Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Hey, guys, this is naive. And you've reached the Mosaic Church podcast. So excited that you're part of our listening community, and I'd love for you to be even more connected. So check out our website. There's more content there and there's more opportunities for you to get connected in our ministries and events as well. Also, love for you to share this content if this is blessed to you. I know that God wants to use you to bless other people with it, so share this podcast if you will. Lastly, would you consider supporting this ministry? This is made possible by other people's generosity, and I'd love for you to pay it forward.
[00:00:39] Join us to reclaim the message and the movement of Jesus together. So would you consider giving to this ministry? I know that God is able to do immeasurably more through us when we come together. Thank you so much. God bless you and enjoy.
[00:01:11] Good morning.
[00:01:14] Hello. Hello, man. Excited crew here this morning, man. Give yourselves a hand. You guys are awesome.
[00:01:21] Very cool. Hey, so if you're joining us for the first time, if you're watching for the first time, we're actually concluding a series. Yeah, we're concluding a series, and it's called Pick a side. Yeah. So if you've been joining us, we've been going through some kind of interesting topics in terms of, like, do you want to live a life that's, you know, like, just basically you pick fear to live your life or love or. And we've talked about comfort versus peace. Today we're gonna talk about. Today we're gonna talk about old versus new.
[00:01:51] Pick a side. And here's the problem with this talk. I don't like it. Okay, here's why I don't like it. I don't like it because I like the mix and match. You know what I'm saying? I like old school, and I like new school. Like, I'm the. I mean, I love music, so I love the latest music out there. I love it, love it, love it. But then there are times that I just gotta listen to some 80s, you know what I'm saying? Or the best is like 90s R&B. Nothing. Like, it just gets you in the mood.
[00:02:20] Or I love fashion. I love new stuff, but there's nothing like an old hoodie, you know what I'm saying? It loves you unconditionally.
[00:02:29] You're bigger, but it's okay. It loves you. It loves you. Yeah. Old and new. It's so fun. It's so fun. And we can do that. We can do that. But what happens when we mix the old and new when it comes to our spirituality or our relationship with Jesus?
[00:02:46] So you're trying to develop this relationship with God. Is there an old and new idea of who God is? Yes, there is.
[00:02:53] In fact, it's in the. It's in the Bible. It's in the Bible. Like, so if you're like, oh, yeah, yeah. The Bible consists of two major section, which is what the old and the new. The new. And we. We've been presented the Bible like this. You grew up in a Baptist church or you grew up in a Methodist church. You grew up in any church. When they gave you something, they gave you kind of like one book. And we're calling it the Bible, which the word means actually library, if you didn't know it means library because it's 66 books. But we've been presented as something that's mixed with the old and the new.
[00:03:37] And so the question is, is it an issue? Is it a problem? Is it a problem? Well, I don't know.
[00:03:42] I'm not quite sure. I think there might be some. There might be some issues, and we're gonna talk about them because it really does affect the way you live your life. It affects the way you think who God is. It affects the way you parent. It affects, like, your relationship with people, how you treat people. It just does. When you mix and match, some of it, like, for example, you know this is my phone, right? I love my phone. But I realized that there's a new iPhone coming out soon.
[00:04:08] It opens up, it flips open. I know some of you guys, like Android people, are like, that happened 10 years ago.
[00:04:14] That happened 10 years ago. But it's new to us people. It's new to us, okay? And there's a whole debate because it opens up like a hot dog, not a sandwich. Anybody know about this?
[00:04:24] It's ridiculous. Anyways, okay, but here's. Since I like old school and new school, I found something else on Amazon.
[00:04:33] It's a life of wonder on Amazon. And I found something that I can plug in this new school, because this is new to. To an old school phone, right? How fun is this? Hello.
[00:04:49] You guys remember this? Doing stuff like this? Yeah. Those of you who don't, you're too young.
[00:04:55] Yeah.
[00:04:56] This is. By the way, don't tell her. I'm gonna give this to my mom. She's gonna love this. She'll love it. She's gonna call the world. She might call you. Yeah. But this is it. I think, spiritually, when we get the Bible, it's something like this.
[00:05:11] And you're like, what? It's something like this. There is a lot of.
