Over the years, I’ve found that one of the issues that Christ followers struggle with the most is how we are to apply the Old Testament in our lives. In fact, five years ago when I preached a series of messages based on questions submitted to me by all of you, that was the most common question that I received. So, just like I did back then, we’re going to turn to the words of Jesus to help us answer that question.
This morning is our third in a series on the most famous sermon ever preached – Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. So far, we’ve seen Jesus describe the character of those who belong to the kingdom of heaven and the present and future blessings that go along with being part of that kingdom. And we’ve also discovered that those blessings aren’t just for His followers – they are to be passed on to others as we live as salt and light in order to influence the world around us.
Once again this morning, we’ll pick up where we left off, so turn with me to Matthew 5 and follow along as I read beginning in verse 17:
17 “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. 18 For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished. 19 Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
We’ll begin by making some general observations about the words of Jesus and then we’ll see if we can’t use them to help us answer the question regarding how we are to apply the Old Testament in our lives today.
SOME GENERAL OBSERVATIONS
We’re going to begin with the final words of this passage in verse 20:
For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
With those words, Jesus reveals that…
1. It is impossible to enter the kingdom of heaven without faith in Jesus
From an external perspective, the scribes and Pharisees were very religious. They prided themselves on keeping all the detailed rules and regulations that had been developed within Judaism since the time God had given Moses the written Law on Mt. Sinai. So from a human perspective, if anyone could attain a righteousness that would punch their ticket into the kingdom of heaven, it had to be those religious leaders.
But from God’s perspective that righteousness was clearly only external and it was self-centered and therefore inadequate to earn a place in the kingdom. In effect, what Jesus was saying was this: It doesn’t matter how religious you are. It doesn’t matter how often you go to church or how much money you put in the offering plate. It doesn’t matter how eloquent you pray publicly or how many so called “righteous” acts that you do so that others will see them and think more highly of you. None of that measures up to the standard that I have set forth in my word. The only way you’re going to reach that standard is through faith in me, because I am the one who has completely and totally fulfilled that standard.
Nearly three years later, as Jesus prepared to die on the cross for their sins, the scribes and Pharisees still hadn’t responded to this message, so Jesus proclaimed a series of seven woes against them, beginning with these words:
But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. For you neither enter yourselves nor allow those who would enter to go in.
Matthew 23:13 (ESV)
Not only had these religious leaders failed to enter the kingdom themselves, they had also prevented others from entering the kingdom by their insistence that people adhere to their legalistic religion.
This first observation has significant implications for all of us here this morning. First, if you have never recognized the insufficiency of your own external righteousness and placed your faith completely in the righteousness of Jesus, then you are not part of His kingdom. That’s not my opinion, that’s what Jesus said. No amount of religiosity is ever going to make you right with God. It is only by depending completely on the absolute righteousness of Jesus that you can be right with God.
And for those of us who are Christ followers, we need to make sure that we’re not like the scribes and Pharisees, imposing impossible requirements upon those outside the kingdom that prevent them from having the opportunity to join us in the kingdom. Far too often, we expect unbelievers to act like believers and condemn them in a way that puts up impenetrable barriers rather than treating them with the same grace with which God has treated us.
2. The key to living in the Kingdom of heaven is upholding God’s Word
Back in high school, I competed in the high jump, believe it or not. And the way that the competition worked in a track meet was that the bar was set at a certain height to begin the meet. Then for those who were able to clear that height, the bar was raised a few inches at a time until there was only one person left who could clear the bar and that person was declared the winner.
For Jesus’ audience that day, I’m sure they felt like the Old Testament Law had raised such a high bar that no one could possibly clear it and so as Jesus began to speak of the Law perhaps they expected He was going to somehow lower the bar so that they could achieve the standard.
But Jesus did exactly the opposite – He actually raised the standard with His words:
Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished.
Jesus obviously had a very high view of Scripture. When He refers here to the Law and Prophets, He was using a well known phrase that referred to the entire Bible of His day – what we would today call the Old Testament. When He came to this earth, not only did Jesus not abolish or do away with any of that Scripture – He came to fulfill it. He didn’t lower the standard – He actually raised the bar.
In the first 16 verses of the chapter Jesus had described the character of a citizen of the kingdom of heaven and then described how His followers were to be a positive influence on the world around them. It is not easy to live that kind of life, is it? It’s as if Jesus’ understood what His audience was thinking as they pondered how they could possibly live like that. And His answer to them was simple – You need to uphold God’s Word just like I am doing.
