Do Moses and Jesus Have Equal Authority Over the Believer?

sermonindex Jul 14, 2014

In my reading of Anabaptist theology on a website I was intrigued by their view of the Bible. For it resonated in my spirit.

The traditional evangelical view is a flat view of the Bible. Both the Old and New Testaments are equally binding on the believer. This view would imply the believer is under the Mosaic law as stipulated in the Moral Law or the Ten Commandments. The believer is exempt from the civil and ceremonial Jewish law.

This view has an appeal to Calvinists who would defend infant baptism. Also such a flat view of the Bible would give rise to a use of force for personal or national defense. Mainly drawn from the Old Testament.

The Anabaptist view is more of a New Covenant emphasis. Whereas the Anabaptist saw both the Old And New Testaments as the word of God. They saw the New Testament as having greater weight then the Old Testament upon the believer. Thus they attached greater significance over the teachings of Christ and the Apostles to rule in the heart of the believer. The Anabaptist stressed great emphasis upon the Sermon on the Mount. To them when Jesus said `You have heard it said` but `I say` Jesus words were more binding then Moses.

I submit the Anabaptist view of the superiority of Christ over Moses is in keeping more with the sweep of redemptive history than the Reformed flat view if scripture which is do prevalent today.

My thoughts.

Bearmaster.

sermonindex Jul 15, 2014

From\t the beginning of the Church's history, the Old Testament (T'nach), the Bible of Jesus, was the primary sacred Scripture of the Church. It was fundamental to the life of the first congregations of the early Church. It was used to persuade Jews that Jesus was Messiah. It was used as primary authority to be quoted in all considerations. The Jewish Bible was therefore the "unimpeachable sourcebook of saving doctrine" to the Christian Church (Kelly 1968:53).

During the second century some Christians under the influence of gnostic philosophies came to look with suspicion upon the Old Testament and even to reject it completely as alien to the gospel of Christ, but these persons were regarded as heretics and outside the stream of true Christianity (Kelly 1968:52).
from: http://lloydthomas.org/5-SpecialStudies/OT-Use.html

The early Church existing for 300 years before our traditional bible was formed officially. So the New Testament was not in every meeting as we have it. The Old Testament was heavily relied upon because it was accessible and the Bible Jesus used. Therefore I believe the early church was able to read the Old Testament to see Jesus Christ and promises from God instead of looking at it to have to keep its laws and regulations.

As much as I appreciate anabaptist theology it is not early church theology but a reaction to reformed beliefs in the 1600's. What about the church for 1500 years especially the early assemblies?

B

brothagary Jul 15, 2014

but blain is the reformed view more prevelent then the anabatise view that held the new had more weight ,,,,id like to see reference to that please ,,to me it sounds like a reactanary opinion of your brother

sermonindex Jul 15, 2014

Some of the comments in this thread take me a bit by surprise. Trying to share a few scriptures without making the issue more complicated.
"Do Moses and Jesus Have Equal Authority Over the Believer"
Jesus has all authority in heaven and on earth. Mtth. 28:18
Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 9For this reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, 10so that at the name of Jesus EVERY KNEE WILL BOW, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth,…Philippians 2:8,9 Jesus is our Lord and we can only have One Lord (Ephesians 4:5)

"The Anabaptist view is more of a New Covenant emphasis"
Jesus introduced a new covenant (Luke 22:20)
By calling this covenant "new," he has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and outdated will soon disappear (Hebrews 8:13)
So it is not a matter of emphasis.
The Old Testament was heavily relied upon because it was accessible and the Bible Jesus used
As much as I appreciate anabaptist theology it is not early church theology.
The Old Testament has many passages which speak about Jesus. (Luke 24:27) But because "all Scripture is inspired " those OT passages about Jesus can't contradict the NT.