[00:05:16] There's some new stuff out there, but there's also some old stuff, but this is kind of cool. The only problem is it's not really practical. That's why sometimes in the Scriptures, when you look at the Bible, you're like, ah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But it's not really practical. And that's why we dismiss it.
[00:05:31] That's why some of our friends go, I don't believe in the Bible. I don't believe in Jesus. Because it's so problematic. It contradicts itself. And here's why. Because we were presented something that was all wrapped up in one book. And the truth is it's 66 books. But also there is a whole new and old section. There's an Old Covenant, an Old Testament and a New covenant, which is called the New Testament. In fact, let me point it out this way to you.
[00:05:59] The Old Testament is the mostly Jewish, if not all of it. In fact, most of the Old Testament is called the Tanakh. Now, Tanakh. This is a Jewish Bible.
[00:06:15] It has the Torah in it. It's got the proverbs and some of the writings. It's got history books, it's got the wisdom books. But this is the Jewish Bible. So if you're Jewish, I have a Jewish friend, and they follow this. This is the end. It has nothing about Jesus in it. It has something about the Messiah. But Jewish people don't believe in Jesus. They go, well, he was not. That's not. No, we don't believe that the Messiah is still yet to come.
[00:06:48] Okay? But we go, well, well, well, no, no, no. We believe this, but we also have something else. We have not just the Tanah, we have the New Testament.
[00:06:59] And so what we've done is, is that we. Your Bible is a combination of these two.
[00:07:06] But maybe you didn't know that.
[00:07:09] Jewish people all day long know that. They're like, you took our stuff. But anyways, we put it together and you get the Holy Bible.
[00:07:19] It's cool. It's not that practical and it's got some issues.
[00:07:25] The problem is, is that this is a story of one nation, a story, a contract that God made with Abraham and then Moses as well.
[00:07:37] This is where we get the Old Testament. This is where we get the Old Ten Commandments. The Ten Commandments. This is it.
[00:07:44] A lot of these is pointed to one particular people group. And God was talking to a particular group. And he said, I will curse Those who curse you.
[00:07:54] This is Old Testament stuff.
[00:07:57] Old Testament stuff. Because God says, whoever is going to be your enemy as a nation, I'll be their enemy.
[00:08:02] By the way, this is the contract.
[00:08:05] If you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours.
[00:08:08] That was the Old Testament covenant. Basically it said, if you do wrong, you're in trouble. If you do right, if you do right in the sight of the Lord, you will be blessed. The contract was if you perform, if you make this happen, I'll do this based on your performance. We both agree that if you do this, I will do this, I will be with you, I'll do this. But if you don't do anything, if you do bad things, I will not gonna be with you. And that's why the Old Testament has a lot of stories about kings going, is God with us? Is God with us? I don't know. Check, check, check. And they'll talk to the prophets. And the prophets were like, I don't think God's with us. Why? Because you did so and so. Okay, let's do something. Let's kill somebody.
[00:08:47] And they usually kill animals. And they were sacrifice. Because it was like, you have to, you have to make, you've got to pay a price. There's gotta be, you gotta reconcile, you gotta some sacrifice something. There's always a blood situation here.
[00:09:01] And this book by itself is very bloody. It is. And that's why some of your friends are like, I don't believe in your God. Cause he justifies all kinds of stuff.
[00:09:11] Cause in this book you can justify genocide, you can justify slavery all day long, all day long. You can justify a lot of bad behavior here.
[00:09:24] Because this is a story of one nation trying to figure out who God is.
[00:09:29] And what we have been given to us is we've taken this and we've connected it together and this has become our Bible. And so people fall to us on all of this.
[00:09:42] And when we also use a lot of this to justify bad behavior.
[00:09:49] We do, we do. And I mean, the reason is, is because we've misunderstood this because it's a combination of these two things and we've misunderstood it. And so because of that, we've misinterpreted it.
[00:10:04] I mean, obviously it was written in like several languages. None of them were English, by the way.
[00:10:11] And we've now misapplied it. And because we've misapplied it, we've misused it and there's a lot of misses but it ends up we have allowed ourselves to misbehave in the world.
[00:10:27] And that's why our actions, people go, so what now? You justified the Crusades, you justified slavery in this nation.
[00:10:41] Why were people okay with slavery here?
[00:10:45] Because of this part of this.
