is abundantly generous with his protection and blessing for anyone who calls on him in faith.
For “whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”
This is a quotation from Joel 2:32
“And it shall come to pass afterward That I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh; Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, Your old men shall dream dreams, Your young men shall see visions. And also on My menservants and on My maidservants I will pour out My Spirit in those days. “And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth: Blood and fire and pillars of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, And the moon into blood, Before the coming of the great and awesome day of the Lord. And it shall come to pass That whoever calls on the name of the Lord Shall be saved. For in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there shall be deliverance, As the Lord has said, Among the remnant whom the Lord calls.