"Revelation 19:16 is the main passage where "King of kings" is mentioned in relation to Jesus Christ. "On his robe and on his thigh he has this name written: KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS." This verse is speaking of the future time when Jesus Christ will return to earth to set up His kingdom. All will proclaim, "Jesus is King!"
King of kings and Lord of lords is a victorious title. It signifies sovereignty over all kings and all lords. Everyone will be in submission to Him, King Jesus! No matter what person in history is the most victorious king or ruler on the earth, Jesus Christ is the King of kings! - See more at: http://goo.gl/EM87Ip

sermonindex Jul 15, 2014

Bretheren in opening this thread I should have gone straight to the word instead of theology.

So I ask again are we under both Moses and Christ? Are we under both the shadow and the substance? Are we under both the Old Covenant and the New Covenant?

I believe the answer can be found in these passages from Hebrews. Please consider the following.

Heb. 1:1-2
God, after He spoke to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways, In these last days has spoken to us by His Son whom He appointed heir of all things and through whom also He made the world.

Heb7:22
and so much the more also Jesus has become the guarantee of a better covenant.

Heb.8:6
But now He has obtained a more excellent ministry, by as much as He is also the mediator of a better covenant, which has been enacted on better promises.

Heb. 8:13
When he said, "a new covenant," He has made the first obsolete. But whatever is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to disappear.

Brethren I wound submit the above verses speak of a moving of redemptive history from the old covenant to the new covenant. There is no flat line view of scripture that speak of us being under two covenants but one. We are under the New Covenant administered by Jesus Christ and inaugurated by His blood at the cross.

This is why the writer of Hebrewes tells us that Christ has been appointed worthy of more glory than Moses (Heb. 3:3).

Thus it would seem reasonable to suggest that the New Testament is far more binding on the believer than the Old Testament.

My thoughts.

Blaine Scogin

Z

ZekeO Jul 15, 2014

I see what you saying Blain, but to draw your final conclusion could lead you down a path which discredits vast swaithes of the bible. The goal of the nt minister is to bring Jesus Christ to the fore in the OT.

sermonindex Jul 15, 2014

Zeek the intention of this thread is not to discredit the Old Testament or to deny that it is the Word if God. But to suggest that Christ is the greater, or rather the final revelation of God. As such it wound be reasonable to assume that the New Testament is more binding on the believer as it is the substance of the New Covenant. Rather He, Jesus is the substance, the reality of the New Covenant.

Thus I reason we are governed by Christ in Zion and not Moses on Sinai.

My thoughts.

Blaine

sermonindex Jul 15, 2014

We are governed by Christ Himself the Person and not even the Scriptures though they are a means so therefore Christ supersedes even the Scriptures themselves.

Z

ZekeO Jul 15, 2014

What are asking then? For Christ is the end of the law for everyone who believes.

What other reason would there be for you to observe the law of Moses? For by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.

H

havok20x Jul 15, 2014

Again,

I want to stress something really heavily here.

The OT is NOT synonymous with the old covenant!

Again, the old covenant is FOUND in what we call the OT, but the OT is not only the old covenant.

The NT is NOT the new covenant. The new covenant is fulfilled in the NT, but the New covenant is also all over the place in the OT. In fact, the Bereans looked in the OT to find out if what Paul was saying was true concerning the Messiah and the new covenant.

Moses and Christ are not pitted one against another. No, sir. The law was my schoolmaster to bring me to Christ. Now Christ is the fulfillment of the law for me.

But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, if, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.

I am righteous because of the faith I have in Jesus Christ, not because of the law. However, Paul makes it very clear that the law has a purpose. Read Romans and Galatians.

Christ is indeed the Greater One. Moses was just a shadow of Christ, and Christ is the fulfillment of the Prophet like him.

However look at what Paul said:

All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, 17 that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.

What was he talking about when he said "all scripture"? He wasn't talking about the NT (although it applies now), I can tell you that much.

It is all useful, it is all authoritative, but it all must be applied for its intended purpose. And because so many have used the law for what it was not intended to be used for, we shy away from the entire OT.

Brother Blaine,

I love you, but this isn't calvinism vs. anything else. The issue is our view of Scriptures.