[00:10:50] Because it was okay. There were some races that were superior and some who were not.
[00:10:57] Problem is, is that, you know, we didn't realize that. No, we have the combination of this and there was a story, but the story has now kind of evolved and grown into something. So let me explain how Jesus did it. So when Jesus shows up, he's grew up on this. When they called him Rabbi, he was the rabbi of this, not the rabbi of this. There was no this.
[00:11:24] You guys know this, right? Okay, so there was this. This was it. And he was a rabbi of this. So he shows up, he comes out like he was about 33 years old or so. 30 years old. He. He's out now. He's gonna start doing some amazing things. But before he does that, he goes and gets baptized, and then he shows up to the temple. Because you worshiped God in the temple. According to this, the temple was where God resided. So he shows up and there were sacrifices in the temple. He shows up and he takes a passage from the Tanakh and he reads it out loud.
[00:11:59] Now, let me read it to you in Hebrew. No, not really. I'm not gonna do that. I don't know Hebrew. This is what he says.
[00:12:07] Luke records this story. He says. He reads this. He says, the spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has chosen Me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free the oppressed and announce that the time.
[00:12:26] The time has come when the Lord will what?
[00:12:30] Save his people.
[00:12:31] Jesus rolled up the scroll, rolled this guy up, gave it back to the tenant, and then sits down, and everybody's like, good reading. Okay, okay, okay, good. And then all eyes were on him. Because what you do is you expound on this, because this was the Tanakh. They were gonna do it. And he's like, what are you gonna say about this? And he says something that they were not expecting.
[00:12:54] He says, this. This passage in the Tanakh has come true today, as you've heard it being read.
[00:13:03] I'm sorry, what he announced there, Right there.
[00:13:09] I just wrote the. This. This just happened. This is the end. It's the end of this.
[00:13:16] No, the end of this is the Messiah would come. He was like, you got it.
[00:13:21] You got it.
[00:13:23] I'm the Zion. I'm the Zion.
[00:13:26] New Covenant is over. I'm starting a new thing. To which they were like, oh, no, you're not. If you read the story at that moment, they tried to kill him.
[00:13:36] Not later on at that moment, they mobbed him, took him to the edge of the city, and they were going to throw him off a cliff.
[00:13:47] That's really the story. You might not know that's what happened, but he survived it.
[00:13:53] This was so offensive to them. And for some of you who grew up in a particular kind of denomination thing, right now you're like, I don't know if I like this because I get it. Because you're like, hold on, hold on. The Bible is the Bible. This is the Bible. The Bible, yeah. Yes, yes. But I just need you to know that it has two different covenants, which is an Old Covenant and an Old Testament. That's why you call it that. And we have a New Testament, new Covenant. And it's problematic. It's cool. When we put it together and it looks like this, it's cool. But you gotta know what you're reading from.
[00:14:29] You gotta know what you're doing here, or you're gonna mess everything up.
[00:14:34] So he says this. They try to kill him.
[00:14:37] And he's like, why? Why? Because he's basically said something that we don't like to hear.
[00:14:44] He.
[00:14:45] In fact. In fact. In fact, when he starts preaching now, so he leaves. So Jesus, this rabbi who shows up the first day in the temple, then never comes back to the temple, guess where he's preaching on the streets. What are you doing? What are you doing? Guess what he's doing, too. He's taking the Tanakh and he's changing it. Changing it.
[00:15:09] He's saying stuff like, you've heard it said, you've read.
[00:15:14] But I tell you. Oh, no, no. You shut your. No, we're just gonna do. We're just gonna do what the Tanakh tells us to do. Are you greater than the law people? They'll ask him all the time, are you greater than Moses? He's like, yeah, actually, I am, but not gonna brag, but I am, I am, I am. I'm actually the Word of God who's become flesh. I'm.
[00:15:37] Yeah. They're like, no, no, no, no, it's not over. And he's like, no, it's over. So when he preaches, he says stuff like this. In Matthew, he says this. He says, do not think.
[00:15:49] Do not think. Which is what? Don't get it twisted in the Greek, okay? He says, do not think that I have come to what?
[00:15:58] Abolish the law? I'm not destroying this thing, not burning this thing up.
[00:16:02] I have not come to abolish this.
[00:16:05] I have not.
