Matthew 19:23 Continued

We saw last time how the divisions of the bible into the Old and New Testaments are not inspired by God, even though they’re helpful for us as we study.

Then we saw how that no one knew all the revealed knowledge of God. We don’t know it all today either. There’s still more that God will progressively reveal, but we do have the complete story in one book from the creation of the world to the end of the world. No other additions will ever be made to this book, the Bible, and before the dispensation, or age, that we’re living in today, mankind simply did not have this book in the form we do.

 

We finished off last time looking at the fact that at the time of Jesus’s ministry He was operating under the dispensation of the law, the Old Covenant, or the Old Testament. He was born, grew up, ministered in His earthly ministry, and died in that dispensation of the law. We saw that it was impossible for the New Covenant or the New Testament, or for the Church, The Body of Christ, to even come into being until He shed his blood.

We also saw how no one, apart from Jesus Himself, knew about the cross and the resurrection from the dead, even Jesus’s closest disciples to who he explained the hidden meanings of the parables.

 

So, today we’re going to take up this issue of rightly dividing the Word again and we’ll see more critical examples of why there’re differences in the Bible and how we navigate through those differences.

 

In the example we gave of the fact that all the way through to half the Gospel of Mark, the disciples had no clue about the resurrection of the Lord, which is the most fundamental and singular most important event in Christianity yet these disciples didn’t know a thing about it!

They went out two by two preaching repentance knowing nothing about the resurrection.

In Mark 9:9-10 we saw plainly that they didn’t know of the resurrection.

Then in Mark 9:30-32 we read,

Then they departed from there and passed through Galilee, and He (Jesus) did not want anyone to know it. 

For He taught His disciples and said to them, “The Son of Man is being betrayed into the hands of men, and they will kill Him. And after He is killed, He will rise the third day.” 

But they (the disciples) did not understand this saying and were afraid to ask Him.

 

Jesus tells them again here that He’s going to be killed and he’ll rise the third day. Notice Jesus doesn’t tell them what this would accomplish. They didn’t know what this meant and they’re afraid to ask Him.

You see they were ignorant of the cross that we now know about and that’s so dear to every Christian.

 

In John 16:12-13 Jesus tells His disciples this,

“I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. 

However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. 

Well, the Holy Spirit has come now. He dwells in all of us that believe the gospel. We have the scripture inspired by the Holy Spirit so that’s happened.

However, when we read John 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 8, 9, right up to up to 16 there are things the disciples did not know that we can know now, today.

So, we might ask, “Well, what’s the good of the Gospel of John then?”

It tells us a lot about Jesus being the Son of God. It points us to His deity. If it weren’t for the foundations of the Gospel of John we’d know nothing of Who the Lord is.

Same with the other Gospels. If it weren’t for the genealogy beginning in Matthew 1:1 there’d be no proof of His royal line, no proof of His virgin birth, no illustrations of the miracles which proved His Deity.

The Gospels are vital to us today because they tell us Who Jesus was, but they don’t give us the doctrines under which we operate today as the Body of Christ, where there’s no separation between Jew and Gentile.

If we try and lead our lives under the dispensation of the law, in which the Gospels were set, we’re going to fail miserably on many points. If we use the four Gospels as our doctrine today, we’re using a set of instruction that were incomplete, by Jesus own words,

“I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. 

However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. 

Now let’s go to Acts chapter one, Jesus had died he’d risen from the dead and he’s about to ascend to heaven and Peter asks him in

verse 6,

Therefore, when they (the disciples) had come together, they asked Him, saying, “Lord, will You at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” 

Then in verse 7 Jesus replies,

And He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has put in His own authority. 

 

See, there’s still things they don’t know in Acts and that’s after they know of the resurrection!

There are things that we don’t know now! We can only know what God’s revealed progressively to mankind and we need to understand when God said what he did and who it was meant for. Who was the audience?

Why?

Because even though we have all of God’s revelation today, in the form of the Bible, if we don’t discern it correctly, we’ll think that our instructions are found in a place where they’re not!

We’ll think God’s doing the same thing throughout the entire scripture which He’s not!

We’ll think that the whole Bible teaches the same thing throughout, which it does not!

This shows us that we need to read the Bible understanding the dispensations, the ages in each section that we read. If we don’t we’ll never make sense of the differences in the Bible.

It’s not some sort of man invented system it’s a vitally important way to read the scripture in context. It’s called rightly dividing as 2^nd Timothy 2:16 tells us.

 

Let’s see some examples of this.

The Apostle Paul says in Ephesians 1:9 that God,

having made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His good pleasure which He purposed in Himself…

See there were things Pauls writing about that were not known before. The great apostles Peter James and John weren’t even aware of them before they were revealed by Jeus Himself to Paul.

Again, not everyone knew everything that got revealed.

So, God spoke in different times in different manners to different people as we saw last time. That’s what Hebrews 1 verses 1 and 2 teach us as we’ve already pointed out.

So, let’s see a few of those differences and also what’s common to all scripture.

To start with, every time God spoke, just the fact that it’s Him speaking means we should listen!

That’s what’s common to all scripture.

2 Timothy 3:16,

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

So, when God speaks it’s something we should listen to, but it doesn’t mean that he’s speaking all things to the same people at the same time in the same way.

For example, we see in Psalm 2:5,

Then He shall speak to them in His wrath, And distress them in His deep displeasure.

God speaks in his wrath! These days people don’t even like to think about God being angry or they’ll say, “Well that’s the Old Testament”, but they forget about Jesus whipping the blokes out of the temple or Revelation 19 when He’s coming back in flaming fire and vengeance, but that’s not what He’s doing today, right now!

It’s one way God spoke in time past, through the prophets, in his wrath.

Now if we just plucked this verse out of the chapter without understanding the context we could say that’s why I pranged my car on the way to work this morning, God was angry. Or God was angry and displeased so He caused the government to bring down some new law or new tax on us or caused me to get cancer.

But, in the correct context we see that he’s talking about Christ’s coming Kingdom where He’ll judge the Nations and He’ll speak to them in his wrath before he sets up the Kingdom.

 

In contrast to God speaking in His wrath we have Hosea 2:14 God speaking comfortably,

Therefore, behold, I (God) will allure her, Will bring her into the wilderness, And speak comfort to her. 

In Psalm 86, God says He’ll speak peace to them. He’ll speak peaceably.

Speaking in his wrath, speaking comfortably, and speaking peaceably are different ways God ‘s spoken.

You and I need to know who it is He’s speaking to and when He’s speaking this way and is it to me and you today?

How do I expect God to speak to me? In his wrath or in his peace or is it based on the day? Is it one day He’s angry and the next day He’s happy and peaceable?

We need to read the Bible in view of the context, the dispensation.

It’s just not true that God’s doing the same thing all the time. He can’t speak wrath and peace at the same time, so we’ve got to rightly divide and put what He says in context.

 

Micah 4:3 is a doozy,

He shall judge between many peoples, And rebuke strong nations afar off; They shall beat their swords into ploughshares, And their spears into pruning hooks; Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, Neither shall they learn war anymore. 

The United Nations has a sculpture in the front of the United Nations headquarters in New York that portrays a man beating a sword into a ploughshare.

So, we’re anti-war, because God doesn’t want us to learn War anymore. Beat your swords into ploughshares and your guns into Forks and spoons.

But in Joel chapter 3:9-10, which is in the same section of the bible, the so called “minor prophets”, we see,

Proclaim this among the nations: “Prepare for war! Wake up the mighty men, Let all the men of war draw near, Let them come up. 

Beat your ploughshares into swords And your pruning hooks into spears; Let the weak say, ‘I am strong.’ “

There’s no statue anywhere near the UN that depicts that!

This is the exact reverse of what God said in Micah 4!

So, the person who comes to us and says they do everything God says in the Bible has got a real problem. They’re missing something because God says things that are exactly opposite! They contradict!

Why? God’s speaking to different people at different times and for different purposes.

Context is vital.

See, if you just plucked either of these verse out and used them as some sort of life application you’d have all sorts of problems. Can’t do that!

The same with salvation. Over here He’s offering it this way but over there He’s not, he’s offering it this way. You see what we’re driving at?

If we keep in mind Hebrews 1:1,

God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets,

We can understand why God does things in different ways. We see that’s the way it had to be for that particular time and for that particular situation.

 

In Luke 2:13 God speaks through Angels. What do they say?

In verse 14,

“Glory to God in the highest, And on earth peace, goodwill toward men!” 

That’s what God sent Jesus to do, to bring peace on Earth right?

But a few chapters later in Luke 12:51 Jesus says,

Do you suppose that I came to give peace on earth? I tell you, not at all, but rather division. 

For from now on five in one house will be divided: three against two, and two against three. 

Father will be divided against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law.” 

Wasn’t that one of the things that God hates in Proverbs 6:19,

A false witness who speaks lies, And one who sows discord among brethren.

But you see Jesus is not creating discord among the Brethren he’s separating the Brethren from the non- Brethren.

If we don’t make the right division here, rightly divide, times, places, and people, we’re opening ourselves up to confusion and then we’ll never understand the Bible properly as it was supposed to be understood.

 

So, will Jesus bring peace to the earth? Not according to Luke 12! Will He ever bring peace on the earth? Yes, He will in Micah chapter 4 and in Revelation 20:22, but not here in Luke.

 

What about going to Church on the Sabbath day?

I’m sure most of us realise that Sunday’s not the Sabbath. So, it would be reasonable to question why we don’t go to church on Saturday, the Sabbath Day.

In Exodus 20:8 we read,

Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. 

That’s one of the big ten. The seventh Day Adventists take that literally. So did Israel. So did Jesus and so did Paul!

Keeping the Sabbath day, the seventh day, holy means no work, respecting rest that’s what it meant in Exodus 31 verse 14. Was that verse just a suggestion for good living?

Let’s see, Exodus 31:15,

Work shall be done for six days, but the seventh is the Sabbath of rest, holy to the LORD. Whoever does any work on the Sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death.

That’s the law!

That makes you really want to keep the Sabbath if anything would!

That’s unless you read Colossians 2:16,

So let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or sabbaths…

Then, in Galatians 4: 9 to 10 Paul says to these Galatian Christians,

But now after you have known God, or rather are known by God, how is it that you turn again to the weak and beggarly elements, to which you desire again to be in bondage? 

You observe days and months and seasons and years. 

I am afraid for you, lest I have laboured for you in vain. 

By that he means the law he means Exodus 31. They’re going back to law keeping!

Paul sees their keeping of special days holy as sign that they’ve misunderstood what Christ is doing in that time that Paul’s teaching them.

 

So, you and I have a problem.

On the one hand we have Moses and on the other hand we have Paul and they’re both inspired of God. They’re both in the Bible and the Bible’s God’s love letter to us and one says you’ll die if you don’t keep the Sabbath the other says don’t let any man judge you regarding it.

What do we do? Flip a coin? No! We need to understand God’s revelation in the dispensation, the time, the context in which He’s talking.

 

God spoke differently about diets in the Bible.

One thing that’s common throughout the Bible in all dispensations relating to food is that if you don’t work you don’t eat.

 

In Genesis 1 it says God gave man every herb bearing or yielding seed to eat and the fruit of the trees to eat, so for sure they’re not eating animals which he gave to man to care for.

This instruction is given when man is still in the Garden of Eden in what we call the dispensation of innocence, before the fall of man where man sinned in disobeying God.

Then 1600 Years later, after the flood of Noah, where just eight people remain from the population of the earth, we’re in a different dispensation, a different age. And in Genesis 9:3-4 God says,

Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. I have given you all things, even as the green herbs.

But you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood.

Make sure it’s dead before eating it in other words.

 

So, after the flood things change again and there’s another age, a new dispensation, and in Genesis 9 God puts the fear of man into the animals which causes them to scatter.

Just don’t eat the blood of these animals just the meat, He commands.

The idea that God forbids the eating of animals just isn’t there.

 

Then, somewhere between 8 and 900 years after that, we’re in the dispensation of the Law and in Leviticus 11:1-2 we have this.

Now the LORD spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying to them, 

“Speak to the children of Israel, saying, ‘These are the animals which you may eat among all the animals that are on the earth. 

Then in the entire rest of the chapter He gives highly detailed highly complex instructions about which animals they can and can’t eat, totally different from Genesis 9 where it was every moving thing.

For example, Leviticus 11:13-23,

‘And these you shall regard as an abomination among the birds; they shall not be eaten, they are an abomination: the eagle, the vulture, the buzzard, the kite, and the falcon after its kind; every raven after its kind, the ostrich, the short-eared owl, the sea gull, and the hawk after its kind; the little owl, the fisher owl, and the screech owl; the white owl, the jackdaw, and the carrion vulture; the stork, the heron after its kind, the hoopoe, and the bat. 

‘All flying insects that creep on all fours shall be an abomination to you. 

Yet these you may eat of every flying insect that creeps on all fours: those which have jointed legs above their feet with which to leap on the earth. 

These you may eat: the locust after its kind, the destroying locust after its kind, the cricket after its kind, and the grasshopper after its kind. Reminds us of John the Baptist, doesn’t it?

But all other flying insects which have four feet shall be an abomination to you. 

You want to follow a Biblical diet now?

 

See, God has a revelation that He’s giving progressively, and He has a purpose that He’s unfolding over time and when God gives new revelation it supersedes the old Revelation just as each age supersedes the previous one.

 

In Leviticus 11, who’s God speaking to in Leviticus 11?

The children of Israel! Leviticus 11:1-2 specifically tells us that.

