The Commandments of God, and the Testimony of Who?

In a recent post, I called on Greg Laurie to go back and look at who the Ten Commandments were given to. Today, I want to look at who the rest of the commandments were given to.

The “Commandments of God” are considered by the Jewish population to be the 613 commandments of the Torah (Genesis through Deuteronomy). It should be noted that no Jew could follow all of the 613. Aside from the fact that we “have all fallen short of the Glory of God” (Rom 3:23), the common Jew has additional reasons for not obeying all of them.

For starters, there is no existing Temple. This excludes the Jew from offering any sacrifice at the Temple, because they were commanded to never offer it anywhere else. So, right from the start, there are a number of commandments that can not be completed by the Torah observant Jew.

Secondly, a male Jew could not, for obvious reasons, adhere to the female cleanliness Laws, simply because he is a man. This means that there are certain Laws that he will never be able to obey. Also in this category (Laws that he can not obey) are the Laws that instruct him redeem his firstborn child (provided he has no children and there is still no Temple); the Laws of leprosy (considering he never contracts leprosy, and there is still no Temple); the Laws of farming (providing he is not a farmer and there is still no Temple); and the list goes on.

For logical reasons, coupled with spiritual reasons, no man can observe the Law in its entirety.

But who is supposed to be doing this Law to begin with? I should start by saying that we are not justified by doing the law. Paul makes that very clear in Romans 3:20, that “by the deeds of the Law no flesh is justified in His sight, for by the law is the knowledge of sin.” We are justified just like Abraham was – through faith.

Is Paul saying that the law is not valid then? No; Paul asks in Rom 3:31, “Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.”

We establish the law.

I believe that these laws are for Christians as well. The scriptures that back this claim are too numerous to list in this post, but I will list the most compelling evidence that I have found so far.

If you will turn to Rev 12:17 which states, “And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.” Do you see it? These people, the “remnant of her seed” keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus the Messiah. This is seen seven times in Revelation (Rev 1:2, Rev 1:9, Rev 6:9, etc).

Also, look at 1 John, 2:3. This verse declares that you can know if you know Him (God). How do you know if you know Him? 1Jo 2:3 “And hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments”. Notice that John doesn’t claim that we are justified by the commandments, but if we know Him, we will obey them.

I don’t know about you, but I want to know that I know Him. 1Jo 2:4 says that, “He that says, I know him, and keeps not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.”

If you are wondering if this is referring to the “two commandments given by Jesus”, you will have to come back tomorrow. In the meantime, I can tell you for now that these “two” are the same at those 613 I wrote about earlier. If you don’t believe me, check back later; we’ll talk about it.