And, as we’ll see more clearly next week, Jesus wasn’t satisfied like the scribes and Pharisees with just upholding the letter of the law – He was more concerned about living according to the heart of the law. For Jesus, the question was not “Do I have to keep these commandments?” but rather “How can I keep these commandments?” But we also see here that Jesus was committed to upholding the entire word of God, down to even the smallest marks that gave meaning to the individual letters and words of Scripture.
So if Jesus demonstrated such high regard for all of God’s Word, then we obviously need to do that as well.
But Jesus went far beyond just having high regard for God’s Word – He actually fulfilled it. By His life, death and resurrection, Jesus made the Old Testament Scriptures full and complete because those Scriptures pointed to Him all along. If you’ve been here at TFC for any time at all, you know that we’ve always encouraged our body to view the Bible through the lens of the overall theme of Scripture:
The reconciliation of God to man through Jesus the Messiah by His mighty works.
From Genesis to Revelation, the Bible is the account of how Jesus has reconciled sinful man to a holy God and made it possible for us to become citizens of the kingdom of heaven.
Therefore if I want to function as an effective citizen in that kingdom I need to uphold all of God’s Word by living my life according to what is contained therein. That principle leads directly to the third and final general observation we’ll make:
3. What I do with God’s Word has eternal consequences
Jesus spoke a serious word of warning to His followers in verse 19:
Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
First of all, let me point out that there is some good news in this verse. Notice that Jesus doesn’t say that if you minimize the importance of His Word that you’ll get kicked out of the kingdom. Since we don’t enter that kingdom in the first place based on our own efforts and merit, then it is also true that we can’t lose our citizenship in the kingdom through our actions either.
However, there are some serious consequences associated with devaluing Scripture. If we try to lower the standards that God has established or encourage others to do the same, we will lose some of the eternal rewards that God desires for us to have. On the other hand, those who highly value God’s Word and encourage others to do the same will receive great eternal rewards.
That’s actually how our earthly governmental entities operate, too. As a citizen of the United States if I choose to minimize the importance of some law and violate that law, I don’t lose my citizenship. But I am subject to being imprisoned and missing out on the benefits of living as a free person in society. On the other hand, if I obey the law, I remain free to experience the benefits of living in this country.
But the consequences of minimizing and failing to obey God’s Word is much more far reaching since those effects are not just limited to my life here on this earth, but will extend into eternity. Given these eternal consequences that arise from how I handle God’s Word, then we see just how important it is this morning that we answer this question accurately:
HOW DOES THE OLD TESTAMENT APPLY TO THE LIFE OF A CHRIST FOLLOWER TODAY?
Like we find with so many areas of our lives as Christ followers, people often tend to drift to one of two extremes when answering this question. Although it is becoming less and less prevalent in our culture, there are those who would say that we must follow literally every part of the Old Testament Law. That, in turn would mean that we would stone adulterers and kill children who are disrespectful to their parents.
Since most people aren’t willing to go that far, they often tend to gravitate to the other extreme and claim we can just ignore the Old Testament altogether. They usually justify that position by quoting Paul in Romans 6 where he writes that we are not under law but under grace. Unfortunately, that conclusion ignores the context of Paul’s letter as well as Jesus’ words that we’ve been looking at this morning. If Jesus didn’t abolish the Old Testament, we dare not do that.
So what I want to do this morning is to see if we can’t develop some practical principles that will help us to find a middle ground that is consistent with the words of Jesus that we’ve focused on this morning.
Before we get to the specifics, I want to take a moment to address the nature of the Old Testament Law. Many commentators have divided that law into three categories:
• The moral law – this is the part of the law that deals with moral behavior and the penalties for violating those standards of conduct. This part of the law is summed up in the Ten Commandments and then further detailed in other related commandments. This part of the law applies to all men.
• The civil law – this part of the law applied only to Israel and guided how they were to live as a people when they entered into the land that God was giving to them.
• The ceremonial law – this is the part of the law that applied to Israel’s worship. It includes the sacrificial system.
These distinctions can be somewhat helpful to us in determining how to apply the Old Testament to our lives as long as we recognize the limitations of this approach. Not all the law fits neatly into one of these three categories and there is often some overlap. But keeping this structure in mind will help us as we develop some practical principles.
Now we’re ready to develop three principles that will help us answer the question we’ve posed:
1. If there is an Old Testament Law that is restated in the New Testament, then it is still binding and valid
Most of the moral law fits in this category. In fact, we’ll see this next week as Jesus begins to take several of the Ten Commandments and expand upon them in order to help His audience understand the spirit of the Law as well as the letter of the Law.
I don’t think anyone would really argue with this first principle. Even those who want to completely ignore the Old Testament would be okay with this. So we don’t need to spend any more time here.
