Jewish Roots (Part 4)

The Jewish Roots Movement — Steve Gregg

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Jewish Roots (Part 5)

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Jewish Roots (Part 4)

The Jewish Roots MovementSteve Gregg

Discover the perspective of Steve Gregg on the relationship between the New Testament and the Old Covenant as he explores the significance of Torah and the law. Gregg emphasizes the importance of love and the new commandment in Christ, striving to understand God's intentions beyond the boundaries of the New Testament. Drawing from biblical examples, such as Noah's offerings and Abraham's circumcision, he challenges the notion that sacrifices and rituals are necessary for salvation. With a focus on the teachings of Jesus, Gregg asserts that the fulfillment of the law lies in Christ and that ceremonial laws are not required in the new covenant.

Transcript

The New Testament is not a new covenant. When we consider whether or not Christians are required to keep the ceremonies of Israel's laws, the laws that God gave in the Old Covenant, we find that the New Testament does not say that we do. It's what the New Testament says that matters.

Because Christ's authority trumps the authority of all other things. When Jesus ascended into heaven, it was shortly after he said to his disciples, All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me. In Matthew 28.18. He had died, he had risen from the dead, he was about ready to go up and sit at the right hand of God, and he announced to his disciples, I'm in authority over everything.

All authority in heaven and earth now is mine. There is no authority except from Christ. What he says is what holds with God.

And if he didn't say something agreeable with Moses on some occasion, then it's because something has changed. Not because Moses wasn't right. Not because Jesus had disagreements with Moses.

He did not. But because Moses' laws were temporal. They were fading like the glow on Moses' face.

And Christ was going to remain and carry forward the program that's eternal, which is not what the Old Covenant was. If you look at 1 Corinthians chapter 9, Interestingly, Paul makes a distinction between the law of Torah and the law of Christ. In 1 Corinthians 9.19, Paul says, For though I am free from all men, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win the more.

And to the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might win the Jews. To those who are under the law, that is under Torah, as under the Torah, that I might win those who are under the Torah. To those who are without Torah, as without Torah, not being without Torah toward God, but under the law toward Christ, that I might win those who are without law.

Now, Paul says, I have different evangelistic strategies. I try to be culturally sensitive to the people I'm reaching out to. If I'm in a Jewish home and they keep the Torah, I keep the Torah with them.

Why not? And we see him doing this very thing when he came to Jerusalem and James asked him to win over the Jewish Christians by showing that he, Paul, was not against the Torah. And he was not against the Torah. He didn't think it was a bad thing.

He just didn't think it was a necessary thing. Because anyone can restrict their diet if they wish and they're committing no moral infraction. I don't believe I'm under the Jewish diet, but I could eat no pork and I wouldn't be sinning.

And if by eating no pork, I was more able to reach somebody who thought it's wrong to eat pork, then that would be a good strategy. And he says, so when I'm with those who are under the law, I become like one who's under the law. So I might win those who are under the law.

But then he says, when I'm with those who are without the law, he means Gentiles. Gentiles are the ones who don't have the law. Well, he says, then I live as one without the law.

That is, I don't keep the Torah if I'm with people who don't keep the Torah. But then he wants to make clear what he says and what he's not saying. In parentheses, it's not that I'm without the law toward God.

I'm under the law of Christ. That is, I have to do what Christ said. I don't have to do what the Torah says.

The Torah is not my master. Christ is my master. And, you know, it's no longer the law and the prophets that I answer to.

It's Christ who I'm to hear and to heed. And so Paul distinguishes between the law of Christ and the law of the Torah. And if you want to know what he considers the law of Christ to be, in Galatians chapter 6, Galatians 6, 2, Paul said, Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.

Christ's law is fulfilled when we bear one another's burdens, or at least that's consistent with Christ's law. If we don't bear one another's burdens, we're breaking Christ's law. But notice, bearing one another's burdens has nothing to do with what you eat or don't eat, or what festivals you keep, or whether you're circumcised.

