Laws for Thee but Not for Me!
Some Christians teach that the Scriptures which warn against observing the Law of Moses were meant for Gentile Christians only. Therefore, they claim, Jewish Christians should continue observing Mosaic laws like Sabbath-keeping, food laws, etc. But Paul was certainly not some early dispensationalist, writing things applicable only to one section of the Church but not the other! He did not preach a “two-track” Christianity. Instead salvation for everyone is through “the obedience of faith” (Rom. 1:5; 16:26). In other words, salvation is for all those who “obey Jesus” (Heb. 5:9; see Acts 5:32).
One of Paul’s repeated points is that there is “no distinction between Jew and Gentile, as the same Lord is Lord of all” (Rom. 10:12). “God’s way of being right is through the faith of Jesus Messiah for everyone who believes, and there is no distinction” (Rom. 3:22). Peter strongly agrees: God “made no distinction between them [the Gentiles] and us [the Jews], by purifying their hearts through faith…We believe that we are being saved through the grace of the lord Jesus, just as they are” (Acts 15:9, 11). And the whole New Testament clearly teaches that there is only one hope and one faith for the one body of Christ:
“In one spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Gentiles, slaves or free; we were all made to drink of one spirit” (1 Cor. 12:13; see also Eph. 4:4-6; Acts 13:39; Rom. 3:28-30; 10:12; Gal 3:28-30).
All members of that one body are under the Law of Messiah, which is different from the Law of Moses. Paul speaks in Acts 13 to both Jews and God-fearing Gentiles gathered in the synagogue:
“Through him [Messiah] everyone who believes is made right from all things from which you could not be made right by the Law of Moses” (Acts 13:39).
In Romans 3 Paul argues:
We maintain that people are made right by faith and not by works of the Law. Or is God the God of Jews only? Is He not the God of Gentiles also? Yes, of Gentiles also, since God is only one Person, and He will make the circumcised right by faith and the uncircumcised right through the same faith” (3:28-30).
When Paul repeatedly warns against Torah-keeping he includes himself by saying we:
“Before faith came, we were held in custody under the Law, locked up until the faith which was to come would be revealed. The Law was our guardian until Messiah, so that we could then be made right by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian” (Gal. 3:23-25).
Note that Paul, a Jewish Christian, is here speaking of himself and his fellow Jewish Christians who were under the Law as a “guardian” until Messiah came. BDAG helpfully defines the word translated “guardian” as:
The man “whose duty it was to conduct a boy or youth…to and from school and to superintend his conduct generally; he was not a ‘teacher’… When the young man became of age, the guardian was no longer needed.”
Paul continues in Galatians 3:26-29:
For in Messiah Jesus, you are all children of God, through faith. For all of you who were baptized into Messiah have clothed yourselves with Messiah. There is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male or female; you are all one in Messiah Jesus. And if you belong to Messiah Jesus then you are Abraham’s children, and heirs of the promise” (Gal. 3:23-29).
Furthermore, Paul sometimes qualifies the phrase “under the law” with a negative adverb like “not” or “never” in order to warn all Christians, Jew or Gentile, not to observe the Law of Moses (see Rom. 6:14; Gal. 5:18). In 1 Corinthians 9:20 Paul, the Jew and Christian, says, “I myself am not under the Law”! Instead, he says, he is “under the Law of Messiah” (1 Cor. 9:21). See also Romans 8:2:
The law of the spirit of life in Messiah Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death (and Gal. 6:2: “the Law of Messiah”).
Similarly, Paul, the Jew and Christian, declares about food, “I know and am convinced in the lord Jesus that there is nothing unclean in itself…All things are clean”! (Rom. 14:14, 20).
Another claim is that since Paul was born and raised under the Law (Phil. 3:5), like Jesus himself (Gal. 4:4), that meant Paul had to remain living and eventually die keeping that same Law. But that would be like saying that a foreigner living in another country had to continue to live and die by the laws of their birth country.
Also note that Paul equates being “under the Law” (Gal. 4:5) with being “held in bondage under the elemental principles of the world” (Gal. 4:3). The early Jewish-Gentile church could no longer serve and be subject to the strict Old Covenant system which included weekly, monthly, and annual festivals (Col. 2:16). Paul makes clear that such observance is now equal to Gentile paganism itself! Faced with this Jewish-Christian crisis, Paul reminds the churches that they have now been set free from the yoke and bondage of the Old Covenant, because Christ “erased the certificate of debt which was against us, with all of its decrees opposed to us. He took it away by nailing it to the cross” (Col. 2:14).
Therefore: “If you have died with Messiah to the elemental spirit forces of the world, why, as if you were alive in the world, do you submit to decrees — do not handle, do not taste, do not touch? All these regulations refer to things that will perish with use; they are just human commands and doctrines. These rules may seem to be wise with their invented religion, ascetic practices, and severe treatment of the body, but they are in reality of no value in stopping sinful indulgence” (Col. 2:20- 23).
