The Law is good, but man is
not because of Adam’s Fall,
His sin caused death
and hopeless misery.
But You sent Grace and Mercy
in the form of Your own Son,
Restoring mankind’s
hope for victory.
✞ Romans 7:12,16, ✞ Mark 10:18
✞ Romans 5:14, ✞ Romans 3:12
✞ Romans 6:23, ✞ Romans 5:15
✞ John 3:18
✞ John 1:17, ✝ 1 Timothy 1:2b,
✞ John 5:23
✞ 1 Corinthians 15:22,
✞ Colossians 1:27
Though Adam was created “good,” his rejection of God’s warning not to eat of the “Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil” caused his spiritual death. Consequently, mankind too, was spiritually dead – separated from God – by being in Adam for about 4,000 years. But then, ✞ John 1:17 clearly declares: “For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.”
This verse signals the coming transition from the harsh demands of the Mosaic Law Covenant, given only to the Jews, to the blessings of the New Covenant of Grace and Mercy, offered to the whole world. It is very important to note that this New (and last) Covenant does not begin at ✞ Matthew 1:1 but at Calvary. The Four Gospels understandably mix the just requirements and duties of the Law with Jesus’ promise of the coming Kingdom of “righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.” ✞ Romans 14:17
When Jesus Christ came down to earth to conquer sin and death
He brought an end to
Law for Righteousness.
For Law arouses sin, produces
wrath and causes death
If you rely on it
for Righteousness.
✞Romans 8:2,
✞Romans 10:4, ✞ Galatians 3:13, ✞ Galatians 2:21
✞ Romans 7:5, & 8, ✞ Romans 4:15,
✞ Romans 6:23, ✞ Galatians 2:16
✞ 2 Corinthians 3:7-9
Why are the vast majority of references (on the right side) from Paul’s thirteen books? Because Jesus directly revealed to him that the Gospel of the Kingdom is now available to all because of His Finished Work at Calvary. In effect, it is the Fifth Gospel, according to Jesus and revealed directly to Paul, ✞ Romans 1:16-17 & ✞ Romans 2:16 and ✞ 2 Corinthians 12:1-6. The purpose of the Mosaic Law is to bring mankind to Jesus to receive His gift of righteousness. The Law is powerless to help you keep it in a futile effort to become righteousness in God’s sight. That is religion, not relationship with God.
The Law actually causes “the ministration of death” and the “ministration of condemnation,” – dead works, ✞ 2 Corinthians 3:7-9. It is no better for the reborn saints in Christ than the Law Tree was for Adam in the Garden. The Mosaic Law is good, but not good for us because we can’t keep it perfectly. Our New Covenant alternative is revealed in ✞ Romans 8:2.
Becoming sin and dying and
then rising from the grave,
He proved that He was God
who came to earth.
The Law had done its job in showing mankind’s need for Him.
So, He nailed it to the cross
and gave rebirth.
The scandal of the Cross is that Jesus, the sinless Lamb, actually became sin and was justly forsaken by God. Then as “sin” (the Adamic nature), Jesus died, was buried then transformed and risen as the first of a new race of redeemed saints in Christ, ✞ 1 Peter 2:9. The Mosaic Law was nailed to the Cross so that all reborn saints will now focus on Jesus, our Righteousness, rather than on the Law of Moses.
When asked by Nicodemus
what He meant by a “rebirth,”
This Savior of the human
race replied:
“By water and the Holy Spirit
is a man reborn,”
The only way he can
be justified.
✞ John 3:4
✞ Titus 3:5-7
✞ John 3:5,
✞ Titus 3:5
✞ John 3:3, ✝ Galatians 3:24.
✞ Galatians 2:19-21, ✞ Romans 4:5
The only way an in Adam sinner can become a justified (righteous) saint in Christ – who sometimes still sins – is by being reborn of God, by grace through faith in what Jesus did for mankind at Calvary. ✞ 2 Corinthians 5:17-21 is the best, concise description of His Finished Work. You can’t earn it, beg, buy, borrow or steal it – or maintain it. It is His gift of total grace to all those who “call on the name of the Lord to be saved,” ✞ Romans 10:9-13
So Jesus, You fulfilled the Law
to be my righteousness,
Your precious Blood has
paid for all my sin.
