What say you

I think FAL is missing something, when the woman was caught in the act of adultery, the law demanded that she be stoned. Did Jesus demand that she be stoned? NO, he had mercy on her. So, the law was a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ, to convict and convince that we are sinners worthy of death. But Jesus taught there was a greater law, a law of mercy and forgiveness.

I am not saying we should let criminals run free, but the law should be tempered with mercy, which I think we do have today, well, maybe we have gone overboard on mercy, but still, that is how our government should operate, justice tempered with mercy to those who turn from sin.

 

No, those are just for the Jews.

Subsequently God wrote them on the hearts of all mankind according to Romans. Must've been a mistake there to do so.

 

You say it must have been a mistake to do so, a mistake of God to write them on the hearts of man. This seems to me to be perfunctorily deficient.

 

Not at all. Your inability to detect sarcasm, especially when my post started off as such is, well, not surprising really.

 

And you failed to detect my message as well. BTW, that is not surprising either. Furthermore, this "sarcasm", hmmm seems as though I remember you criticizing me on previous occasions for using the literary device of sarcasm.

 

Yours wasn't sarcasm at all. But hey, nice try, albeit it's altogether dishonest of you to make such a pretense in retro.

So, you're saying you hold grudges about the past? Yes?

 

Did I say that? If you will go back and read what I posted earlier in this thread, I said that I thought our laws were already based on the 10 commandments. But you have always disagreed with me on everything, so I guess you had to maintain your quota.

In case you don't know, there are 613 OT laws. Which ones do you want our government to put into law? All of them?

 

I'm really trying to understand your question, but I just don't know where you're going with it. God's ways are always right, and if everyone in this country were Christian and loved the Lord and obeyed Him, we would have a wonderful place to live. But that is not the case.
God's laws are just. I have to admit though, I would not want my son stoned to death for disobedience. There was a time in his life when if he had lived in OT days, he would have been. I am thankful we live under the law of grace.

 

Barbaric punishments for a barbaric period in time.

The laws themselves weren't barbaric, but were to teach the people of that time an iota of civilization. I mean really, who thinks to boil a goat in its mother's milk??? But evidently some did (probably for some pagan religious ceremony since most of the OT laws were meant to turn the people away from the rampant idol worship of the day).

Consequences were severe, but in those days life was severe. A rebellious child might threaten the physical security of a village. You send a kid out to watch the sheep and the lions attack the herd because the kid refused, what happens? People go hungry.

Do we think stoning a child to be barbaric nowdays? Of course. Then again, we think electrocution is as well, when a mere 20 years ago, it was appropriate.

Times change and cultures change along with them. God knew what the peoples of the OT needed in terms of laws and punishments. He gave dietary laws that would increase the strength of His people in that time. We don't follow them today, because God made it obvious that most of those laws were no longer needed.

Christ left us with two. There are eight others that are convenient subcatagories of those two. But He gave the punishment side of things over to the governments of man to decide. Why? I suppose He decided we were civilized enough to handle it.

Reading through this thread, though makes me wonder......

 

I'm doing the best I can brother.

After going back to the O/P several times, I have no idea what your question really is.


HankD

 

God's standards are revealed in Christ, who fulfilled the Law and as a result we now live in the age of grace, which is God's way. The old has passed away and the new has come. I am thankful for it.

 

Of course not. But the bible says that God has ordained every nation and it's leaders. In our case, we have reaped what we've sown. But our laws are already based on God's 10 commandments. If they have failed, it's our own fault because we (the church) have become too much like the world and allowed it to happen. Abortion is a stench in the nostrils of God and it's only a matter of time before He judges this nation for it. Not to mention adultery, divorce, homos*xuality, our idolatrous worship of money.....

But to bring back the OT Law that was meant for Israel would be wrong in my opinion because God Himself has done away with it.

 

But OT laws aren't God's best. God's best came to earth in form of a man and gave Himself as the sacrifice so these penalties no longer need applied. The rules are still good for "for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness", but the heavenly penalties, the penalties God required for disobeying those laws have been paid. All that is left is the penalties humans enforce on one another.

Oh, we're still a barbarous people. As long as this earth exists in its corrupted form, there will be barbarism. And I agree, there is little new under the sun, except the Son. Because He came we can be assured that justice has been fulfilled, even if we can't see it from here.