How do any of those things bear anybody else's burdens? But if you lay down your life for somebody else, if you sacrifice your time and your energy and your money to help somebody else, that's love. And love is the fulfilling of the law. Jesus said that in Matthew 22, verses 37 through 40, when he was asked, What's the great command? He said, Well, Hero Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord, and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.

He said there's a second one like it, and that is that you shall love your neighbor as you love yourself. He said, On these two hang all the law and the prophets. So all that God requires is love for himself and love for our fellow man.

In fact, Jesus, before he died, said to his disciples in John 13, 34 and 35, A new commandment I give to you. What are they doing for? Because the old one was obsolete. So he's saying, I'm going to give you a new commandment.

Now there's a new covenant, and it's got a new commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. By this, all men will know that you're my disciples, if you have love one for another. Once again, people don't know that we're Christians because we keep Torah.

They know we're Christians because we love, because that's the law of Christ. That's the command of Christ, the new commandment that he gave. And as we saw, Paul contrasted Torah observance with the law of Christ.

When I'm with those who keep Torah, I keep Torah. When I'm with those who don't keep Torah, I just keep the law of Christ, because I always have to keep that anyway. So the law of Christ is love, and it does not include things that are mere rituals, because rituals are not related to love, except in a situation where you're breaking a ritual that offends somebody.

And so Paul does tell the Corinthians, for example, that God doesn't care what you eat. All meat's clean, Paul says. He says, I know and I'm persuaded by Christ that there's nothing unclean of itself.

But to him who thinks it's unclean, it's unclean. He said, if I eat meat and it stumbles my brother, then I'm not loving. Love is the commandment.

I may have to put myself under certain rituals, not because they are required, but because the conscience of somebody that I care about is delicate, and therefore I'm being considered. But that's a very different thing. And again, Jesus said in Matthew 7, 12, As you would that men would do to you, do likewise to them.

This is the whole law and the prophets. What he's saying is, if you want to keep God's law, you want to know what the prophets really were getting at, it's just this. Love your neighbor as you love yourself.

What's that look like? It means what do you want people to do to you? Do that to them. That's how you love your neighbor as you love yourself. It has much more to do with what you do than what you feel.

Because you can do to someone the right thing and a kind thing, even when you don't much like them. You're still loving them. It's love your neighbor as you love yourself as you do to them.

What you want done to you. That's what Jesus said. That's the whole law of the prophets.

Now, we don't necessarily start understanding what God wants about this area just from the New Testament. The Old Testament tells us a lot about this too. For example, there were no unclean animals, as far as we know, before the flood.

That is, no unclean animals to eat, because people didn't eat animals. In Genesis 1, 29, God said that he gave man and woman every herb of the field and every tree bearing fruit as their food. And there's no indication that anyone ate animal food at all.

There's no distinction between clean and unclean, except in the area of what could be sacrificed. Therefore, when Noah built the ark, he was told to bring seven pairs, or seven each, of the clean animals, and only two each of the unclean animals. But no one was eating meat yet.

So it's clear that clean and unclean has to do with animals that can be sacrificed. In fact, it says in Genesis 8, 20, or later on, when Noah came out of the ark, that he offered up of the clean animals an offering to the Lord. Clean and unclean, even later in the Jewish law, the same animals that you could eat were the same ones you could sacrifice.

The ones you couldn't eat, you couldn't sacrifice. Animals were clean or unclean for sacrificial purposes, first, secondarily for eating purposes. But before the flood, people didn't eat meat at all.

So clean and unclean only had to do with what could be sacrificed or not. But, after the flood, permission was given to eat meat. But in Genesis 9, verse 3, God made it very clear that they could eat anything that moves.

Which is interesting because that obviously would include lots of animals that were later declared to be unclean under the law of Moses. In Genesis 9, verse 3, God says, Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. I have given you all things, even as green herbs.

So just like you could eat the herbs before, now you can eat all the animals. All of them. Everything that moves.

No distinction between clean and unclean for eating. There no doubt was still a distinction as to what animals could be sacrificed and which could not. But when it came to eating, there were no restrictions.

