Quote:
Originally Posted by
InfoJunkie4Life
I am not sure. I am sure, that when it comes to the studies of the Bible, that there are points where we will never agree, and we can both submit our view points and never come to any conclusion.
But, you should come to the same conclusions as I do (there is but one Truth - God isn't schizophrenic, at least insofar as I know), and if that conclusion seeks objective truth I am forced to agree.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
InfoJunkie4Life
There are two things that discern sin, the Law and conscience. The Law was put into writing as a covenant between God and the Jewish nation and to show a clear difference between what is right and what is wrong. Conscience is a matter of the heart. Even before the Law people had conscience, and it is by the heart which we can see true motives. It would seem unjust to judge people by the Law if they are not part of the Jewish covenant or if they have never heard of such a thing (I will admit that things aren't always as they seem, this statement isn't a supporting factor, just a supposition). Thus, it seems necessary for God to judge people by their own conscience when they are not applicable to the Law.
Because of the nature of the Law, there in still a clear boundary as to where sin and righteousness lie. So, the Law, even in the above described circumstances, is not nullified but rather just not a playing factor in judgment. There will still be a judgment based on the law which said person sees morally, ie. conscience. I also would to say that no matter how it turns out it will be perfectly just in the way God judges men of all circumstances.
I think our side conversation is getting a bit off topic, maybe it would be wise to start a thread more specifically concerning the matter.
I don’t think we’re as far apart as you might think.
St. Chrysostom seems shed the best light on the Law found Romans 3:31. The purpose of the law is to make man righteous. But, a law held externally, is that done simply out of rote, habit, or fear has no power to make man righteous. We can burn all the flesh in the land, wash our hands from minute to minute till they’re raw, or burn incense until every man, women, and child has inflamed sinuses with little effect of making us holy. This was what Christ was telling the Pharisees; simply following one of these LAWS isn’t redemption. However, faith can do just that, the law is the effect of faith. Once faith takes hold, it establishes the LAW; it establishes it in the heart. “Faith is not opposed to the Law,” rather the law is ‘perfected’ in faith.
… For here he shows that the faith, so far from doing any disparagement to the Law, even assists it, as it on the other hand paved the way for the faith. For as the Law itself before bore witness to it (for he says, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets), so here this establishes that, now that it is unnerved. And how did it establish? He would say. What was the object of the Law and what the scope of all its enactments? Why, to make man righteous. But this it had no power to do. For all, it says, have sinned: but faith when it came accomplished it. For when a man is once a believer, he is straightway justified. The intention then of the Law it did establish, and what all its enactments aim after, this has it brought to a consummation. Consequently it has not disannulled, but perfected it. Here then three points he has demonstrated; first, that without the Law it is possible to be justified; next, that this the Law could not effect; and, that faith is not opposed to the Law. For since the chief cause of perplexity to the Jews was this, that the faith seemed to be in opposition to it, he shows more than the Jew wishes, that so far from being contrary, it is even in close alliance and cooperation with it, which was what they especially longed to hear proved.( Source: St. John Chrysostom, On Romans, Homily 7
CHURCH FATHERS: Homily 7 on Romans (Chrysostom))
Yes we who believe in One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church hold the faith that Christ came to fulfill (to make complete, or to perfect) the LAW. Do away with THE LAW, and you’ve done away with Christ, his sacrifice, and our redemption through him. THE LAW looks to the authority of THE LAW GIVER, so too does our faith. Thus Paul rightly says, “Do we then, destroy the law through faith? God forbid! But we establish the law.”
