Gospel of John [20:19]. Christ's Resurrection, part 27 (fellowship with Christ and the Father - Agape).

Title: Gospel of John [20:19]. Christ's Resurrection, part 27 (fellowship with Christ and the Father - Agape).

 

Memorial Day honors those who died serving the US military.

 

1JO 4:19

We love, because He first loved us.

 

GAL 5:13-14 For you were called to freedom, brethren; only do not turn your freedom into an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.

 

GAL 5:14 For the whole Law is fulfilled in one word, in the statement, " You shall love your neighbor as yourself."

 

The law was a jailer who held in custody those who were subjected to sin, in order that they should not escape the consciousness of their sins and their liability to punishment in the form of the curses that God stated.

 

We find Paul in the NT expounding on this very thing as some of his flock were fooled into returning to the Mosaic Law as a means of worshipping God.  

 

GAL 3:23 But before faith came ["the faith" - faith in a historic cross as opposed to prophetic], we were kept in custody under the law, being shut up to the faith which was later to be revealed.

 

GAL 3:24 Therefore the Law has become our tutor [a slave who had general charge over a boy 6-16 years old] to lead us to Christ, that we may be justified by faith.

 

Paul emphasizes both the inferiority of the Law of grace, and its temporary character.

 

GAL 3:25 But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor.

 

GAL 3:26 For you are all sons [adult sons] of God through faith in Christ Jesus.

 

So what is to restrain us now that we are free adult sons? Well, it's not a what but a Who, God the Holy Spirit, and you're no longer a child under the curse of the Law but a born again adult child of God who has been blessed by God with adulthood in His very family. By this union and our dependence on God the Holy Spirit we actually show off the power of God within by following the commands, but walking in the ethics of Christianity, the law of love, the royal family honor code, and I don't mean showing off in terms of approbation, but revealing to the world, to your neighbor, the agape of God that He has poured out within you.

 

The context shows that the last part of the verse should have faith and in Christ Jesus separated: "For you are all sons of God through faith, in Christ Jesus." Position in Christ is emphasized.

 

The next verse shows that Paul is not here emphasizing the act of faith in Christ but our position in Him - our vital union with Him.

 

GAL 3:27 For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves [aorist - at the point of baptism of the Spirit] with Christ.

 

The baptism of the Holy Spirit entered us into vital union with Christ. He is not a mask or a covering. Clothed means us in Him and He in us forever.

 

Now that we are clothed with Christ we are commanded to walk in this manner - as one who is enveloped in Christ and Christ in us:

 

ROM 13:14

But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts.

 

1PE 5:5

You younger men, likewise, be subject to your elders; and all of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, for God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble.

 

So then we are no longer under the Law and our ethics as Christians are the ethics of Christ, of agape love, as He has loved us. We are enveloped in Him forever as sons of God who have grown past the slave guardian.

 

Again, under the Law there is no escape. The Law shut them out of all forms of escape other than faith in the prophetic Messiah's blood sacrifice.

 

We are no longer under the curses or the blessings of the Law. We still reap what we sow, but it is not in curses, but in a loss of experiencing the blessings that come from abiding in God's love.

 

Divine discipline is not a curse but a loving turning of the heart back to the blessings of the light.

 

GAL 3:10 For as many [people] as are of the works of the Law are under a curse; for it is written, "Cursed is everyone who does not abide by all things written in the book of the law, to perform them." [DEU 27:26]

 

GAL 3:11 Now that no one is justified by the Law before God is evident; for, " The righteous man shall live by faith. "

 

Abraham was credited with righteousness by means of his faith in the promise of God's deliverance, and that, 400 years before the giving of the Law.

 

GAL 3:12 However, the Law is not of faith [in terms of justification]; on the contrary, "He who practices them shall live by them."

 

GAL 3:13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse for us —  for it is written, "Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree" — 

 

We have "under a curse," "made a curse," and "redeemed us from the curse."

 

GAL 3:14 in order that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham [justification by faith] might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.

 

To state that the Christian has no restrictions in terms of commands and statutes is antinomianism. To state that keeping the commands and statutes makes us righteous is legalism. To attempt Christian ethics from our own inner selves is darkness, a lie, and total failure.

 

1JO 1:6

If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth;

 

So both testaments have commands, many of which are identical, but what is the difference? And, if this is so, why are we no longer under the Law?

 

ROM 5:5

and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.

 

Unlike the OT believer, the Christian is indwelt by God, in union with Christ, and God's agape is poured out in his heart. Now, love for God and one's neighbor flow from God's very gift within.

 

A new creature in Christ is a new spiritual species rather than a new racial species. The OT saint was to recognize God's gifts that were freely given and so love Him. The NT saint is given God's very agape love within.

 

He is a new creature in Christ. He is not one who observes God and so loves Him. He is one who is in God and God is in Him and so loves Him as being one with Him.

 

Our love for God is not a love that compares all things around us and finds that is the best and the sum of all conceivable good and has the most desirable objects and so we have an attractive love for Him simply because there is nothing like Him. God doesn't just transcend all human desire, He is not at all of the same plane. He is not the highest good compared to all other good we see. He is not the richest one or has the most stuff. He is simply not to be classed with any objects of desire whatsoever. What we have here is a purely theocentric love, in which all initiation on man's part is excluded.