According to Jesus, we are not His disciples unless we are abiding in His word. How can we be Christians except through belief in Him? How can we say we believe Him if we aren't careful to hear what He said and seeking to do those things? What Church has a statement of faith or doctrine that says they are doing this? I was raised in the Church of Chirst, who believed themselves to be the restored Church, and they see themselves to be the original first Century Church, doing what the Bible says in Bible ways. While the 'pattern' they are organized by is good and mostly according to the offices mentioned in the New Testament, we can all read from the Great Commission of Matthew that the commandment not only deals with baptism, it focuses on discipleship and teaching the disciples to abide in whatever Jesus commanded us to do. I would encourage anyone who wants to know the truth to take their own Bible and go through all the teachings of Jesus and highlight or underline those things He said that could be taken to be commandments and not just recommendations that you have a choice to do or not - according to what He said. Did Jesus command taking the Lord's Supper every first day of the week? No, but He did say to do it correctly when you do remember Him as He commanded. Did Jesus teach about the necessity to sing without an instrument? No, but He did say that those who please God in their worship do so by worshiping Him in spirit and truth and teaching the commandments of God in truth rather than teaching as doctrine those things which are the commandments of men, false teachers, false prophets, and doctrines of demons. Jesus repeatedly warned of those who would teach falsehood in His name. We all have His words if we have a Bible, so aren't we really without excuse if we take our faith seriously, instead of thinking we are saved simply by the belief we had one day of our life when we said we believed and obeyed the truth. Those who said, 'Lord, Lord!', were not abiding in His word, as they were 'Workers of iniquity', rather than abiding in His commandments/doctrine/truth.
From the records of Moses we see on the surface that God desires good for His creation, but that rejecting His word separates us from His presence. Adam and Eve were in the garden that God had planted for them. He gave man charge over the earth, to subdue it under his control, and that the seventh day was the day of rest to give God praise and honor as Creator of all. Surely all man knew was good and he abided in the things God told him. It was not until man chose to disbelieve God that sin crept in to do the work of the evil one. Even in this first family we find the great evil of murder, and that this murder was due to the pride of one who did not please God against one who did please God in what he did. Also note that Noah knew about sacrifices and clean and unclean animals long before Moses received the law from God. As such, it is also reasonable that Adam and Eve and all mankind until the time of Noah were under the laws from God. Yet mankind grew more and more in wickedness, violence and evil. They were still going about thier daily lives, ingoring the peaching of Noah to repent and turn to God because God was going to destroy the world with a flood. They chose to disbelieve Noah and continue in sin and perished in the flood. In much the same way, the world today still ignores the call of Jesus to repent and prepare for the kingdom of God. And when will Israel call upon God to save them and seek His face with all thier heart, soul and strength? Are we approaching the time of when the fulness of the Gentiles has been fulfilled, and this is why so few have deep regard for the fullness of the words of Jesus?
Jesus spoke with clarity. The greatest commandment identified by Jesus is surely the greatest commandment! It has not changed at all. With the teachings of Jesus we can often locate the greatest truths towards the last of His teachings. It isn't until Matthew 22 that we find Jesus saying which is the first commandment of all, and that was in reply to the Scribes who had questioned Him.
Matthew 22:34-40;
'But when the Pharisees heard that He had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together. Then one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him, and saying, 'Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?' Jesus said to him, "You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets."
It is clear that Jesus taught that the Law and Prophets hang upon these two commands. He didn't say that these exclude the Law and the Prophets. In my mind, when things hang from something, the thing they hang from is a peg or a rod or beam of some type, but the thing to grasp is that they have connection to a common thing which upholds them both. Even in the gospel accounts we find that the things Jesus said and did were according to the law and the prophets. Another way to think of it is a tapestry that various elements are woven into it, that the threads are connected to each other - they don't stand alone in each thread, although each thread is a part of the whole and that the whole has parameters.
Coming to parameters we can find some gems throughout the Sacred records. One of my personal favorites is found in Micah 6:6-8;
"With what shall I come before the LORD, and bow myself before the High God? Shall I come before Him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? Will the LORD be pleased with thousands of rams, ten thousand rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? He has shown you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?"
We find in the teachings of Jesus all of these elements and more. He tells us what is good. He tells us that justice includes judging righteously, and not according to appearance, but according to the truth given by God. He shows us what loving mercy is. He shows us humility that we need to imitate, even if we cannot fully attain to His stature because we are but men - made of the dust of the earth. God is mindful that man is but dust, yet He loved us by sending His only begotten Son that we might be blessed to reach out to His example to follow. If we understand that He counted equality with God as not a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself to be made into the form of man, destined to die the unjust death He died upon the cross to save us by redeeming our souls with His own blood, how can we but look at this unequaled love with anything but awe, respect and humility?
So take your Bible, open it up, look into His words of eternal life, and consider if you really are a disciple of Jesus Christ. Talk to Him about it. He wants to hear from you.
O, how I love Jesus, because He first loved me. love that song...
Great post as always, Jude! God has said in His word those who love Him will seek His face and stay in His word day and night.. ooooowwweee reminds me of another song, Night and Day by Ella Fitzgerald and Cole Porter, Night and Day... you are the one, only you beneath the moon or under the sun, whether near me or far... matters not darling where you are...hmm-mmm-mm, la, la, dedede... oooops, sorry, got caught up in the moment:ROFL: :dancingp::yay::rocknroll:
