Featured Forensic Justification of sinners!

Not any more than we can disobey God's commands yet be obedient to God.

This is, however, the difference. You are presenting a situation where Jesus obeys the Ten Commandments in order to be faithful to the Father. Scripture denounces the idea, and instead places obedience as the result of faith, trust, and love towards God.

It is the reasons. You truly present a works based religion. What you are missing is that the Law as a whole pointed to Jesus, and Jesus fulfilled the Law - not to BECOME righteous but BECAUSE He is righteous.

Again, you have the tail wagging the dog and the dog responds to the name "Heresy".

 

What a silly question.

I say that Jesus fulfilled the Law because he is righteous, you say Jesus obeyed the Ten Commandments to be righteous... And you ask me which commandment Jesus did not obey???

Do you understand what Jesus means when he said that he came to "fulfill" the Law? He means that the Law is about him. It was ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS about Christ - NEVER about getting men to Heaven by obeying the Ten Commandments, but always about God and His glory.

 

It's not a false dichotomy. It is the dichotomy Jesus spoke to the Pharisees. Love God and you fulfill the

No, it is not a false dichotomy at all. It is, in fact, one that Jesus pointed out repeatedly to the Pharisees.

You cannot obey God’s commandments to get into a right relationship with God; Being in a right relationship with God you will obey His commandments.

The “rich young ruler” believed if he obeyed all of the Law, lacking none, he would be saved. Jesus told him he lacked one, selling all and giving to the poor. Jesus was not offering another way into the Kingdom, he was showing the man (and the world) that through the Law that he could not be saved. The deficiency was not in the Law. It was not in the performance (or lack thereof) of the Law. It was in the man.

When the Pharisees tested Jesus by asking which is the greatest command, Jesus said “You shall love the lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind”. This is not one of the Ten Commandments, but one of the commandments God gave to Moses in the giving of “all of the commandments and statutes” (Deut. 5-6). This sums up every command. You don’t have to worry about not killing, stealing, lying, idolatry, etc. if you love God with all of your being. This is the sum of the Law, and failure to which it alludes. Sin is loving ourselves rather than God.

It is interesting that even the Pharisees recognized the truth of Jesus’ words. They did not challenge Him on the declaration. If you love God you will obey His commandments. And that is the key here (and our disagreement).

Obedience to merit righteousness is not obedience out of righteousness; justification by works is not justification by faith; working to earn salvation is not the same as works as the fruit of salvation. Obedience is stressed on both accounts. But the source of the obedience is what makes this a dichotomy.

 

Are you saying "Calvinist" or "Reformed"? One is more narrow than the other.

 

First off, happy anniversary. We will be celebrating 38 in June, so we're just behind you.

Insofar as my position, I do not think that I can be swayed to view righteousness in terms of moral obedience as opposed to moral obedience being the fruit of righteousness.

Maybe it is that we understand differently, from a different angle. Perhaps you simply possess superior comprehension skills (I never claimed to be the sharpest student). More likely it is a combination of the two. But as it stands, my hope is that we have communicated our positions adequately that we can see both where we agree and disagree.

 

But the LORD was pleased To crush Him, putting Him to grief; If He would render Himself as a guilt offering, He will see His offspring, He will prolong His days, And the good pleasure of the LORD will prosper in His hand. Isaiah 53:10 (NASB)

 

From my understanding, the sin offering is directed towards the sinfulness of man (our "sin nature", or inclination towards the flesh) where as the "guilt" or "trespass" offering is for those sins that are committed (the fruits of that sinful nature).

Sin offering is general. It is for "sin", not for a specific transgression (i.e., breaking the Law). "If the anointed priest sins, bringing guilt on the people, then let him offer to the Lord for his sin which he has sinned a young bull without blemish as a sin offering" Lev. 4:3. The representative (the priest) sins, and guilt is brought upon the people. This is general (no specific sin, and the people are guilty because of their representative - not that they themselves violated a command).

The "guilt" or "transgression offering" is different. "If a person sins in hearing the utterance of an oath, and is a witness, whether he has seen or known of the matter—if he does not tell it, he bears guilt." This pattern continues: "Or if a person touches any unclean thing"; "Or if he touches human uncleanness"...ect. "And it shall be, when he is guilty in any of these matters, that he shall confess that he has sinned in that thing."(Lev 5:1).

This offering is not generalized.

In relation to our conversation here, and those definitions, you lean more to Christ being a guilt offering for the transgressions of the elect. Some lean towards Christ being a sin offering for sin in general (our sinful nature). I believe that Jesus is both a sin offering and a guilt offering (that the entire Law points to Christ and his fulfillment of the Law).

That is our biggest disagreement here. I believe that Jesus' righteousness includes both aspects (a moral aspect based on our behavior in transgressing God's law, but also an ontological aspect that the Law serves to illustrate - we, in our beings, fall short of the glory of God, and our sins are manifestations of our sinfulness). I believe imputed righteousness includes both our "Sin" (our sinful nature) and our sins (disobedience to God's command as a product of our sinful nature).

So....I believe that Christ came as man, remained faithful to God, reliant on the Holy Spirit, trusting God, and seeking God's will rather than his human desires. The fruit of this "walking in the Light" is obedience to God's laws.

 

We have to be careful here unless we get a picture that Jesus was not indeed man. He was no more human than human, and no less God than God.

My point is that we do not lack the power to obey God, but the will (borrowing from Jonathan Edwards). Jesus submitted to the Father. All He did was through the Spirit (not of His own accord but the will of the Father through the power of the Spirit). All this time I am sure that He was tempted by the desires of the flesh. In the wilderness, I am sure he was hungry and thirsty.

In Paul tells us, in Philippians, why the Father glorified the Son. The Son did not regard equality with God a "thing to be grasped" - sound familiar (think about Adam's temptation) - but "humbled himself and became obedient" even to the death of the cross. Jesus was glorified for submitting to the Father through the Spirit. His ministry was not His but the Father's through the Spirit.

This is why I believe that Christ fulfilled not only the guilt/transgression offering but also the sin offering.

 

Amen!! I add that the Law as a whole testifies to Jesus - the Ten Commandments and the commandments and statutes of His law, the Bronze Altar, the Laver, all point to Christ. The Ark, the Exodus, Moses, and Joshua point to Christ. Creation itself points to Christ, through Whom and for Whom all things are made.