It wasn't until the time of Moses that restrictions were put on eating certain animals. Which means that God, even when he made the animals, didn't put any restrictions on which animals were going to be suitable someday to eat or not. This is something that was just, you know, part of the law.

And it doesn't continue after the law. Abraham, by the way, was imputed righteous without the law because the law was not yet given. And it says in Genesis 15, 6, it says that Abraham believed in the Lord and it was counted to him for righteousness.

Now Paul makes a big issue about this. In Romans chapter 4, he makes it very clear that Abraham was righteous, but he didn't keep the law because the law was not yet given. Now he knows that the Jews are going to say, ah, but there was a command given to Abraham.

That was circumcision. And he did get circumcised. But Paul makes the point in Romans 4 that he got circumcised after he was declared righteous.

It's in Genesis 15, 6, it says Abraham believed in the Lord and it was counted to him for righteousness. Two chapters later, in chapter 17 of Genesis, God told Abraham to get circumcised and he did. So the circumcision of Abraham was after he was already righteous.

And Paul says in Romans 4, he got circumcised as a sign of the faith that he already had. And therefore, circumcision wasn't a means of being righteous with God at all. It was added as a testimony to his faith, it says in Romans 4, 11.

Also, we know, of course, from what the New Testament says, that circumcision, which was imposed as a physical act on Abraham and his offspring, was a symbol or a type of a spiritual circumcision of the heart. And it says so in a verse we mentioned earlier in our last hour, Romans 2, 28, 29. He is not a Jew who is one outwardly, neither is that circumcision which is outward and of the flesh.

But he is a Jew who is one inwardly and circumcision is of the heart. In Philippians chapter 3, in verse 3, Paul says, We are the circumcision who worship God in the spirit, who rejoice in Christ Jesus, and who have put no confidence in the flesh. That's what true circumcision is, spiritual worship, confidence in Christ, not in the flesh.

That's real circumcision. And therefore, even if I had not been circumcised as a baby, which everyone I guess in my generation probably was, I would still be of the circumcision if I'm worshipping God in the spirit, rejoicing in Christ Jesus and putting no confidence in the flesh. David in the Old Testament also, he did live under the law.

Unlike Abraham, David lived after the law was given. And yet, the law didn't change the terms of a man's relationship with God. David was chosen by God because he was a man after God's own heart.

It's a heart issue that God's always looked for. And David, of course, sinned terribly. In fact, when he sinned with Bathsheba and had her husband killed, he was guilty of both adultery and murder.

Now, interestingly enough, in the Old Covenant law, there was no sacrifice for either. If you committed murder or adultery, you were just put to death. There's no atonement sacrifice for murder or adultery in the law.

So David could not be justified by the law after he did what he did. It was something that would just condemn him to die. Now, we know that he repented and God gave him, God spared his life.

But he spared his life not because he kept the law. He didn't. He'd broken the law, as a matter of fact.

God spared his life in spite of the fact that he'd broken the law and he did not even offer animal sacrifices to atone for it. Because, of course, there is no such atonement for it. In Psalm 51, which David wrote after he repented of this very sin, you can see the Psalm title.

Psalm 51, the Psalm title says, To the chief musician, a psalm of David, when Nathan the prophet went to him after he had gone to Bathsheba. Well, he is repenting of this sin with Bathsheba and her husband. And David says to God in verses 16 and 17, For you do not desire sacrifice, or else I would give it.

You do not delight in burnt offerings. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and a contrite heart. These, O God, you will not despise.

Now, it's important to know that David, as a man after God's own heart, knew God's heart better than many Christians do. There are many Christians who still think it matters a great deal to God, whether you keep the Sabbath, whether you eat a kosher diet, whether you give a tithe to the church, as if these are the things that make a man dear to God. David knew the heart of God.

He said, I know you don't desire sacrifices and offerings. I'd be glad to give them. I could give them if you want them.

I know you don't want that. How interesting that he would know that, because Leviticus spent seven chapters giving all the details of how God wanted sacrifices to be made. But David, who knew the heart of God, realized that the sacrifices were not really what rings God's chimes.

That's not really what God's all excited about. What he wants is a broken spirit. What he wants is a humble heart.