[00:16:06] Or the prophets, which is the whole Tanakh. I've not.
[00:16:10] I have not come to abolish law. But. But I've come to do something bigger.
[00:16:15] To what?
[00:16:17] Fulfill it.
[00:16:19] What does fulfillment mean? To finish it, to wrap it up.
[00:16:28] It's over.
[00:16:29] The law had an expiry date.
[00:16:32] Now, I know some of you guys don't look at those, but it's done.
[00:16:39] It's over.
[00:16:40] It had an expiry date.
[00:16:43] And they are losing their minds. They're like, we're gonna kill this guy.
[00:16:50] That's why Jesus was so problematic.
[00:16:53] Here's why. Because the Tanakh laid out not just the Ten Commandments, because the Ten Commandments were basically the tables of content of all the laws. See, there were more than, like, about 300 laws. There's a book about all the laws called the Leviticus. And they listed out all the things. So it's like under murder, under adultery, it was like, what do you do? How do you do it? Da, da, da, da. It was very detailed, all this stuff. And this law, if you fulfilled it, if the religious people fulfilled it, if the Pharisees, which are the ones with the most spiritual people, if they fulfilled it, they were like, they're the most holy of people. So you have to fulfill the law, basically, if you want to live a holy life, if you wanted to please God, you needed to obey the law, just do this and you're fine. You don't have to do anything else. Just do what I tell you to do. And when you do something wrong, kill an animal. Kill and fix it and do this.
[00:17:49] And Jesus comes in and he says, let me just tell you this. Let me just tell you this. And he says it, he says, let me just warn you here.
[00:17:55] He says, unless your righteousness is, what, better than the Pharisees and the teachers of the law and the Pharisees, you will what?
[00:18:10] You're never going to enter the kingdom of heaven. And the kingdom of heaven. I just want you to know he's not talking about hell and heaven here. He's talking about eternal life. He's talking about a life that's fulfilled whole. He's talking about a life that's come alive, a free life. That's what he's talking about.
[00:18:26] So problematic.
[00:18:29] Problematic.
[00:18:30] Why? Because they ended up. And you know the story, calling him a false prophet, calling him all kinds of things.
[00:18:39] Because he said, I've come to fulfill this thing.
[00:18:47] And it's hard for us though, right? It's hard for us. When you look at the Bible, you're like, well, hold up. No, what are you saying, Naeem? Are you saying that the Old Testament doesn't count? No, I'm not saying that. Don't get it twisted.
[00:18:59] I'm not trying to abolish the Old Testament. I'm not saying it doesn't matter anymore. I'm just saying Jesus fulfilled.
[00:19:06] I'm just saying it's new. It's now. It's new.
[00:19:09] How you say it? New operating procedures. Now you have a new download. Now you gotta. The old one does not work. If you tried a phone and you have to like, update and like, I'm not updating this thing.
[00:19:20] It doesn't work anymore. And it's very problematic. In fact, it is harmful when we mix and match it.
[00:19:29] Because why? Because this is law and this is grace.
[00:19:38] This is priesthood and people and all that. You have to go through someone to get to God and this is Jesus.
[00:19:48] It's problematic. This is prophets that told that hear from God. This is the Holy Spirit lives inside of you.
[00:19:57] This is temple worship, temple sacrifice. This is. You are the temple of the Holy Spirit.
[00:20:04] Very different.
[00:20:05] I mean, yeah, they kind of match because they mention the same things, but not the same at all.
[00:20:11] Not the same at all. This is hope for some.
[00:20:15] The Jewish people, that's why they follow this.
[00:20:19] That's why they have temples all over the city on this. It is hope for some. They are the chosen nation. Jesus shows up and goes, well, actually, it's hope for all. Yeah, it's not one nation, it's all nations.
[00:20:34] Right?
[00:20:38] But dang it, we've missed. We connected.
[00:20:41] We put it together. We put it together. And it's problematic. And it's not just our issue. It's the early church's issue. To Paul the Apostle Paul, man, he. When he goes out and starts setting these churches. And Paul is the guy who was an expert on this. An expert on this, actually.
[00:20:59] I mean, persecuted all the people who were believing and kind of living out the New Testament and Jesus ways. In fact, Jesus Christians were called the way.
[00:21:09] This was the path.