Y

yuehan Jul 15, 2014

Christians do not live under the law, but under Christ:

Romans 6:14-15 - "For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace."

1 Corinthians 15:56 - "The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law."

Romans 7:4-6 - "Therefore, my brethren, you also have become dead to the law through the body of Christ, that you may be married to another ”” to Him who was raised from the dead, that we should bear fruit to God. For when we were in the flesh, the sinful passions which were aroused by the law were at work in our members to bear fruit to death. But now we have been delivered from the law, having died to what we were held by, so that we should serve in the newness of the Spirit and not in the oldness of the letter."

Romans 5-8 speaks of this very clearly - though it took many years before the scales fell off my eyes and I finally grasped its meaning. I believe the key to understanding Romans is to read the text literally, and pay due attention to the grammatical tenses used by Paul.

Y

yuehan Jul 15, 2014

This article articulates quite well on Christian living - what it means to be alive to God, and being dead to sin, self, the law, and the world:

The Key To The Victorious Christian Life: An explanation of how to experience the victory, peace, freedom and joy God has provided for us in Christ (by Mike Quarles)

http://brotherheart.wordpress.com/articles-by-mike-quarles/the-key-to-the-victorious-christian-life/

sermonindex Jul 15, 2014

Havoc I agree the issue is our view of Scripture. But is the view a flat line view with both covenants binding upon believer. Or is it a view of redemptive history that shifts from the shadow of the law to the reality of Christ. I suggest that it is the latter.

To say that we progress from the shadow to the reality is not pitting Moses against Christ. But rather a moving of redemptive history from the Old Covenant to the New Covenant.

Perhaps this movement can be best understood in the Mount of Transfiguration found in the synoptic gospels. Here Jesus was with Moses the law giver. He was also with Elijah who represented the spirit of the prophets. Yet they faded away when God spoke through the cloud saying this is my beloved Son, Listen to Him. When the cloud left Jesus remained. I think the significance is quite obvious.

I think the above is illustrated in 2 Cor.3 when Paul speaks of the ministry of the Old Covenant fading away in favor of the New Covenant.

My thoughts.

Blaine

Y

yuehan Jul 15, 2014

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D

dolfan Jul 15, 2014

This topic always draws out the most interesting responses no matter where you find it.

It can be messy. As a rule, we are not very good students of God's Word. We bring our own ways of reading and processing information to it, for one. We also have so many disparate voices insisting on being authoritative themselves and they are saying all sorts of different and often opposing or inconsistent things.

I like what Havok said about the OT and NT.

We should not view the revelation of God in the Word through two sets of glasses. The Bible is a long revelation of God, who is always the same. It is the revelation of God in His relationship with His creation. Because it is a practical revelation of an actual relationship, we are blessed to have concrete historical accounts of that revelation in real human time as opposed to a compilation of truisms and abstract ideas. One reason we fail to read it as a single, complex, continuing revelation of one God is because the faces, names and places do change as God's relationship outlasts one generation and is accounted for into the next, and so on.

It does little help to say that the OT is fulfilled in the NT. It is true, but it doesn't really mean anything in a practical sense to most readers.

The OT is not out of date. It is not "less authority" than the NT. There is no opposition between them. What the OT is, though, is the revelation of God, given to men by eyewitness accounts, by God's providential supervision of the recording of actual events, places and people, and by the agency of the Holy Spirit. The OT revelation is the history of God's specific revelation of Himself and His intentions for His creation on earth through one relationship with a multi-generational ethne with whom He bound Himself in three particular covenants: Abrahamic (through whose seed all nations will be blessed, the seed being Jesus), Mosaic (the Law of God as a tutor and master of the ways of God and the sin of man, designed to bring the particular line of Abraham through Issac and Jacob through time and by the guiding hand of God until the fulness of time and the person of a Jesus, son of Mary) and Davidic (a royal kingdom comprised of the line of Abraham, Issac and Jacob and ruled by descendants of David, culminating finally and forever in Jesus the Christ in the eschaton of all things.). The NT is the historical account of God's completion of His revelatory work and His redemptive work with His only begotten Son, Jesus, as the fullest and final revelation of God and as the redemption of the physical line of Abraham (Israel) and of the "nations" through faith in Jesus.

