Law and the New Testament – The Law of God: Questions and Answers

Law and the New Testament
The Law of God: Questions and Answers

The New Testament is the Law of God.

Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your Law, ‘I said you are gods’? If he called them gods to whom the word of God came—and Scripture cannot be broken—do you say of him whom the Father consecrated and sent into the world, ‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said, “I am the Son of God”? John 9:34-36

Jesus here identified the Psalms (Ps. 82:6, in particular) as part of the “Law” of God. And He said that the psalms, as God’s Law, were speaking about those who, like the religious leaders who were challenging Jesus, had been entrusted with judging the people of God. The psalms are an aspect of the Law of God because they carried forward and expanded the teaching of the Law into the specific historical situations of their day.

The New Testament does the same thing, as Jesus demonstrates by applying the Law and the psalms to the people He was teaching and to Himself. Jesus came to fulfill the Law of God, as we have seen. In fulfilling the Law of God He continued its place in His own life and teaching, and that in two ways.

First, Jesus fulfilled all the righteousness of the Law of God, everything God requires in order to allow sinful human beings to share in His presence and enter into His glory. And, second, Jesus endured all the threats and judgments of the Law, so as to take away from sinful human beings whatever might yet keep them from the presence of the Lord. Jesus embodied the Law, therefore, and brought it in all its glory and demands completely into the period of the New Testament.

Further, Jesus announced the coming of the Kingdom of God and insisted that greatness in that Kingdom—which the rest of the New Testament unpacks—is achieved through obeying and teaching the Law of God (Matt. 5:17-19). It’s no wonder Paul, John, and all the other Apostles affirmed the ongoing validity of the Law of God. They were heralds of the Good News of the Kingdom of God, and the Kingdom without the Law is unthinkable, not to mention unrealizable.

The New Testament, like the psalms, brings the Law forward to its own unique set of historical and cultural circumstances, teaching us how to benefit from the whole counsel of God, in Jesus Christ, according to the Law and the prophets.

So when we use the term, “Law” of God, we acknowledge that, ultimately, that Law can only be fully understood in the light of the revelation of God in the New Testament.

Got a question about the Law of God? Write to T. M. at tmmoore@ailbe.org, and your answer might appear in this series of In the Gates columns.

Visit our website, www.ailbe.org, and sign up to receive our thrice-weekly devotional, Crosfigell, featuring writers from the period of the Celtic Revival and T. M.’s reflections on Scripture and the Celtic Christian tradition. Does the Law of God still apply today? Order a copy of T. M.’s book, The Ground for Christian Ethics, and study the question for yourself.

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In the Gates is a devotional series on the Law of God by Rev. T. M. Moore, editor of the Worldview Church. He serves as dean of the Centurions Program of the Wilberforce Forum and principal of The Fellowship of Ailbe, a spiritual fellowship in the Celtic Christian tradition. He is the author or editor of twenty books, and has contributed chapters to four others. His essays, reviews, articles, papers, and poetry have appeared in dozens of national and international journals, and on a wide range of websites. His most recent books are The Ailbe Psalter and The Ground for Christian Ethics (Waxed Tablet).

Scripture quotations in this article are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, (c) copyright 2001, 2007 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.