[00:21:11] And then they tried the way, and they were like, this is not going to work. So Paul the Apostle, who was. I mean, he was. He grew up on this. He was like, oh, we're going to. We're going to.
[00:21:22] We're gonna shut this down. And so he started killing off, persecuting, imprisoning people who were following this, who were kind of following Jesus ways. And then Jesus shows up and goes, hey, what are you doing? Some of us know the story. He has a major conversion and he changes his name. And it's like, you know, it's not no longer Saul, it's Paul now. And he goes around, starts churches, and the churches he starts end up doing the same thing. Because there's something inside of our human nature that says, no, no, no, no, no. If I do wrong, I gotta make it right.
[00:21:53] There's something about us that says, if I do wrong, I gotta be punished. There's something about it that says, no, no, no, because I've done this. I deserve this.
[00:22:02] Bono, the lead singer from YouTube, said it best. He says, grace interrupts the consequences of my decisions.
[00:22:10] It does. It's different.
[00:22:12] It just interrupts every single thing. But we will have a tendency to get them together. So here, let me read you a couple of. Let me read you a letter that he writes to a church in Galatia. So he starts off in Galatia 1. He says, I'm astonished. He says, I tell you, you're blowing my mind here. I'm astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you to live in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different. What Gospel. You are changing some things, guys, he says, which is no What? Which is no what? It's no gospel at all. Evidently. Some people are throwing you into confusion, and they're trying to pervert the gospel of Christ. What were they trying to do? They weren't trying to do anything, which is not just natural. They were trying to put Judaism and Jesus together.
[00:23:01] That's all they were doing. Then they're like, hey, believe in Jesus. Say the prayer. But also, let's do circumcision.
[00:23:07] What? Oh, let's obey the laws. Oh, also, you can't eat. So and so and so. So and so. And you can't do all that and all the what? I thought that's the problem. The gospel is no longer the gospel anymore because then it's all about relationship with God through works and not faith. So Paul's like, what are you doing? What are you doing? And then he says this. He says, guys, guys, you remember this, right? We remember this, right? For through the law, I, we, all of us, we died to the law so we might live for God. We died to it. We died to it. It doesn't apply anymore, okay? We died to it. I, like all of us, we have been crucified with Christ.
[00:23:45] I no longer live. But Christ lives what?
[00:23:48] In me? The life I now live in the body.
[00:23:50] I live by what?
[00:23:53] Not the teachings of Moses. By faith. You can't live just by faith. Yeah, in faith. In who?
[00:24:00] The prophets? No, in the Son of God. That guy, remember him? Jesus? Who. What? Did what? Who loved me and gave himself for me. And he says, guys, I don't set aside the. Like, we can't. We can't set aside the grace of God.
[00:24:15] I mean, if we set aside the grace.
[00:24:18] I mean, if righteousness could be attained by this, then tell me, why in the world did Christ have to die?
[00:24:27] Christ died for what?
[00:24:30] Nothing.
[00:24:31] To which some of them were like, well, then why was the law given anyways, huh?
[00:24:35] Why did you made it all? Why is the Tanakh even a thing? He goes, great question. Let me answer that. He goes, why then was the law given?
[00:24:45] He said it was given. It was given alongside the promise to show people their sins.
[00:24:51] Basically showing them.
[00:24:53] Because you can't. If you want sin, if you want all kinds of laws. Laws don't change people's hearts.
[00:25:03] Holding people accountable. Laws don't do that. Law actually causes rebellion in the heart of a human.
[00:25:09] It just does that. It was given to show us something. But the law was designed also, by the way, he said the law was designed to last, okay? Forever. Forever. Forever. Forever. Anybody? Forever? No.
[00:25:23] What? Last for what? Only until who?
[00:25:26] The coming of the child who was promised Emmanuel. Christmas is coming.
[00:25:35] Jesus.
[00:25:36] It was only to last. Then.
[00:25:38] What are you saying? You're saying it doesn't matter anymore? I'm not saying it doesn't matter anymore. I'm just saying if this was a homework assignment, I turned it in.
[00:25:48] That's all I'm saying.
[00:25:49] That's all I'm saying.
[00:25:51] Okay?
