When one accepts the fact that King Jesus has "all authority in heaven and on earth" (Mt. 28:18) and that His authority (in the form of law) is expressed in the New Testament, the next logical question is: how is Christ's authority established?
You see, the New Testament is not a list of positive commands and "thou shalt not's." Of course, there are commands found throughout the New Testament, but in essence, we're reading a series of 27 letters to and narratives about Jesus' ministry and the churches of the first century. To submit to the authority of Christ, must we obey every single detail of the New Testament?
Must we sell all of our possessions and give our profits to the church (Acts 4:32-37)? Must we enter Jewish synagogues every Sabbath to teach the assembled Jews the gospel (Acts 19:8)? Must we meet in an "upper room" as did the disciples in Troas (Acts 20:7)? Does the fact that John was commanded to eat a book mean that we all must eat a book to be obedient to the Lord (Rev. 10:8-9)?
Many other such examples and commands could be cited, but I'm sure you get the point. There are clearly details of the New Testament that we are not required to obey. There are personal remarks made by Jesus to His disciples and by Paul to his associates that cannot and must not be bound on 21st century Christians. And, of course, there are many commands regarding spiritual gifts (1 Cor. 14) that do not have the same meaning today in light of the fact that spiritual gifts have passed away (1 Cor. 13:8-11).
So while the initial question might have seemed inappropriate or unnecessary, it is clearly a crucial question. Again, how is Christ's authority established? Or to put it another way, how do we know which details of the New Testament to obey and which not to obey?
First of all, I believe that if we strive to do all things by the authority of King Jesus (Col. 3:17) and therefore seek to pattern our lives after the New Testament Scriptures as much as we can (Eph. 4:3-5), we'll be the kingdom-citizens that King Jesus wants us to be (2 Tim. 3:16-17). In other words, if we approached all spiritual questions by turning to the New Testament for authority and/or guidance, and if we did so prayerfully and with careful deliberation, I fail to see how and where we'd go wrong. Not only would we be doing things that we know King Jesus accepts, but we'd cut out a lot of the unscriptural activities that many churches today are promoting on the basis of tradition or emotion.
Having said that, because the issue of scriptural authority is so widely misunderstood, let's focus more specifically on the means by which scriptural authority is established. And let's begin by answering the following question: how did Jesus establish scriptural authority (from the Old Testament) while alive on the earth and subject to the old law? We established in the previous article that Jesus used the Old Testament as His guide and obeyed every letter and stroke of the law, but again, by what means did He establish scriptural authority?
In this chapter, let's focus specifically on the direct commands of Scripture...
Jesus obviously believed that the direct commands of the Old Testament were authoritative and binding. In Matthew 4:10, when confronted with the temptation to worship Satan, Jesus responded by appealing to the command to worship the Lord only. He told the rich young ruler to "keep the commandments" and then rattled off a few of the "ten commandments" (Mt. 19:16-19). In Matthew 8:4, He told the cleansed leper to obey the commandment of Moses regarding his obligation to go to the priest and make an offering. When God issues a command through His inspired Scriptures, we must take heed and obey!
However, even though Jesus viewed direct commands of Scripture as authoritative, He was also aware of the fact that commands can be misunderstood, twisted and or abused. The Pharisees, for example, used one command of the old law to negate or nullify another command. They believed in giving gifts and offerings to God (Mt. 15:5-6), but they used this Scriptural concept to negate their obligation to honor their parents (Mt. 15:4). Of course, the Pharisees were very keen on the command to observe the Sabbath, but they were misapplying the Sabbath laws and condemning certain things that were permissible (Mt. 12:1-2, 9-14). In John 8:1-5, the Jews had caught a woman in the act of adultery and reminded Jesus of Moses' instructions to have her stoned. Was this commanded in the Law of Moses? Yes, but the man was equally guilty and subject to stoning...and yet where was he? Jesus knew that they were abusing this command of Scripture to serve their own wicked agenda.
Furthermore, we don't see Jesus building an ark of gopherwood (Gen. 6:14), besieging cities (Josh. 6) or serving in the Temple as a priest. He knew that these commands were given to specific individuals for specific reasons.
Direct commands of Scripture are obviously authoritative, but as we've learned from Jesus, it's very easy to misunderstand, twist and/or misapply scriptural commands. As we approach the commands of the New Testament, we must be equally reverent and careful in our interpretation and application of them.
We must first of all ensure that we understand the command in context. I've always liked the example of Matthew 19:6. This is where Jesus says, "What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate." Here He is talking about marriage, but one might wrongly apply the command to condemn wood-splitting. Think about it ;).
Not only must we consider the written context, we must consider the audience and social/cultural context. Just as Jesus didn't feel the need to obey God's command to build an ark of gopherwood, neither should we feel the need (or bind the need) to obey commands that were specifically given to certain individuals. For example...
- Jesus commanded His disciples in the Limited Commission to "not enter any of the cities of the Samaritans; but rather, go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel" (Mt. 10:5-6). Does this command apply to us? Is it wrong for us to preach the gospel to the Gentiles? Of course not. This command was given to a specific audience, and the greater context of Scripture is clear that WE are commanded to preach the gospel to ALL nations (Mark 16:15).
- Commands such as "foot washing" (John 13:14) and "holy kisses" (Rom. 16:16) both pertained to cultural practices of that day. It was common to wash the feet of guests and to greet others with a kiss on the cheek (Paul's command was for these kisses to be holy rather than lewd). Not only do we live in a society where neither is practiced, but our society would view both of these practices, especially foot washing, as extremely unusual. I'm reminded of the old law's instructions regarding the tabernacle and how many of those instructions were nullified when the Temple was built by Solomon.
- Paul's command to Timothy to bring to him his cloak, books and parchments (2 Tim. 4:13), and all the commands to greet certain ones (found at the end of many Pauline epistles) were obviously given to specific individuals for specific reasons.
- Even the command to take up a collection on Sundays (1 Cor. 16:1-2) was given for a specific reason (i.e. to aid needy saints in Jerusalem, vs. 3). Many churches today have incorrectly assumed that Paul is issuing forth a generic command for a weekly collection. At the same time, this passage does provide us with a God-ordained means of collecting funds and therefore has that benefit. I will say more about this at a later date.
- The commands in 1 Corinthians 12-14 intended to govern miraculous gifts no longer apply in an age where miraculous gifts have ceased (1 Cor. 13:8-11). There are, even still, many principles that we can draw from these chapters.
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