What he's looking at is the heart. And David ought to know, because it was when Samuel had come to David's house, before David was brought in, that Samuel looked at David's older brothers looking for a future king of Israel. And his older brothers were oppressive, and God told Samuel, don't look on the appearance of this man.

For man looks on the outward appearance, but God looks on the heart. In other words, Samuel was impressed by the older brothers of David, but God said, I'm not. I look on the heart.

And David knew that God looks on the heart. That's why he was chosen to be king instead of his older brothers. And so he knew that rituals in themselves do not reflect anything about your heart.

Your moral behavior does. And he knew he'd done the wrong thing when he killed Uriah and slept with Bathsheba. That was immoral, and that was not okay.

He repented of it, and God forgave him. God can forgive the things that the law can't. The law could not forgive him.

The law would have him executed. But God isn't a stickler for everything in the law. Of course, he's against murder and adultery, but as far as the death penalty, God has the right to commute that sentence if he wants to, if he sees fit.

It's God's business. And also, when David ate the showbread, it's not like he had any... There's no evidence he had any conscience twangs about this. He's fleeing for his life from Saul.

He comes to Nob, where the tabernacle is. He asks the priest there for some bread. And the priest says, Hey, we don't have any ordinary bread here.

We just have the 12 loaves of the showbread. That's only for priests. And David said, I'll take that.

And the priest said, Well, I guess if you and your men have kept away from women for a while... And David said, We haven't seen any women for three days. So the priest said, Okay, we'll give you... It's a violation of the law, of the ceremonial law. But ritual ceremonial laws, in a sense, they seem to be made to be broken sometimes because the needs of man preempt them.

God will have mercy rather than sacrifice. And that's what David knew. David knew that a thousand years before Christ came to make that clear.

Now, not only David, but the Old Testament prophets often spoke about these things. I've mentioned some of the things they've said. But in 1 Samuel 15, 22, Samuel said to King Saul, So, sure, sacrifices were commanded.

But things are... There's some things a lot more important. Does God care? Samuel says about animal sacrifices, as much as he cares about listening to him, heeding him, obeying him, in things that are more personal and more moral. In Isaiah 11, we read this earlier.

We mentioned Hosea 6, 6. God said, I will have mercy and not sacrifice. In Jeremiah, chapter 22, Jeremiah is talking about King Josiah, a king who had since died, but who had been a righteous king. And Jeremiah says about him in Jeremiah 22, 15 through 16, he's talking to Josiah's son, who was not such a good king, says, What does it mean to know God? That you go to the tabernacle and keep a kosher diet? No, he says, He knew me.

What does it mean to know me? He did justice and righteousness. He judged the cause of the poor and the needy. He did right things morally, justly.

That's what it means to know me, Jeremiah said. God said. In Micah chapter 6, verses 6 through 8, Micah is sort of having a dialogue, imagining how his readers are responding to him.

His readers are acting as if God expects way too much, as if God's demands are just too great to be expected to be fulfilled by man. And it's as if they are asking this question in Micah 6, 6, He's faced with thousands of rams, ten thousands of rivers of oil. This is sort of exaggerated, but they're trying to say, you know, What do I need to bring God? Everything? Thousands of rivers of oil, thousands of rams.

And the answer is given in verse 8, These are the things that God cared about, even in the Old Testament. Sacrifices? Not so much. Yeah, they were commanded.

When you're under the ritual laws, you keep the rituals. When you're under the old covenant, you have to keep the stipulations of the covenant, but you have to make a distinction between what really matters to God and what doesn't. And what really matters to God is not rituals and ceremonies.

And I have to say the church has made mistakes about this throughout its history, because it wasn't very long after the death of the apostles that rituals and ceremonies began to be added to the Christian worship service that the Bible never required. It eventually got to be so much that you have things like the Roman Catholic Church and its rituals, and frankly, the Eastern Orthodox Church has its rituals too. And so do Protestant churches.

They have their rituals. And a lot of times people think these rituals matter to God. To a very large extent, I think they don't matter to God.