These laws are not for Gentiles they’re for Israel. In Genesis 9 where all moving things can be eaten there was no Israel in the Garden of Eden there was definitely no Israel but buy the time we’re in Leviticus there is a nation of Israel.

 

Then in 1 Timothy 4:1, Paul comes in with this,

Now the Spirit expressly says that in latter times some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons, speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their own conscience seared with a hot iron, forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from foods which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth. 

For every creature of God is good, and nothing is to be refused if it is received with thanksgiving; for it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer. 

See, certain people were trying to get believers back under the law of Leviticus 11 and Paul calls it a doctrine of demons!

What’s with all these differences and contradictions, what is the truth?

We’ll all of them are the truth in their correct context!

 

Paul was given a revelation from Jesus Christ Himself that wasn’t about Israel alone. It’s not under the law and it’s not about the Kingdom of Heaven.

It was to the body of Christ in which there’s no difference between Jew and Gentile and there’s no command about what that church puts into their mouth.

Every creature of God is good and nothing’s to be refused and is to be received with Thanksgiving. It’s Sanctified by the word of God in Prayer. There is a sidebar to that. We should demonstrate wisdom and restraint when we’re with a brother who still does regard food.

 

God spoke differently about the law in the Bible and what’s common all the way through, from Genesis Revelation, is that the law is good. The law is righteous.

God’s not giving laws that are bad, His law is righteous and holy and good and there’s right and wrong on every page of scripture. What is it that’s wrong? Sin, which is always wrong and Holiness which is always right.

So, under the law or under Jesus or under Paul or anywhere that says this’s a sin according to God’s holy standard, that’s wrong.

So, we ask, “Is it wrong just for that person or for everybody at that time?”

In Deuteronomy 6:24-25 we see this,

And the LORD commanded us to observe all these statutes, to fear the LORD our God, for our good always, that He might preserve us alive, as it is this day. 

Then it will be righteousness for us, if we are careful to observe all these commandments before the LORD our God, as He has commanded us.’ 

Now, could they do all the Commandments? No! They could offer sacrifices when they didn’t but there’s none righteous. We now know this from Romans 3:10,

As it is written: “THERE IS NONE RIGHTEOUS, NO, NOT ONE;

Quoting from Psalm 14 verse 1, and there’s many other places that show us this.

But yet, it (the Law) will be righteousness to us, as we’ve just seen.

 

Then we have Jesus arriving.

The general idea we have today, after His coming, is that the Old Testament was Israel’s law, and the New Testament is NOT Israel’s law.

The thinking is that Jesus came and changed all that.

But in Matthew 5:17 Jesus says,

“Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill. 

In our culture we forget that verse.

Then in the next verse, verse 18,

For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled. 

Then, in Matthew 23:1 at the end of his ministry he actually tells his disciples this,

Then Jesus spoke to the multitudes and to His disciples, saying: “The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat. 

Therefore whatever they (The scribes and Pharisees) tell you to observe, that observe and do, but do not do according to their works; for they say, and do not do.

What’s Jesus teaching here?

Say and do the law! Don’t be a hypocrite. Yet in the Church today we still mostly see Jesus’s sayings as our doctrine, even though we don’t and never could keep His sayings. In most cases we’re ignorant of just what it is He did say because He’s speaking the Law, and He’s speaking it to Israel to who it was given.

Jesus didn’t come to destroy the law, He’s teaching the Law and obedience to it right through Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

That’s what He tells our rich young ruler from the passage were up to in our Matthew study in Matthew 19.

He’s telling to Keep the commandments, the law, and He’s also trying to encourage the young man to see Who He really was, The Messiah, The Son of God, God incarnate.

 

In Acts 2 we see the disciples after the Holy Spirit had been poured out from Heaven saying the things the Holy Spirit wanted them to say and doing the things the Holy Spirit wanted them to do.

In Acts 2:45 they sold their possessions and goods, and divided them among all, as anyone had need.

Then in verse 46 we see this,

So continuing daily with one accord…

Where? In the local church? No! In the temple!

This is the temple that the Jews built in accordance to the law.

Why were they in the temple using the temple for their religious worship?

In Acts 3:1,

Now Peter and John went up together to the temple at the hour of prayer, the ninth hour. 

Hours of prayer. Do we have that in the Body of Christ?

That came from Israel. Israel had hours of prayer.

They would pray certain hours of the day and they prayed toward the temple or in the temple or at the temple and here’s Peter and John, filled with the Holy Spirit going up together into the temple to pray. Why are they going up to the temple?

Because the temple mattered to Israel.