So death no longer has the
sting of endless misery
For now Your very Spirit
lives within!
✞ Matthew 3:15, ✞ 2 Corinthians 5:21,
✞ Romans 3:26
✞ Ephesians 1:7, ✞ Colossians 2:13, ✞ 2 Corinthians 5:19, ✞ Hebrews 8:12
✞ 1 Corinthians 15:26, 54-55,
✞ 2 Timothy 1:9-10, Romans 6:9
✞ 1 Corinthians 3:16,
✞ 1 Corinthians 6:20
Fortunately, Jesus fulfilled the demands of the Mosaic Law perfectly for us by operating according to the Law of the Holy Spirit of Life living within Him, ✞ Romans 8:2. His blood sacrifice paid for and removed the total sin debt of all mankind for all time, AND it reconciled mankind to God – from God’s viewpoint, ✞ 2 Corinthians 5:18-19. Verse ✞ 20 then exhorts each person to choose to be reconciled to God by being reborn by God and, thereby, be made eternally righteousness in God’s sight. How is this possible? Again, verse ✞ 21 describes what Jesus did for us – became sin – so that we can become righteousness in Him.
God sent You, Holy Spirit, so that You could live through me
And keep my eyes on Jesus –
my New Way.
His living words renew my mind
so I can think like Him.
You help me hear what
Jesus has to say.
✞ Acts 2:4, ✞ John 6:63,
✞ Galatians 3:3-5
✞ Romans 7:6, ✞ Romans 8:6,
✞ Colossians 3:1-3, ✞ John 14:6
✞ Romans 12:2, ✞ Ephesians 5:26, ✞ Colossians 3:1-3, ✞ 1 Corinthians 2:16
✞ John 16:13
So now, for all those reborn of God (see how ✞ Romans 10:9-13), Jesus sends the Holy Spirit – who led and empowered Him while on earth – to live in and through us too. He wants to renew our thinking – corrupted by our former spirit-self, now crucified and gone through rebirth – with the revelation of God’s amazing benefits and blessings of our Grace-based, New Covenant life in Christ Jesus – the Fifth Gospel. This not about religion – man’s attempts to please God to earn heaven – but the revelation that all reborn believers are already seated in Christ in the heavenlies – whether they think so or not, ✞ Ephesians 2:6.
His words of Life replace the Law that I could never keep.
I live by faith in all that
He has done.
Like Abraham who trusted God
and gave him Righteousness
I’m Righteous in You, Father, through Your Son.
✞ Acts 13:39,
✞ Romans 3:23, ✞ Acts 15:10-11
✞ Romans 3:26, ✞ Romans 7:1,
✞ Hebrews 8:13, ✞ Acts 13:39
✞ Romans 4:3-5, ✞ 3:24 and ✞ 3:28,
✞ John 3:16-18
✞ 2 Corinthians 5:17, and ✞ 21
It is high time we Christians focus on Jesus (not on Moses) and on His perfect, Finished Work that accomplished the exchange of our Adamic nature with His gift of a new, righteousness nature – the Divine Exchange. So, Father-God …
I thank You for the Gift of Faith
and Love and Liberty,
The “Higher Law” that
Moses could not give.
This time, You sent a Savior
King to rescue me from death,
Because of Him, this prodigal
now lives!
✞ Ephesians 2:8-9, ✞ Hebrews 11:1, ✞ Romans 4:5, ✞ Galatians 5:1, ✞ 5-6,
✞ Romans 8:2, ✞ Romans 13:10,
✞ John 4:14, ✞ John 3:16,
✞ 1Revelation 19:16, ✞ Colossians 2:12-14
✞ Romans 6:13, ✞ Romans 14:7,
Though once dead to God in Adam, when you are reborn of God, by God, you become alive to Him and in Him forevermore as His precious child. Just like it was not your effort that put you in Adam, it is not your efforts but your belief in Jesus’ efforts on your behalf which enables your rebirth by your new Father – God Himself. See how to be reborn of God here: ✞ Romans 10:9-13
Commentary interspersed above.
life, that is, Jesus himself.