[00:25:52] Then he keeps on going. He says, let me put it this way. And now he's just talking to. He's just talking to. Not us, okay? He's talking to people who understand Jewish history. They were born Jewish. They were like, grew up Jewish. They know the stories. And he gets into them a little bit and he says, let me put it this way.
[00:26:11] The law was a guardian. There's a guardian until Christ came. He protected us until we were made right with God through faith. It was like a guardian, okay? But now, like, the law was a babysitter. Okay? Let me just put it that way. It was a babysitter.
[00:26:27] But now Dad's come home.
[00:26:32] Thanks, you're good to go. Says the law protected us until we were made right with God through faith. And now that the way of faith has come. We are no longer. We no longer need the law as a guardian. And they're like, ah. Still don't buy it. Still don't buy it. He's like, okay, let me put it this way.
[00:26:51] It says for all. For you are all children of God through faith. Through faith in Christ Jesus. And all who have been united with Christ in baptism have put on Christ.
[00:27:05] It's like putting on new clothes.
[00:27:07] There's no longer guys. There's no longer Jews. Whoa. And Gentiles.
[00:27:14] It's not that anymore. And by the way, it's no longer what?
[00:27:19] Slave or free. You can't categorize people anymore. Also, there's no male or female.
[00:27:26] Like, only males can do this. Only females can do this. They got to do that.
[00:27:31] It's not that. For you are now all what, one? I mean, the other translation says, like, all made one in Christ Jesus. It's bigger than this.
[00:27:43] And when they still don't get it, he says this. He says, let me tell you this. Let me just tell you this. Tell me, tell me. He says. He asked him a question. He says, who? If you want to live under the law. Tell me. He says, if you want to live under the law.
[00:27:55] Do you not know? Do you know what the law actually says? Like, they're like, ah, I kind of read it. It's long.
[00:28:02] The scriptures say that Abraham had two sons. They're like, oh, we know that story. We know that story. Don't tell me it was Isaac and Ishmael. Yeah, we know that story. Okay, cool. He says it says that, right? One was from his slave wife, one was from his freeborn wife. Okay, what does that mean? He was like, well, the. The son of the slave wife was born in a human attempt to bring about the fulfillment of God's promise. They're like, yeah. Are you talking about. Yes, I am talking about that. I'm talking about how when they were waiting for, you know, you know, Isaac to be born, and they couldn't. They're like, I don't know what's going to happen. And Sarah was like, why don't you have, you know, relationship with my, you know, servant here? And she got pregnant, and Ishmael showed up. He was like, well, let me just tell you that, like, the son of the slave woman was born by your human effort.
[00:28:59] Says, but the son of the freeborn wife was born as God's own fulfillment of his promise.
[00:29:06] And now they lean in, they go, hold on. You're just. You just.
[00:29:12] You're going back to this. And there's no issues going back to this, but we gotta know what you're talking about. He goes, hey, these two women. Let me just say this. He says, these two women serve as an. What?
[00:29:25] Illustration of God's two covenants. What now? Yeah. Two covenants.
[00:29:31] It's actually two different covenants. The first woman, Hagar, represents Mount Sinai. Oh, we know Mount Sinai. We know that story. You know why? Because that is when Moses got the Ten Commandments. Yes, we remember that day. Ooh. Yes, we remember that. Let's put it up everywhere.
[00:29:53] He keeps on going, though. He goes, so. By the way, he says, the first woman, Hagar, this is the slave woman, represents Mount Sinai, where people receive the law that.
[00:30:07] What are you saying?
[00:30:10] He said, it enslaved them.
[00:30:13] It enslaved them. To make sure that you better perform, you better do right, you better be pure, and you better kill something. If you don't, you better make penance. You got to do the thing. You got to prove to God that you love him or you're not getting anything good out of him.
[00:30:33] He said that enslaves us.
[00:30:37] He says, but the other woman, this is just an illustration, says, but another woman, Sarah, represents the heavenly Jerusalem.
[00:30:47] She is the free woman.
[00:30:52] So, dear brothers and sisters, we are not children of the slain woman. We are children of the free woman.
[00:31:00] Then he ends this letter, and this is so hilarious. I just put it in there because I thought it was funny.