These aren’t people trying to learn the new doctrines of Christianity! The Holy Spirit’s filled them to communicate what He wants them to say, but they’re in the temple to pray at the Jewish hour of prayer.

 

Hebrews 7:12 we read,

For the priesthood being changed, of necessity there is also a change of the law.

See, there’s been a change in the priesthood and a change in the law.

Is the priesthood removed? No!

Is the Law removed? No! But they have changed.

Something more has been revealed and it’s revealed by the son.

 

We started by looking at Hebrews 1:1,

God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, 

Then verse 2,

..has in these last days spoken to us BY HIS SON…

He’s both the high priest and the reason for the change of the law, and, Oh how much we could talk about relating to Jesus as the High Priest, but we’ve got to stick with the program.

 

Hebrews 8:8 explains how the prophets of old spoke about this new covenant.

We read,

Because finding fault with them, (that’s the covenants), He says: “BEHOLD, THE DAYS ARE COMING, SAYS THE LORD, WHEN I WILL MAKE A NEW COVENANT WITH THE HOUSE OF ISRAEL AND WITH THE HOUSE OF JUDAH!

Again, God spoke to different people at different times in different ways.

Who’s God speaking to here in Hebrews 8, which is quoted from Jeremiah 31 from verse 31?

Israel and Judah!

Hebrews 8:9,

NOT ACCORDING TO THE COVENANT THAT I MADE WITH THEIR FATHERS IN THE DAY WHEN I TOOK THEM BY THE HAND TO LEAD THEM OUT OF THE LAND OF EGYPT; BECAUSE THEY DID NOT CONTINUE IN MY COVENANT, AND I DISREGARDED THEM, SAYS THE LORD. 

See different time, different way.

Then verse 10,

FOR THIS IS THE COVENANT THAT I WILL MAKE WITH THE HOUSE OF ISRAEL AFTER THOSE DAYS, SAYS THE LORD:

After those days. Different time. When will the New Covenant be made? It’ll be made when it’s ratified in the spilled blood of Jesus Christ!

See, this New Covenant, this New Testament didn’t start with Jesus in the manger!

Verse 10 continues,

I WILL PUT MY LAWS IN THEIR (Israel’s) MIND AND WRITE THEM ON THEIR (Israel’s) HEARTS; AND I WILL BE THEIR (Israel’s) GOD, AND THEY (Israel) SHALL BE MY PEOPLE. 

Well, is that the case today? Most definitely not! This is the promise associated with that New Covenant. When will that happen? In the Kingdom which will come but is not here now.

We change all that in today’s church. We say. “Well, the New Covenant’s not really to Israel it’s to the church and it’s not meaning the Mosaic law, it just means the words of God.”

But the Bible’s very clear here as to who’s being spoken to, and we need to smash the meaning around terribly badly in order to make it say something else.

 

God didn’t always speak about the Law!

We saw in Genesis 9 there was no Mosaic law. In Genesis 1:1 there was just one single Law, “Don’t eat of the fruit of THAT tree!” That was it!

Now, we have this verse in Hebrews saying that God’s going to put His laws in Israel’s hearts and minds.

Hebrews 8:11,

NONE OF THEM (Israel) SHALL TEACH HIS NEIGHBOR, AND NONE HIS BROTHER,

So, no more teachers! They’re all going to know Me; God says, and that’s definitely not the case today is it?

 

Different people, different places, different times.

In the old days, before the invention of echo sounding technology, to know the depth under the ship’s keel, a seaman would need to use a lead line. He’d cast the line with a large lead dropper out in the direction the ship was heading, and it would be straight up and down as the ship rode directly over it. Through a series of marks, the leadsman would call the depth out to the skipper.

Nowadays a ship’s technology can pretty much see a beer can on the seabed.

How stupid would it be to see a container ship or a warship, bristling with technology, with a sailor hanging over the side with a rope calling out the depth? But at the time it was totally necessary for the survival of the ship.

We still have the knowledge of how it used to be done but we no longer use that method.

See? Different times, require different methods.

It’s same throughout the whole of life and it’s the same in the bible and we need to recognise what God ordained then and what He ordains now.

Everything in the bible is not relating to us today just as everything Jesus said is not relating to us today, even though everything is absolutely for us today.

It’s for our learning as per 2 Timothy 3:16,

All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:

It’s critical for us to discern who’s being spoken to and in what dispensation or age it’s referring to if we’re ever going to understand God’s Word. What’s the context?

My hope is that we’ll finish up where we left off with the rich young ruler with a more complete view of just what’s being said and why.

Until then my friends may God open His Word to your hearts and open you to His Word.