They matter to people. Maybe sometimes they elevate people's minds to God in a good way. I don't know.

But God doesn't care about ceremonies or rituals. He did in the Old Testament because he had assigned these rituals to be a foreshadowing of spiritual things. They had to be done as a teaching device.

The law was a schoolmaster. It had to teach people lessons, spiritual lessons in ritual parables. And that's what it was.

But as far as where God's heart really is at, he just doesn't care about rituals that much. What he cares is that you do justly and love mercy and walk humbly with your God. Now, I want to talk very briefly here and we'll quit.

We're going to finish in about 13 minutes here, it looks like. The example and teaching of Jesus. This is, of course, all important because I was saying that that what Jesus says is what holds, is what is authoritative.

All authority in heaven and earth belongs to him. So whatever he said about these things is what Christians are to believe and follow. First of all, Jesus taught in Matthew chapter 5 that all the law and the prophets needed to be fulfilled.

And until they are fulfilled, they are in force. That is to say, when God made these laws, he intended for them to stay in force until their fulfillment. He said that in Matthew 5, 17 and 18.

Do not think that I came to destroy the law or the prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill. For surely I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law until it is fulfilled.

Now, there is a problem with this passage and understanding it partly because there are two clauses in this statement that start with till. The thing modified by these two clauses is not one jot or tittle will pass from the law. That is, the law will be in force.

It will not pass. Not one bit of it. Not one little bit of it.

Until when? Well, there are two untils. Until heaven and earth pass away is the first one. And until all is fulfilled is the other.

Now, we either have to assume that all is fulfilled when heaven and earth passes away or or that there's two different time frames here. Now, I don't think there's two different time frames. Or maybe there is.

It's a little confusing. But what is very clear is he said not one jot or tittle, not one thing in the law will pass until it is all fulfilled. Now, till heaven and earth pass away may be just a manner of speaking.

I'll tell you why. Because there's sort of a parallel statement to it in Luke. In Luke 16, 16.

And you'll see that it's worded a little differently but same teaching, essentially. In Luke 16, 16, he said the law and the prophets were until John. Since that time, the kingdom of God has been preached and it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one tittle of the law to fail.

Now, notice he says it a little differently there. He doesn't say until heaven and earth pass away, not one jot or tittle to fail. He says it's easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one jot or tittle to fail.

Now, which is it? It's very possible that he's using a hyperbole. Sort of like we mean when we say till hell freezes over. You know? Yeah, you know when that's kind of, when hell freezes over.

But we don't really believe hell is going to freeze over, at least not right away. We're using it as a hyperbole. And it could be simply saying it's easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for a jot or tittle of the law to pass without it being fulfilled.

And the wording is awkward, difficult. When you compare the two statements, they say it slightly differently. But one thing we can say this, there are parts of the law that have passed away.

The Levitical priesthood has passed away. That's part of the law. Certainly a bigger part than a jot or a tittle.

It's a major part of the law. The Levitical priesthood has passed away. It's a major part of the law.

The Levitical priesthood passed away and has been replaced forever by a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. The sacrificial system has passed away. That's not a small matter of the law.

That's a big matter of the law. Many things have passed away. Even Jesus saying, what goes into your mouth doesn't defile you, suggests that the ceremonial laws about unclean foods have passed away.

And we have to admit, some things in the law have passed away. The question is, have they all? Well, Jesus said not one jot or tittle of the law will pass until all is fulfilled. I have to assume that if any of it has passed, then all of it has been fulfilled.

The meaning of till heaven and earth pass away is obscure. I'm thinking it could mean, you know, again, sort of like what we say when hell freezes over, you know, but or saying what he said in Luke 16, 17. It's easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one of these things to fail, to be fulfilled.

In any case, he does say that they are to be fulfilled and when they are fulfilled, they pass away. And we know that some of them have been fulfilled, but he said none of them will be until they all are. So the whole law has been fulfilled in Christ or else none of it has.