Gal 3:23-24-25 But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed. Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster. KJV
There is a certain security in the Law, being ‘kept’ under the Law. St. John Chrysostom likens being kept as the walls of a fortress form a ‘KEEP’, keeping us confined in a comforting fear and hate used to keep the world out. So, the law forms right reasoning as a tutor forms the mind of the student of physics. The physics teacher enumerates, laws from Newton, Copernicus, Einstein, etc. to students, bound to their desks, fearing to venture into the ‘real world,’ remaining comfort, i.e. kept. (By the way – that once described no. 1 son – but we got him over that – we cut of the funds – works every time.) But, now – on graduation day – there is the realization our faith is can and will operate in the world, and quite well under the Law too. This doesn’t mean the laws of Newton or Einstein no longer work – what goes up continues to come down after graduation. (This works especially well with egos; when my ego is inflated upward, some jerk always comes along to deflate it! I learned that on graduation day). Similarly, the student in Christ graduates receiving faith learns from the Law to operate his faith in the real world day by day. What goes up with faith comes down with salvation. (Source: CHURCH FATHERS: Homily 3 on Galatians (Chrysostom) )
Scripture must always be in harmony with itself and that of Apostolic Tradition which in turn must be in harmony with scripture and be in harmony with itself. That is to say is that God is not schizophrenic. He doesn’t tell you one thing and me something else.
But now in Christ Jesus, you, who some time were afar off, are made nigh by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and breaking down the middle wall of partition, the enmities in his flesh: Making void the law of commandments contained in decrees: that he might make the two in himself into one new man, making peace, Eph 2:13
The Law was given by God to the Israelite who used it to build up a wall of self-identification. The Law was a means to keep out by fear those on the other side of the wall who worshiped idols, building a wall roundabout the world as till it closed in on itself. A battment, “a middle wall, no longer establishing them in security, but cutting them off from God. Such then is the middle wall of partition formed out of the hedge. And to explain what this is, he subjoins, the enmity in His flesh having abolished, the law of commandments.” St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on Ephesians, Homily 5 (Source: CHURCH FATHERS: Homily 5 on Ephesians (Chrysostom) ). He transforms us from our disposition of fear towards the commands of the Law to a position of charity in the Body of Christ.
I say then: Have they so stumbled, that they should fall? God forbid! But by their offence salvation is come to the Gentiles, that they may be emulous of them. Rom 11:11.
Rendering the Law dead makes an apparent contradiction in Paul’s epistle to the Romans. Failing to understand the primary thrust of Paul’s message to the Roman’s we fail to see the confining externalization of the Law termed Judaizing. "Know you not, brethren (for I speak to them that know the law) that the law hath dominion over a man as long as it liveth? For the woman that hath a husband, whilst her husband liveth is bound to the law. But if her husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband. Therefore, whilst her husband liveth, she shall be called an adulteress, if she be with another man: but if her husband be dead, she is delivered from the law of her husband: so that she is not an adulteress, if she be with another man. Therefore, my brethren, you also are become dead to the law, by the body of Christ: that you may belong to another, who is risen again from the dead that we may bring forth fruit to God. Paul considers the un-baptized Jew as being “married” to the Mosaic Law and is ‘bound’ to it for life. The only way to escape the former ‘binding of the Law’ is to be resurrected into the body of Christ. The Law lives in Christ; “Do not think that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets.” God rules through the law of the Prophets.
But Pope Paul VI sums it best:
“Thus the Church of Christ acknowledges that, according to God's saving design, the beginnings of her faith and her election are found already among the Patriarchs, Moses and the prophets. She professes that all who believes in Christ-Abraham's sons according to faith are included in the same Patriarch's call, and likewise that the salvation of the Church is mysteriously foreshadowed by the chosen people's exodus from the land of bondage. The Church, therefore, cannot forget that she received the revelation of the Old Testament through the people with whom God in His inexpressible mercy concluded the Ancient Covenant. Nor can she forget that she draws sustenance from the root of that well-cultivated olive tree onto which have been grafted the wild shoots, the Gentiles. Indeed, the Church believes that by His cross Christ, Our Peace, reconciled Jews and Gentiles, making both one in Himself.
The Church keeps ever in mind the words of the Apostle about his kinsmen: "theirs is the sonship and the glory and the covenants and the law and the worship and the promises; theirs are the fathers and from them is the Christ according to the flesh" (Rom. 9:4-5), the Son of the Virgin Mary. She also recalls that the Apostles, the Church's main-stay and pillars, as well as most of the early disciples who proclaimed Christ's Gospel to the world, sprang from the Jewish people. “Pope Paul VI, NOSTRA AETATE, OCTOBER 28, 1965
JoeT
