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"Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets. I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill." Matthew 5:1 7.

It is the Creator of men, the Giver of the law, who declares that it is not His purpose to set aside its precepts. The principles of this law are the principles of heaven. The angels of heaven attain unto no higher knowledge than to know the will of God, and to do His willis the highest service that can engage their powers.

The law given upon Sinai was the enunciation of the principle of love, a revelation to earth of the law of heaven. But Israel had not perceived the spiritual nature of the law, and too often their professed obedience was but an observance of forms and ceremonies, rather than a surrender of the heart to the sovereignty of love.

Speaking of the law, Jesus said, "I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill." His mission was to "magnify the law, and make it honorable." Isaiah 42:21. He was to show the spiritual nature of the law, to present its far-reaching principles, and to make plain its eternal obligation. He showed the people that the law of God penetrated to the motives of the heart, and the lover of self was a transgressor of the law. Far from taking anything from the sacredness of a single precept, He revealed to men the exalted character of the whole law.

The mission of Christ on earth was not to destroy the law, but by His grace to bring man back to obedience to its precepts. The self-denying Redeemer, throughout His pilgrimage of love on earth, was a living representation of the character of the law of God.

"Till heaven and earth pass," said Jesus, "one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled." By His own obedience to the law, Christ testified to its immutable character and proved that through His grace it could be perfectly obeyed by every son and daughter of Adam. He does not teach that the law is ever to be revoked, but He fixes the eye upon the utmost limit of man’s horizon and assures us that until this point is reached the law will retain its authority so that none may suppose it was His mission to abolish the precepts of the law. So long as heaven and earth continue, the holy principles of God’s law will remain.

Because the law of the Lord is perfect, and therefore changeless, it is impossible for sinful men, in themselves, to meet the standard of its requirement. This was why Jesus came as our Redeemer. It was His mission, by making men partakers of the divine nature, to bring them into harmony with the principles of the law of heaven. When we forsake our sins and receive Christ as our Saviour, the law is exalted. The apostle Paul asks, "Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law." Romans 3:31.

    I will put My laws into
  their hearts, and in their
   minds will I write them.
  Hebrews 10:16

The new-covenant promise is, "I will put My laws into their hearts, and in their minds will I write them." Hebrews 10:16. While the system of types which pointed to Christ as the Lamb of God that should take away the sin of the world was to pass away at His death, the principles of righteousness embodied in the Ten Commandments are as immutable as the eternal throne. Not one command has been annulled, not a jot or tittle has been changed. Those principles that were made known to man in Paradise as the great law of life will exist unchanged in Paradise restored. When Eden shall bloom on earth again, God’s law of love will be obeyed by all beneath the sun.

"Forever, 0 Lord, Thy word is settled in heaven." "All His commandments are sure. They stand fast for ever and ever, and are done in truth and uprightness." "Concerning Thy testimonies, I have known of old that Thou hast founded them forever." Psalms 119:89; 111:7, 8; 119:152.



Copyright 2006 by Family Heritage Books.
Web page created: 06/13/06 Updated: 06/13/06