If the whole law has not been fulfilled in Christ, then the sacrificial system is still in force. The Levitical priesthood is still in force and every other part of the law because nothing, not the slightest part of it, passes away until the whole thing is fulfilled. But Jesus said when it does, when it is fulfilled, then it does pass away.

So I feel that that would suggest that Jesus agrees with the rest of Scripture on this, that the law passes away. There's been a change in the law. There's a new covenant makes the old covenant obsolete and all that other stuff the Bible says.

Remember Jesus said in John 4 when he's talking to the woman at the well, she said, where should we worship, in Jerusalem or in this mountain? Our people say this mountain, your people say that mountain. And Jesus said, woman, I say to you, the time is coming and now is when people will not worship in Jerusalem or in this mountain, but those who worship God will worship in spirit and in truth. Now realize that the word worship, until Jesus said that, worship almost always meant sacrifices.

Pagan worship meant offering sacrifices to pagan deities. Jewish worship meant offering animal sacrifices to God. Jesus said, we're getting done with that.

The temple in Jerusalem, the temple in Gerudim, they're passe, they're gone. The time's coming where people won't even go there anymore. True worship is being, the whole ritual worship, that's being replaced with something called being worshiping in spirit and in truth.

The spiritual worship is replacing the temple and the ritual and all that. So Jesus indicated not only that spiritual worship is needed, but he didn't say, well, of course, you have to keep the rituals and spiritually worship. He said, no, they're not going to worship like that anymore.

The day is coming when they won't worship here in Jerusalem or in Samaria. That's old, that's passe, that's going out. It won't be around anymore.

And by the way, it isn't. Now, as far as Jesus' behavior goes, it's interesting how he was with the Sabbath. He seemed to make the Sabbath a special test case to show the Pharisees that they were thinking wrong.

First of all, we never, we never read that Jesus preached or encouraged people to keep the Sabbath. And that's interesting because virtually every moral law, well, certainly the moral laws in the Ten Commandments, he did repeat. He did say we shouldn't murder or commit adultery or steal or bear false witness.

He did say we shouldn't dishonor our parents. He did say we should worship God alone. But though he said those things frequently, he never once said you should keep the Sabbath.

You just can't find it in the teaching of Jesus or anywhere else in the New Testament, by the way, by the other writers. That's interesting. Secondly, there's no record of Jesus keeping the Sabbath.

If by that we mean doing what the Bible says to do on the Sabbath. Now, Seventh-day Adventists and others sometimes say, no, Jesus kept the Sabbath, Paul kept the Sabbath. What they mean is they went into the synagogue and preached on the Sabbath.

That's the only keeping of the Sabbath that someone could point to that Jesus or Paul did. And that's not keeping the Sabbath. First of all, the Sabbath law didn't talk about synagogue.

The synagogue wasn't mentioned in the Law of Moses. But more than that, preaching is what Jesus did every day. The Sabbath law says in six days you do all your work and on the seventh day you don't do your work.

But Jesus preached on Sunday and Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday and Thursday and Friday. When the Sabbath came, he preached then too. He healed on Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday.

And when the Sabbath came, he healed on that day too. He did his work the same every day. Every day he did not observe a day of rest from his work.

He did not therefore observe Sabbath. We never read of Jesus resting on the Sabbath. Preaching on the Sabbath, there's no law in the Old Testament that says thou shalt preach on the Sabbath.

Therefore his preaching on the Sabbath doesn't constitute keeping the Sabbath. It means that other days of the week he preached where people were, on the hillsides, in other places, in his marketplace. On Saturday he preached where the people were, which was in the synagogue.

That's where the Jews were on Saturdays. So did Paul for the same reason. Jesus broke the Sabbath, he said, because his father breaks the Sabbath.

Yes, he did say that. Seventh-day Adventists also and Torah observant people do not like me saying that, but I'll just say what the Bible says and they can take up their complaint with John. In John chapter 5, verses 16 through 19, it says, For this reason the Jews persecuted Jesus and sought to kill him, because he had done these things on the Sabbath.

But Jesus answered them, My father has been working until now, and I've been working. In other words, my father works every day, I work every day. I don't keep the Sabbath because my father doesn't keep the Sabbath.

