Gospel

Rebuilding the Wall

/ David R Maas / Leave a comment

Insisting on a Torah-observant lifestyle or favoring ethnic distinctions restores the walls of separation between Jewish and Gentile believers.

The Mosaic Law was intended to keep Israel distinct from the surrounding Gentile nations. If the Church adopts the requirements of the Mosaic Law, it will rebuild the “middle wall of partition” between Jewish and Gentile believers, a wall removed by Jesus at great personal cost. The Apostle Paul presented an alternative to the Law for defining and identifying the single people of God – the “faith of Jesus Christ.”

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In His Name Alone!

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Jesus of Nazareth fulfills the promise to bless all nations in Abraham. Christ is the Patriarch’s Heir and our only source of Salvation.

Basic to the biblical doctrine of redemption is the covenant with Abraham, which included the promise that “all the nations of the Earth will be blessed in you.” The Patriarch would have innumerable descendants. The fulfillment of the promise is found only in Jesus of Nazareth, for “there is no other name under Heaven whereby we may be saved!”

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The Spirit is Life!

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The Spirit of God imparts life, especially the everlasting life of which the Gift of the Spirit is the foretaste and guarantee. 

The Spirit of God is life-giving. “God is Spirit,” and where His Spirit is, there is life! By His Spirit God created all things, including the “hosts of the Heavens.” In contrast, sin kills men, and it does so through the “letter of the Law.” Death’s “sting” is sin, “and the power of sin is the Law.” However, God’s Spirit gives us life, and where His Spirit is, there is also “liberty” – (John 4:24, 6:63, 1 Corinthians 15:56, 2 Corinthians 3:6, 3:17).

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Redeeming our Bodies

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Paul links the bodily resurrection of believers to the New Creation. Both events are vital for our complete redemption – Romans 8:1-23.

There is “now no condemnation” of anyone who is “in Christ Jesus.” This happy condition exists because the “law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set us free from the law of sin and death.” In his Letter to the Romans, the Apostle Paul links our salvation to the inheritance of Christ and the coming redemption of our bodies and creation itself.

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Resurrection and Completion

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Paul expresses his goal of going on to completion, a process that will culminate in bodily resurrection when Jesus arrives in glory.

Paul instructed the congregation of Philippi to go on to “completion” in Jesus. Bodily resurrection must take place for the consummation of this process and the completion of our salvation. This will occur when Jesus appears “on the clouds of Heaven.” God will continue to perform what He began with our conversion until “the Day of Christ.” Salvation is a process throughout our lives.

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