Fulfilling the law.

          I have beleived for quite some years that God is revealed to us in the simplicity and complexities of the world. Yesterday I wrote about the power of glacial movement as a witness to the power of God and to the example of fully embracing who and what God created you to be.  There is no inticate formulizing or logic involved. You have eyes to see and you see God's created world. Observe and see. Observe and learn. On the other end of the spectrum there is the incredible intracacies of physics, particles and complex mathematics. This helps us see God a bit clearer but at the same time bears witness to how much we do not know about God and how awesome God is. All of this without philosophies and circular logic so rampant in some religions. Truth should be plain to see for all of humanity.

          It is quite true also with laws. We are very adept as humans at creating laws, religions seem to have an advanced degree in law making. Jesus railed against such nonsense all the time. It wasn't that he was against laws per se but Jesus knew the intent. Just as Jesus said "The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath, Jesus might say the laws were created for man not man for the laws. How do laws affect humanity? Can we obey all the laws in some rote fashion?  By strict adherance can we be saved? Jesus said he wasn't getting rid of the law, he was fulfilling it. 

           Laws are not meant to be easy, they are a kind of cliff notes for our behaviour. Thow shall not kill is not simply about murder or taking a physical life. It is about not loving, it is about killing someone's spirit, it is about devaluing life that has been created by God; a life that God cherished at least as much as God cherishes you.  Never picking up a gun and blowing someone away is not fulfillment of the sixth commandment.

        The real meat of the laws is in those two great commandments.  How do the ten play out when you circumscribe them with the great two?  Now you have to start using your brain. You can no longer check of boxes of questionable acts you did not do. Now you have to think,  if I live by the rule "whoever dies with the most toys wins" am I living up to the first commandment?  Even if I go to church every day in my Bentley and chic clothes I think the whole point is missed and you have failed at fulfilling the law. 

         How can you fulfill the law and how have I failed at fulfilling the law? That is the question.

Matthew 5:17-20

‘Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfil. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished. Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.