INTRODUCTION TO THE LAW OF CHRIST – Bible Study Series

You know that before Christ was born, suffered and died, there was an era of old testament. God began with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and later the children of Jacob were taken to Egypt and they began to suffer and God raised Moses as a savior to bring them to the promise land. On the journey to that promise land, God began to deal with them with laws. I’m going to talk about the kind of laws that existed before Jesus came, and the kind of laws that is now in Christ. Christianity is not lawless religion, there is a law of Christ.

There are standards and principles guiding our way of life. Before we go in depth in the law of Christ, I will expose the kind of law that were before Christ. Why God gave the laws before Christ and why God now gave us new laws in Christ?, In Romans 3v28, the Bible said that man is justified by faith without the deeds of laws; salvation is purely by grace, not by works but only by grace. Ref: Ephesians 2v8-9 “Because by the grace you have salvation through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is given by God: 9 Not by works, so that no man may take glory to himself.” Titus 3v5-6: Not by works of righteousness which we did ourselves, but in the measure of his mercy, he gave us salvation, through the washing of the new birth and the giving of new life in the holy spirit, 6 which he gave us freely through Jesus Christ our savior.”

This is what Christ brought to us.

In the old testament it was all about works and even at that time they couldn’t be saved because salvation is not by works but purely by grace. You cannot save yourself by your works except through what Jesus did for you to save you. Salvation comes by faith in the grace of God not by the works of man. Salvation is not partly by works and partly faith. You don’t mix salvation with the doctrines in the old testament. We have been given new laws, which we must follow, I’m not saying that the old testament is useless, but we should look at the old testament through the eyes of Christ. We must put Christ in the center of all that is done in the old testament.

Salvation was always by grace ref: Genesis 6v8 “But Noah had grace in the eyes of God.”; Noah found grace at the sight of God; Ref: Genesis 15v6 “And he had faith in the Lord, and it was put to his account as righteousness.” Abraham had faith in God and that made him righteous. God was telling them to obey His laws because God wanted to take them to the point where they understand and agree that without His grace, no one can be able to fulfill the laws.

There were some of the prophets in the old testament like Isaiah and David that got that revelation that it is only by grace of God someone can get salvation and not by works. Ref: Isaiah 6:5 Then said I, Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts. When he saw the glory of God, he condemned himself as not pure, as unworthy person even though he was a prophet of God. God supernaturally took away the sins of Isaiah not because he was obedient to the law but by showing mercy. So, there were some people in the old testament Era who came to the knowledge that salvation comes by grace and not by the works of men.

Keeping the laws of Moses never justify anyone Ref: Rom3v20 “Because by the works of the law no man is able to have righteousness in his eyes, for through the law comes the knowledge of sin.”; Rom 9:39 “And, as Isaiah had said it before, If the Lord of armies had not given us a seed, we would have been like Sodom and Gomorrah.”

So, the laws of Moses couldn’t give people righteousness nor salvation because God wants people to come to the awareness that they are weak to save themselves except grace come in. That is why Jesus came to die for us. If there are people in the church of God today that have connected salvation to works and not Grace, those people will never enter the kingdom of God. Making heaven is more than the works you can do by yourself. Except God help us we cannot make heaven by our strength. Don’t deceive yourself by thinking that you can please God only by dressing decently, paying tithe, paying offerings, helping the poor, it is more than that. Except God help us, we cannot please him—That is the bottom line. Except He strengthens us, we cannot be strong, except He teaches us, we cannot do things right, So, we must depend on Him to achieve anything good that heaven recognize. Failure to do that means you cannot achieve good things.

There are some ministers that have failed God because of the wrong teachings they are doing, for instance, they keep preaching saying stop fornication, stop lying, stop committing adultery, otherwise you cannot make heaven, that is true but it is incomplete gospel. So, if the gospel is incomplete, then it is false gospel. It is not possible for people to stop lying by themselves, what they should preach is JESUS. They should tell them that when Jesus come into your life you will receive power ref: John1v12, If we preach Jesus and people received Him, they will receive power to stop lying, adultery, fornication…So, when we preach complete Gospel it has power to change lives. People cannot live right except by the grace of God. It is not enough to tell people to stop sinning but it is important to show them how to stop, and what will enable them to stop.

Don’t preach the gospel of condemnation but preach the gospel of salvation. This doesn’t mean that you will not warn people against sins but you should show them the way out of sinful life. There is no way out except Jesus Christ, May the Lord help you to be firmly established in His own life truth in Jesus name, AMEN!!!