Therefore the Jews sought all the more to kill him, because he not only broke the Sabbath, now did John say that Jesus broke the Sabbath? He said he broke the Sabbath. They sought to kill him because he not only broke the Sabbath, but also said that God was his father, making himself equal with God. Now, Seventh-day Adventists will say, No, he didn't break the Sabbath, he just, he was just, to the Pharisees' mind, he broke the Sabbath.

But that's not what John said. John didn't tell us what the Pharisees thought he did. He says they wanted to kill him because he did do that.

He not only broke the Sabbath, he also said God was his father, making himself equal with God. By the way, Jehovah's Witnesses don't like that second part. They'll say, No, the Pharisees just thought he was making God his father.

They just thought he was making himself equal with God. It's interesting how people don't want to go with what the Bible actually says. John tells us Jesus did two things, and they wanted to kill him.

The first thing he did was break the Sabbath. The second thing he did was call God his father, making himself equal with God. That's how the language works.

If you are devoted to another doctrine that just happens to be unscriptural, then you'll do what you can to finagle ways to make it not work. I'm not committed to any such doctrine. I don't have an, I'm not an ideologue.

I'm a Bible teacher. I'm compelled to say, This is what the Bible says. It's what the language says.

Jesus broke the Sabbath. He called God his father. And he did so because he said his father did so.

He even defended his disciples for breaking the Sabbath in Matthew 12, verses 1-7, when they're picking grain. Now, Seventh-day Adventists and Torah observers, people say, Well, they weren't breaking the Sabbath. They were just breaking the traditions of the rabbis about the Sabbath.

Jesus wouldn't have defended them for breaking the Sabbath, but he defended them for not keeping the rabbinic traditions of the Sabbath. No, that's not correct. When Jesus defended them, he didn't talk about traditions.

He could have. He did on another occasion when they were criticized for not washing their hands. He said, You're keeping your traditions.

That's traditions only, traditions of man. But on this occasion, he made no reference to traditions. He said, Didn't you hear what David did? Well, what did David do? He broke a law of God, not a tradition.

He ate the showbread. That's not breaking tradition. That's breaking the law.

He said, His disciples were in the same category. They were hungry like David was. They broke a ceremonial law.

Sabbath is ceremonial. Showbread is ceremonial. Didn't you hear what David did? Then why are you condemning my disciples? And he said, And haven't you heard that the priests defile the Sabbath every week? What's he mean by that? The priest's job is to offer sacrifices.

They do it Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. They treat Sabbath like an ordinary day. The word profane is the word he used.

They profane the Sabbath. That means treat it like an ordinary day. He says, Don't you know the priests in the temple profane the Sabbath every Sabbath and are guiltless? Now, he's not talking about traditions here.

He could have made that argument, but he didn't make that argument. He's talking about actual cases of violation of ritual laws, which the Pharisees did not criticize. They didn't criticize David for breaking a ritual law.

They don't criticize the priests for breaking a ritual law. Now, he knew that they would say about that latter example, Oh, but they're doing the work of the temple, and that's important. But his next line was, Yeah, but someone greater than the temple is here.

In other words, I'm more important than the temple. If the priest can break the Sabbath doing the temple work, my disciples can break the Sabbath doing my work because I'm greater than the temple. If temple is so important that it allows people to break Sabbath, then I'm more important still.

And that should allow people to break Sabbath. That's his argument. You can't make him making a different argument in that passage.

He defended them for breaking the Sabbath. He said that the priests profane the Sabbath. He also said that he was the Lord of the Sabbath.

Matthew 12, 8, says, Therefore, the Son of Man is the Lord of the Sabbath. What's that mean? It certainly means he's not under it. He broke Sabbath.

I consider that to be like when a policeman breaks the speed limit when he's chasing a criminal with his lights flashing and sirens on. Is he breaking the speed limit? Yeah, sure he is. But he's authorized.

Jesus broke Sabbath. He's authorized to. His disciples were because he authorized them to.

It's a breaking of the law, but they're the ones who are allowed to do it. He's the Lord of the Sabbath. He's the Sabbath is not the Lord of him.