Without the OT, there is no NT. Without the NT, the OT is moot. Certainly, there are specific portions of the OT that do not have direct application to the nations, and the whole of the ritual law of the OT is made unnecessary by the sacrifice and resurrection of Jesus. Yet, these do not pit one of the testaments against the other, nor the covenants.

Finally, Jesus is the fulfillment of all things. It is before Him that every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that He is Lord. At the transfiguration, where Moses and Elijah appeared to Peter, James and John and spoke with Jesus, it was Peter's response to build three tabernacles including one for Moses. But, only a week before, Peter had said to Jesus, "You are the Christ, the son of the loving God." The Father Himself responded to Peter: "This is my Son. Hear ye Him," and Moses and Elijah were gone. There is no question that Jesus was, is and shall ever remain the One to whom we answer, the One to whom we must give account. He is the ahead of the Body and there is no other. There are no "degrees" of His authority, which is absolute and unique as the blessed and only potentate.

M

MaryJane Jul 15, 2014

by sermonindex on 2014/7/15 7:44:10

We are governed by Christ Himself the Person and not even the Scriptures though they are a means so therefore Christ supersedes even the Scriptures themselves.
______________________

Great post Greg, simple and to the point. JESUS is a person and we are governed by HIM.

God Bless
maryjane

H

havok20x Jul 15, 2014

Brother Blaine,

If you have meet anyone who says that you have to keep the law AND the new covenant, they are desperately mistaken--calvinist, arminian, or neither.

I think we agree mostly, but I am discussing it from the perspective that many, many Christians ignore the first 39 books of the Bible because they aren't the New Testament, because some deceived preacher or church member told them that the OT was unimportant.

D

dolfan Jul 15, 2014

Havok wrote:

"I think we agree mostly, but I am discussing it from the perspective that many, many Christians ignore the first 39 books of the Bible because they aren't the New Testament, because some deceived preacher or church member told them that the OT was unimportant."

And, a lot of them say this. Re: Joseph Prince, much of the Church of Christ denomination, and lots more.

Y

yuehan Jul 15, 2014

Dolfan wrote:

"And, a lot of them say this. Re: Joseph Prince, much of the Church of Christ denomination, and lots more."

Where does Joseph Prince say this? He speaks of seeing Christ in the Old Testament, I thus find it hard to believe that he would make such a blanket dismissal.

D

dolfan Jul 15, 2014

Yuehan,

I respectfully submit the following:

From Destined to Reign,

"The law is about you looking at yourself. The new covenant is all about you seeing Jesus.” (p. 196)

"Have you noticed that the law entered so that sin might abound? It clearly means that the more you preach the law, the more sin will abound. After all, the strength of sin is the law. Therefore, when you see sin and you preach more of the law, you are literally adding wood to fire." (p. 249)

Now, these two rather randomly chosen quotes carry a lot of meaning. The law brings me to Christ, according to Paul. Not so for Prince, who says it helps you look at yourself. Plus, the law isn't "about" that at all. He made it up.

Prince wholly disowns the power of the OT. "My friend, the spirit of Jesus in the new covenant of grace is not the spirit of the old covenant of law during Elijah’s time.” (p. 51-52.). The testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy, says the Bible. The testimony of Jesus is replete, full of, the OT law and prophets, even as He preached the kingdom of God. Jesus actually rebuked Satan with the OT three times.

There is so much more. Read some of Michael Brown's work on Prince's writing.

Prince says this, too, albeit less about his covenant issues:

"Because of Jesus' finished work at the cross, He will never be angry with you nor rebuke you even when you fail. (p. 305)". He just took out 2 Tim. 3:16 there, which by itself includes "all Scripture" .... primarily the OT at that time ... As being I spired and profitable for, among other things, rebuke.