Who Is Under The Law?

Hi Mike,

You said in your reply to Carlton Pearson, A E Knoch, Et Al Posted October 3 2004:

“What none of these teachers see is what the scriptures reveal ‘grace’ to be. These men are all quick to quote:

Rom 5:20 Moreover the law entered, that the offense might abound. But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound:”

The truth is that they do not comprehend that statement by Paul at all. The super-exceeding grace of Romans 5: 20 is exclusively for those who were under the law and committed the offenses against the Sinai Ten Words.

Hebrews 9: 15 is irrefutable. Galatians 3: 15 confirms this to the letter. “…Brethren [I am saying this as a man], a human covenant likewise having been ratified, no one is repudiating or modifying it…”

Who gave the modern universalist ministers the right to modify Hebrews 9: 15 and give it to the non-Israelite nation’s  mistranslated “ GENTILES.”

No one else qualifies.

D____

 

Hi D____,

You state:

“The truth is that they do not comprehend that statement by Paul at all. The super-exceeding grace of Romans 5: 20 is exclusively for those who were under the law [emphasis mine] and committed the offenses against the Sinai Ten Words.

“Hebrews 9: 15 is irrefutable. Galatians 3: 15 confirms this to the letter.

“…Brethren [I am saying this as a man], a human covenant likewise having been ratified, no one is repudiating or modifying it…”

“Who gave the modern universalist ministers the right to modify Hebrews 9: 15 and give it to the non-Israelite nation’s  mistranslated “ GENTILES.”

“No one else qualifies.”

Here is Gal 3:15, which you reference to show me that “no one else qualifies” but “those who were under the law”:

Gal 3:15  Brethren, I speak after the manner of men; Though it be but a man’s covenant, yet if it be confirmed, no man disannulleth, or addeth thereto.

But you have overlooked the very point Paul is making to these Gentile Galatians and to you and to me when he tells these very same people in the very same breath:

Gal 3:23  But before faith came, we [Gentiles, Galatians] were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed.

“Speaking after the manner of men” I see your point clearly. But for all who are given to understand “the things of the spirit”, and who now “know no man after the flesh”, I submit to you the rest of this chapter:

Gal 3:16  Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ. 
Gal 3:17  And this I say, that the covenant, that was confirmed before of God in Christ, the law, which was four hundred and thirty years after, cannot disannul, that it should make the promise of none effect.
Gal 3:18  For if the inheritance be of the law, it is no more of promise: but God gave it to Abraham by promise.
Gal 3:19  Wherefore then serveth the law? It was added because of transgressions, till the seed should come to whom the promise was made; and it was ordained by angels in the hand of a mediator.
Gal 3:20  Now a mediator is not a mediator of one, but God is one.
Gal 3:21  Is the law then against the promises of God? God forbid: for if there had been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness should have been by the law.
Gal 3:22  But the scripture hath concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe. 
Gal 3:23  But before faith came, we were kept under the law [concluded so by “the scripture”, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed.
Gal 3:24  Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith.
Gal 3:25  But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster.
Gal 3:26  For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.
Gal 3:27  For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ.
Gal 3:28  There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.
Gal 3:29  And if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.

1Co 2:12  Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. [“as Isaac was are children of promise”]
1Co 2:13  Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual. 
1Co 2:14  But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

The “scripture hath [also] concluded” that a physical Jews is “not a Jew” at all, and that when Christ said “salvation is of the Jews” Rom 2:29 is “the Jews” of whom He spoke:

Rom 2:28  For he is not a Jew, which is one outwardly; neither is that circumcision, which is outward in the flesh:
Rom 2:29  But he is a Jew, which is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God.

2Co 5:16  Wherefore henceforth know we no man after the flesh: yea, though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we him no more.
2Co 5:17  Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.

Speaking to these Gentile Galatians, these “peoples of the nations”, Paul is explaining that the promises which appear to the carnal mind to be made only to Abraham and to his “one seed” Isaac, are in spiritual reality being made to Christ and those who are in Christ. It is only they who are that “one seed” to whom those promises were actually being given. He goes on to tell these Gentile Galatians:

Gal 3:26  For ye [Gentile Galatians] are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.

Gal 3:28  There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one [that “one seed… as Isaac was… Abraham’s seed”] in Christ Jesus.
Gal 3:29  And if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.

So now these Gentile Galatians and you and me and the Corinthians and “as many… as have been baptized into Christ”, are now “as Isaac was… the children of promise… Abraham’s seed… to whom the promises were made”. Those are all quotes from the scriptures.