[00:31:05] He ends the letter, and he writes this. He says, notice that what large letters I use as I write these closing words in my own handwriting. It's terrible. We know it. Everybody knows it. Everybody knows. This is. I wrote this large letters. This is what I'm writing. Here's what he writes. He says, in all caps, he says, it doesn't matter whether you have been circumcised or not, guys. It's not about that. What counts is whether you've been what?
[00:31:37] Transformed into a new creation. What he's saying is. Listen, listen, listen. He's saying this. He's saying, guys, this Old Testament, this old covenant, you and I need to appreciate it because it's our story.
[00:31:54] It's the story of humanity.
[00:31:56] We need to appreciate it, but we can't apply it anymore.
[00:32:03] We don't have to do all these sacrifices anymore. We can't do this. Listen, we need to revisit this. And it's cool to revisit stuff, to know. To know where you've come from to revisit. I mean, to look at history and go, wow, wow. We need to Revisit it.
[00:32:19] But you know and I know we cannot repeat it.
[00:32:23] You can't repeat this.
[00:32:26] And by the way, we can learn from this.
[00:32:29] This is important stuff. We can learn from this, but we cannot leverage it.
[00:32:36] Which means we cannot go back to the Old Testament scriptures and say, well, it says, kill them all. Well, then God just says, kill them all.
[00:32:47] We can't go to the Old Testament and says, well, Jesus said in Deuteronomy, no, he didn't.
[00:32:53] No, he didn't.
[00:32:55] He said, hey, it's done. Old Testament is done. New Testament.
[00:33:01] You think the law. I've not come to abolish the law. I've come to fulfill it.
[00:33:06] In fact, what I'm telling you is, let's take the Old Testament. And here's what he does in Matthew 5. He takes pretty much the Ten Commandments and he starts listing them in a way that you've never heard. He basically said, you've heard it said, don't murder.
[00:33:23] And someone who murders, this will happen to them. I tell you, if you look at a person with anger and hatred and rage in your heart, you've already done it.
[00:33:33] They're like, let's just go back to the law.
[00:33:36] Then he goes, oh, you think this is bad? Adultery? Let's talk about. They're like, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah. No, I didn't do it. I haven't done anything. I'm good on adultery. He's like, let me just tell you. The Tanakh tells you, hey, don't commit adultery.
[00:33:51] I'm going to tell you that if you are fantasizing and lusting over people that you're not married to, you've already committed adultery. They're like, let's definitely go back to the Old Testament.
[00:34:06] That's why we go back.
[00:34:09] But when we go back, what we do is we justify treating people.
[00:34:14] We justify the lies that even the enemy tells us about who we are.
[00:34:20] We justify being okay with calling ourselves names that are not true.
[00:34:29] We call ourselves unworthy. When Jesus was like, dude, I mean, I died so you could be worthy. Why do you keep saying that?
[00:34:37] We start doing some things because we kind of go back to the Old. See, so Jesus did this really clearly. I want to tell you this. He did three major things are so important.
[00:34:46] Number one, he gave us the new covenant. So this new covenant, is this. So Jesus, he does the Old. The Last Supper, right? Right before he's gonna be killed. He sits down, he does the Old Testament stuff. The Passover is an Old Testament story. He does it. He does it? Passover meal. After the meal, he does something which you might have heard before.
[00:35:08] It says after supper, he took. This is after he did this. He says after. Now this Old Testament, old covenant is done. This ceremony.
[00:35:20] He started a new one. He said after supper, he took the cup of the wine and said, this is the what new what?
[00:35:30] Between God and his people. An agreement confirmed with my blood, which is poured out as a sacrifice for you.
[00:35:39] And then he tells these people to do this in remembrance of him. He says, this is now a new covenant, which was mind boggling to them.
[00:35:50] It's like, what you. Yeah, he says, I fulfilled this one. I'm just starting a new one. And the new one is that you don't have to pay for your sins.
[00:36:02] You don't have to sacrifice animals. You don't have to do this. No, this, this is the new covenant.
[00:36:08] Then he changes also the commandments.
[00:36:13] He goes, let me give you a new commandment. They're like, oh, we got so many.
[00:36:17] He's like, no, no, let me give you the one most important one. They're like, new commandment. Okay, what is it?
[00:36:23] So John 13, he says, so now I'm giving you a new commandment.