He even said man is Lord of Sabbath too, because he said the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. So Jesus made it very clear. He is the Lord of the Sabbath and he was born a Sabbath.

That means what is he the Lord? Yes. What's that mean? You do what he says, right? Why do you call me Lord? Lord, you don't do what I say. So he's the Lord.

Is he the Lord of us? Is he the Lord of us today? Today is Sunday now. It's past sundown Sabbath. So it's technically Sunday.

Is he the Lord right now? Yes. Will it be the Lord on Monday? Yes. How about Tuesday? Yes.

How about Wednesday, Thursday, Friday? Yeah, Friday, Friday too. Yeah. How about the Sabbath? Is he the Lord then too? Yes.

He's the Lord even of the Sabbath. That's what Jesus said. The Son of man is Lord even of the Sabbath.

That means six days a week, what disciples are supposed to do is one thing. What their Lord tells them to do. Please their Lord.

What are we supposed to do on the Sabbath? Well, that day too. Even the Sabbath. He's the Lord.

Sabbath is not the Lord. Jesus is the Lord. And therefore, obeying Jesus is what we're required to do.

In Matthew 12, 12, Jesus said, Therefore it's lawful to do good on the Sabbath day. Oh, okay. What am I supposed to do? Is it bad? No, I'm supposed to do good all the time.

So, if I'm doing good, it doesn't matter whether it's the Sabbath day or something else. If I'm doing, if I'm following Christ, if I'm doing what a Christian is supposed to do, then it doesn't matter whether it's the Sabbath or some other day, because it's lawful to do good on the Sabbath. Which is the same thing and the only thing it's lawful to do any day of the week.

Sabbath is no different. We're supposed to do good every day, including the Sabbath. And that's recognizing the Lordship of Christ and doing what he says to do.

One other thing. Circumcision preempts the Sabbath, he said in John 22. It's interesting, he said, You're supposed to sacrifice a child on the eighth day.

But what if it's the Sabbath? Well, they go ahead and do it. Circumcision, the need to circumcision on the eighth day, is more important than keeping the Sabbath. Because the priest or the rabbi or whoever does the circumcision, he'll do his work on the Sabbath.

Because it's the eighth day, he can't avoid it, he can't wait until the ninth day. Okay, so circumcision is more important than Sabbath keeping. Jesus pointed that out in John 7, 22.

And yet, the Bible tells us that circumcision is nothing. If circumcision is more important than Sabbath keeping, and circumcision is nothing, Sabbath must not be so much as some people want to make of it. And when it came to the clean and unclean, real quickly, Jesus touched lepers in Matthew 8, 3. He was touched by a woman who had an issue of blood, Mark 5, verses 25 through 34.

He touched a dead body more than once, at least once, in Mark 5, 41 and Luke 7, 14. Twice he touched dead bodies. And he declared all foods clean in Mark 7, 19.

Now what we have there is that Jesus ignored the laws about clean and unclean. You can't touch a leper. You can't touch a woman with an issue of blood.

You can't touch a dead body. Well, Jesus can, and did. And didn't make an issue of it.

And he acted as if there were no clean or unclean rules. And he declared nothing that goes into a man's mouth defiles him, but what comes out of his mouth. That means there's no food that's unclean.

And that's what Mark says about it in Mark 7, 19. Thus he declared all foods clean. All right, I said we're going to quit, and we're going to quit right here.

But let me just say that we have one more time we're going to get together on this subject. And we're going to talk at that time about what the apostles taught about this. Peter, James, the Jerusalem Council, and especially Paul.

And we're going to look at their teachings. That'll finish up this series. So suffice it to say that Jesus and the Old Testament would argue that the new covenant does not require people to keep the ceremonial laws.

And anyone who says they do is going to have to come up against Jesus, and Paul, and Peter, and James, and the Jerusalem Council, and in other words, the whole Bible. And so we'll talk more about what the apostles said about this next time we've gone long. So we're going to stop here at this point.

Those of you watching on YouTube, thanks for joining us. We'll see you next time.