Here it is clearly stated again in the very next chapter of this same epistle:

Gal 4:28  Now we, brethren [Gentile Galatians], as Isaac was, are the children of promise. 

Christ made this statement the night of His apprehension by the Jews:

Joh 16:12  I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. 

This is just one of the “many things” Christ’s apostles themselves could not yet bear. This sense of being someone special in mere marred flesh and blood was so strong within them all that after being commanded by the spirit to go into a Gentile’s house, and after witnessing the giving of the holy spirit to those same Gentiles, Peter still separated himself from the Gentiles at Antioch:

Gal 2:14  But when I saw that they walked not uprightly according to the truth of the gospel, I said unto Peter before them all, If thou, being a Jew, livest after the manner of Gentiles, and not as do the Jews, why compellest thou the Gentiles to live as do the Jews?

Paul himself still did not see just how inconsequential the physical pedigree of Abraham was until he was a prisoner at Rome. That is where he wrote these words which answer your question concerning who gave the authority to give the promises of Abraham to the Gentiles. That was not done by any man, rather it was done by the holy spirit, as I have just demonstrated for you in Gal 3 and 4 above.

But it is reiterated in even stronger terms again here in Ephesians 2:

Eph 2:11  Wherefore remember, that ye being in time past Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is called the Circumcision in the flesh made by hands;
Eph 2:12  That at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world:
Eph 2:13  But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ.
Eph 2:14  For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us; 
Eph 2:15  Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace; 
Eph 2:16  And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby:
Eph 2:17  And came and preached peace to you which were afar off, and to them that were nigh.
Eph 2:18  For through him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father.
Eph 2:19  Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God;

Gentiles, the peoples of the nations who are “in Christ”, are now “Abraham’s seed and heirs according to the promise… as Isaac was, are the children of promise”

“Now in Christ Jesus [Christ] has made both one… to make in Himself of twain one new man… that He might reconcile both [physical Jews and physical Gentiles] unto God in one body”.

You say:

“Hebrews 9: 15 is irrefutable. Galatians 3: 15 confirms this to the letter.”

Seeing that the rest of Gal 3 and Gal 4:28 demonstrate that the nations, “in Christ [are now] Abraham’s seed and heirs according to the promise… as Isaac was are children of promise”, and seeking only to “know the Truth”, I ask you to reconsider what you take Heb 9:15 to be saying:

Heb 9:15  And for this cause he is the mediator of the new testament, that by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first testament, they which are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance.

It is Paul who teaches us that the old covenant comes to be “fading away… abolished… nullified… and destroyed” when we come to Christ. It remains only in the sense that it “brings us to Christ”, as Paul explained right there in Gal 3:

Gal 3:19  Wherefore then serveth the law? It was added because of transgressions, [only] till the seed should come to whom the promise was made; and it was ordained by angels in the hand of a mediator.
Gal 3:20  Now a mediator is not a mediator of one, but God is one.
Gal 3:21  Is the law then against the promises of God? God forbid: for if there had been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness should have been by the law.
Gal 3:22  But the scripture hath concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe.
Gal 3:23  But before faith came, we [Gentile Galatians and “all” others] were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed.
Gal 3:24  Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith.
Gal 3:25  But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster. 

It is the scriptures which teach us that we are all, Jews and Gentiles, “kept under the law… till the seed should come,”

The law “is not [even] made for a righteous man, but for the lawless”, and was never intended to bring salvation, which comes only through Christ:

1Ti 1:9  Knowing this, that the law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and for sinners, for unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers,

Joh 14:6  Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. [“The seed”]

Heb 9:15  And for this cause he is the mediator of the new testament, that by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first testament, they which are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance.

Where is a single word in that verse which in any way contradicts the truth of this verse of…:

Gal 3:22  But the scripture hath concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe.
Gal 3:23  But before faith came, we [Gentile Galatians and “all” others] were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed.

So there is the answer to your question, “the scripture hath concluded all under sin [“kept under the law”] that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe”. Now the promise of grace comes to all, and not to the Gentiles alone. Christ is making of two one, not of twain two:

Eph 2:15  Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace;

The article on iswasandwillbe.com entitled The Law of Mose Versus The Law of The Spirit deals with this subject in depth. It can be read at this link:

http://www.iswasandwillbe.com/the-law-of-moses-versus-the-spirit/

Your brother in the Christ “who hath made [Jews and Gentiles] both one… for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace”;

Mike