[00:36:29] Love each other. Oh, Jesus. We got that. Love yourself, love your neighbor as yourself. We got that. He's like, no, no, no, no, no, that was Moses writings.
[00:36:40] I got something else. What's mine. He goes, love each other just as what I have loved you. Oh, that's hard to do because my neighbor things and I just treat him just like how he is.
[00:36:58] No, you gotta love like I loved you. You should love one another. And he says, this kind of love, your love for one another, will prove to the world that you are my. What?
[00:37:10] You are my disciples. You are my disciples.
[00:37:13] Not Jewish.
[00:37:15] You are my disciples. If you do this, if you do this.
[00:37:20] New command, new covenant, new agreement, basically new commandment. And now you guys have a new mission.
[00:37:30] Oh, the mission here, according to this, was we're gonna be a great nation.
[00:37:35] We're gonna be freed. We're gonna be a great nation. And God of Israel, the God of Israel is the God, true God.
[00:37:41] And he was like, there's only one God. But let me just tell you the great commission here. Here's a great commission for you.
[00:37:49] So when he gets crucified, comes back, talks to disciples. Before he leaves again, he says this. Jesus came and told his disciples, I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth. The reason why he said this is because to a Jewish audience, this was the authority.
[00:38:08] This was under heaven and earth. This was the authority. He says, I've been given all authority. Therefore, go make disciples of the Jewish nations.
[00:38:19] No. Make disciples of what?
[00:38:22] All nations. Baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. How about Abraham, Isaac and Jacob? No good guys, but old guys.
[00:38:34] This is new.
[00:38:36] Father, Son, Holy Spirit. And then also teach them. Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands. Oh, all the commands. We got so many. No, no. All the commands. What I have given you this, not this.
[00:38:54] And guess what? I'll be sure of this. I'm with you always.
[00:38:59] Not when you do good.
[00:39:02] I'm with you always.
[00:39:04] Not in your best moments, when you make an altar and I'll do all these things and God shows up and does. No, no. I'm. I'm in your worst moments.
[00:39:14] I'm in those moments when you even hate what you did and you hate yourself. I still love you.
[00:39:21] Those moments. I'm with you always.
[00:39:24] Even to the end of this age.
[00:39:29] You are now no longer have to go to temples. You are so worthy to become one that the Holy Spirit can live inside of you.
[00:39:41] You're worthy of that.
[00:39:42] See? Whole different scenario. Could you. What would our lives look like if, yes, we appreciated the scriptures, but we actually knew what they were.
[00:39:55] We actually knew what they were.
[00:39:57] And then we go, yes, let's learn from this. Let's revisit this. Let's, let's, let's, let's, let's appreciate this, but let's apply this.
[00:40:08] Let's live this out.
[00:40:11] Right?
[00:40:13] Yeah.
[00:40:14] All right.
[00:40:16] I know for some of you it might be hard because you're like, ah. All I know is this.
[00:40:21] And I get it, I get it.
[00:40:23] But God.
[00:40:26] God will show you some things and I hope you lean in. So let's pray together.
[00:40:30] Let's pray. Lord God, we just thank you so much for this morning. We thank you for our lives. We thank you, God, that understanding your scriptures, understanding the Tanakh, understanding God, where, where humanity has kind of come from and how we've evolved and how our relationship was and what you've done for us is.
[00:40:50] It's, it's. It's good to know where we came from, but it's even better to know where we're going.
[00:40:55] So, God, I pray that we go all the way with you, God. We lean into your ways. God, Jesus, you asked us to pray in your name, so I pray in your name.
[00:41:10] I pray in your name.
[00:41:12] In your name. No other God, your name.
[00:41:18] I pray, God, that your life, your ways, your values, who you are, the kind of life you live, what principles you lived out, would shape our lives so much that it would be undeniable that we are followers of you, that we would not confuse people by any means.
[00:41:40] No, God, we would. We would. We would be people of the New covenant, the people of the Way, and it would change our lives.
[00:41:51] God, I thank you for that. I pray, God, as we respond this morning, you'd help us.
[00:41:59] Allow us to see what that means for us.
[00:42:04] In Jesus name.
[00:42:06] Thanks for listening to this message from Mosaic church in Charlotte, North Carolina.
[00:42:12] For more audio and video content, visit us at MosaicChurch TV.