2. If there is an Old Testament Law that is set aside in the New Testament, it is no longer binding
This principle is best demonstrated by the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15. Some in the church were teaching that a person could not become a Christ follower unless they first became a Jew and observed the command to be circumcised. At the leading of Peter, Barnabas, Paul and James – all of them Jews – the decision that was reached is that it was not necessary to follow the Biblical command to be circumcised. However, the council did not completely dismiss the need to follow other Old Testament laws that dealt with idols, sexual immorality and eating the blood of animals.
Most of the ceremonial law fits into this category. That makes sense since Jesus completely fulfilled that aspect of the law through His sacrificial death on the cross.
For since the law has but a shadow of the good things to come instead of the true form of these realities, it can never, by the same sacrifices that are continually offered every year, make perfect those who draw near…When he said above, “You have neither desired nor taken pleasure in sacrifices and offerings and burnt offerings and sin offerings” (these are offered according to the law), then he added, “Behold, I have come to do your will.” He does away with the first in order to establish the second. And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.
Hebrews 10:1, 8-10 (ESV)
When the Temple was destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD, it is as if God further emphasized the fact that Jesus completely fulfilled these ceremonial laws since it is no longer possible for the people to make sacrifices.
Another area where this principle applies is most of the dietary laws that were set aside by both the words of Jesus as well as by the word of God in Acts and in other New Testament writings.
Again, no one will really argue this principle at all. In fact, those who want to ignore the Old Testament really like this one. But that leaves us with the most difficult task of all – how do we deal with those parts of the Law that aren’t specifically mentioned in the New Testament. And there are obviously a lot of them.
3. If there is an Old Testament Law that is not specifically mentioned in the New Testament, then apply this process:
• Identify general principles
God gave the Old Testament Law to His people for their own good. For instance, the dietary laws were intended to prevent them from becoming sick from food-borne illnesses. Many of the social laws were designed to protect people’s dignity – especially women, the poor, slaves, widows and others who were often in positions where they were unable to protect themselves. The ceremonial laws were given as a way for the people to deal with their sin before God.
So as we look at those laws, we need to determine the underlying principle that gives rise to that command.
• See if the principle is confirmed in the New Testament
Once we’ve identified the principle behind the specific law, we can then go to the New Testament and see if that same principle is given to us there. Since the entire Bible is consistent from cover to cover, we’re going to find that in almost every case, even if the specific Old Testament Law is not addressed in the New Testament, the underlying principles behind the law will be confirmed in some way there.
• Apply the principle to the specific situation
Having identified the underlying principle, we can now take that principle, rather than the specific law itself, and apply it to whatever situation we might be dealing with in our lives.
Let’s work through an example of how this process can be used. We’ll use this command from the Book of Deuteronomy:
“When you build a new house, you shall make a parapet for your roof, that you may not bring the guilt of blood upon your house, if anyone should fall from it.
Deuteronomy 22:8 (ESV)
I checked it out very carefully and I am pretty sure that this commandment is not addressed anywhere in the New Testament. Since it doesn’t fit either of the first two criteria we need to apply this process.
Since Mary and I have a home with a flat roof, there is a parapet around the edge of the roof, but for any of you who have houses with pitched roofs, I’m pretty sure you’re violating the literal command since your house is not constructed with a parapet. But are you really violating the spirit of the law here?
The first thing we have to do is to identify the general principle, which is pretty easy to do in this case because God gives us the reason for the command. The reason for building the parapet is to keep someone from falling off the roof and being injured or killed. So the broader principle here is that I am to protect my family from harm.
The second step is to see if that principle is confirmed in the New Testament. Let me suggest a few passages that would be applicable here:
In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body.
Ephesians 5:28-30 (ESV)
But if anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.
1 Timothy 5:8 (ESV)
Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you1 of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.
1 Peter 3:7 (ESV)
So the principle that I am to be diligent in protecting my family, and especially my wife, is certainly confirmed in several places in the New Testament. And that principle can certainly be applied to a number of specific situations. In my personal case, one way I apply that principle is that I have made a commitment never to speak ill of Mary in public or to say anything to anyone else that would damage her reputation. If I have an issue with her I will only discuss it with her one on one in private.
If we follow the example of Jesus, then the question we ask won’t be “Do I have to keep this commandment?” but rather “How can I keep this commandment?” And this process provides the framework that will allow us to do so.
God’s Word – all of God’s Word - should matter to us because it mattered to Jesus. Since Jesus came not to abolish the law, but to fulfill it – all of it – how dare we do anything less.
